In her earliest days Ri Koran, a Japanese girl, born in Manchuria, who sang and acted in Japanese and Chinese. was forced to keep her Japanese identity a secret, to become a Manchurian singer and movie star playing Chinese beauties who fell in love with brave Japanese empire builders. In U.S. occupied Tokyo, she returned to the screen as Yamaguchi Yoshiko, starring in films approved by American censors and designed to promote American-style democracy. Before long, she decided to reinvent herself yet again by moving to the United States.