biography of bruce lee in english

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Bruce Lee's Best Productivity Tricks

Bruce Lee is one of history's most productive people, which is pretty amazing considering he died at 32 years old. He was not only an action film star and martial artist, but also an instructor, screenwriter, director, and philosopher. Here's just a small bit of what we can learn from him.

Get Rid of the Unessential

Bruce Lee created Jeet Kune Do as a system of martial arts and philosophy. The basic philosophy of this system was to reduce movement and thought to just the essential actions. In Lee's words, it's to "Hack away at the unessential" because "the height of cultivation always runs on simplicity."

Lee constantly talked about efficiency, directness, and simplicity as being the "economy of motion." In his martial arts, it was about reaching the target as quickly as possible with maximum force—or to put it another way—doing it quickly, correctly, and without a lot effort.

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From a productivity point of view this is one of the basic ideas Lifehacker is founded on. Lee talked a lot about what we talk about in simplicity , focusing on the essential , and minimalism . The easiest way to make something simple? Get rid of every extraneous parts until it's just what you need. This isn't just about what you already have either—Lee was fond of telling people to absorb what they found useful and discard everything else—which in a roundabout way is a good practice productivity systems , clutter , and life advice in general.

Pay Attention to How You Interact with Others

With any type of martial art, you need to pay attention to not only yourself, but what people are doing around you. For Lee, this awareness was a foundation for looking at yourself:

Awareness is without choice, without demand, without anxiety; in that state of mind, there is perception. To know oneself is to study oneself in action with another person.

The idea that you should pay attention to how you interact with others isn't just about martial arts, of course. It's about all types of communication. From the office to your relationships , having the ability to study yourself and how you communicate will make you better at it than someone who only looks at themselves.

Balance Your "Thinking Time" and Your "Doing Time"

Depending on the type of person you are, it's often easy to go overboard with your preparation time or how much time you spend on actually doing a project. Of course, you can't do one without the other, and Lee recommends a very careful balance between thoughts and action:

When our mind is tranquil, there will be an occasional pause to its feverish activities, there will be a let-go, and it is only then in the interval between two thoughts that a flash of UNDERSTANDING — understanding, which is not thought — can take place... Balance your thoughts with action. — If you spend too much time thinking about a thing, you'll never get it done.

We've talked plenty about the idea of thinking time in all forms , but it's incredibly easy to get lost in that rabbit hole of preparation and forget to move yourself toward action. Thankfully, getting started is all it takes sometimes .

Remain Fluid

One of Lee's main goals with Jeet Kun Do was to create a system that could adapt to situations and people. To a point, this was about fluidity. Lee thought that we should all be able to function in any situation we're thrown in and that awareness of is about being able to adapt:

Empty your mind, be formless, shapeless, like water. If you put water into a cup, it becomes the cup. You put water into a bottle and it becomes the bottle. You put it in a teapot it becomes the teapot. That water can flow, or it can crash. Be water my friend.

Lee's main point here, and with a lot of his ways for living, is that we need to remain flexible as often as possible. That means adapting to situations at work and in life . It's also important to cultivate knowledge and try to see from another point of view so you can react to situations. For a lot of us, this is really about training ourselves so we're more aware of our surroundings .

What is Bruce Lee famous for?

How did bruce lee die.

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When was Bruce Lee born?

Bruce Lee was born on November 27, 1940, in San Francisco, California, United States.

Bruce Lee was renowned for his martial arts prowess and helped popularize martial arts movies in the 1970s. Lee starred in films such as Tang shan da xiong (1971), Jing wu men (1972), and Enter the Dragon (1973). Lee is often credited with changing the way Asian people were presented in American films.

What was Bruce Lee's martial art called?

Bruce Lee developed a martial art technique called jeet kune do , a blend of ancient kung fu, fencing, boxing, and philosophy, which he began teaching instead of traditional martial arts.

Bruce Lee's official cause of death was swelling of the brain caused by an allergic reaction to a headache medication, although some considered the circumstances of his death mysterious. He died in Hong Kong on July 20, 1973, six days before the release of his film Enter the Dragon there.

Read a brief summary of this topic

Bruce Lee , Chinese name Li Jun Fan , (born November 27, 1940, San Francisco, California , U.S.—died July 20, 1973, Hong Kong), American-born film actor who was renowned for his martial arts prowess and who helped popularize martial arts movies in the 1970s.

Lee was born in San Francisco , but he grew up in Hong Kong . He was introduced to the entertainment industry at an early age, as his father was an opera singer and part-time actor. The younger Lee began appearing in films as a child and was frequently cast as a juvenile delinquent or street urchin. As a teenager, he took up with local gangs and began learning kung fu to better defend himself. At that time he also started dance lessons, which further refined his footwork and balance; in 1958 Lee won the Hong Kong cha-cha championship.

USA 2006 - 78th Annual Academy Awards. Closeup of giant Oscar statue at the entrance of the Kodak Theatre in Los Angeles, California. Hompepage blog 2009, arts and entertainment, film movie hollywood

Lee’s parents were increasingly disturbed by his street fighting and run-ins with the police, and they sent him to live in the United States shortly after he turned 18. He lived with family friends in Seattle , where he finished high school and studied philosophy and drama at the University of Washington . While in Seattle he opened his first martial arts school, and in 1964 he relocated to Oakland , California, to found a second school. It was about that time that he developed his own technique— jeet kune do , a blend of ancient kung fu, fencing , boxing , and philosophy—which he began teaching instead of traditional martial arts. He drew the attention of a television producer after giving a kung fu demonstration at a Los Angeles -area karate tournament, and he was cast as the sidekick Kato in the television series The Green Hornet (1966–67).

Lee had difficulty finding acting jobs after the cancellation of The Green Hornet , and he began supplementing his income by giving private jeet kune do lessons to Hollywood stars, including Steve McQueen . In the 1969 film Marlowe , Lee received notice for a scene in which he destroyed an entire office through kickboxing and karate moves. Troubled by his inability to find other suitable roles, however, he moved back to Hong Kong in 1971. There Lee starred in two films that broke box-office records throughout Asia, and he later found success in the United States with Tang shan da xiong (1971; Fists of Fury [U.S.], or The Big Boss [Hong Kong English title]) and Jing wu men (1972; The Chinese Connection [U.S.], or Fist of Fury [Hong Kong English title]).

Lee used his sudden box-office clout to form his own production company, and he coproduced, directed, wrote, and starred in his next film, Meng long guo jiang (1972; Return of the Dragon [U.S.], or The Way of the Dragon [Hong Kong English title]). Lee’s following film, Enter the Dragon (1973), was the first joint venture between Hong Kong- and U.S.-based production companies, and it became a worldwide hit, thrusting Lee into international movie stardom. Tragically, he died six days before the film’s Hong Kong release. The mysterious circumstances of his death were a source of speculation for fans and historians, but the cause of death was officially listed as swelling of the brain caused by an allergic reaction to a headache medication. At the time, Lee had been working on a film called Game of Death , which was pieced together with stand-ins and cardboard cutouts of Lee’s face and was released in 1978.

After Lee’s death, his films gained a large cult following. Lee himself became one of the biggest pop culture icons of the 20th century, and he is often credited with changing the way Asians were presented in American films. A slightly fictionalized biopic, Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story , appeared in 1993. His son, Brandon, followed Lee into acting, and he died after being shot with a misloaded prop gun while filming The Crow (1994).

(1940-1973)

Who Was Bruce Lee?

Iconic actor, director and martial arts expert Bruce Lee was a child actor in Hong Kong who later returned to the U.S. and taught martial arts. He starred in the TV series The Green Hornet (1966-67) and became a major box office draw in The Chinese Connection and Fists of Fury . Shortly before the release of his film Enter the Dragon , he died at the age of 32 on July 20, 1973.

Lee was born Lee Jun Fan on November 27, 1940, in San Francisco, California, in both the hour and year of the Dragon. His father, Lee Hoi Chuen, a Hong Kong opera singer, moved with his wife, Grace Ho, and three children to the United States in 1939; Hoi Chuen's fourth child, a son, was born while he was on tour in San Francisco.

Lee received the name "Bruce" from a nurse at his birthing hospital, and his family never used the name during his preschool years. The future star appeared in his first film at the age of 3 months, when he served as the stand-in for an American baby in Golden Gate Girl (1941).

In the early 1940s, the Lees moved back to Hong Kong, then occupied by the Japanese. Apparently a natural in front of the camera, Lee appeared in roughly 20 films as a child actor, beginning in 1946. He also studied dance, winning Hong Kong's cha-cha competition, and would become known for his poetry as well.

As a teenager, he was taunted by British students for his Chinese background and later joined a street gang. In 1953, he began to hone his passions into a discipline, studying kung fu (referred to as "gung fu" in Cantonese) under the tutelage of Master Yip Man. By the end of the decade, Lee moved back to the U.S. to live with family friends outside Seattle, Washington, initially taking up work as a dance instructor.

Devoted Teacher

Lee finished high school in Edison, Washington, and subsequently enrolled as a philosophy major at the University of Washington. He also got a job teaching the Wing Chun style of martial arts that he had learned in Hong Kong to his fellow students and others. Through his teaching, Lee met Linda Emery, whom he married in 1964. By that time, Lee had opened his own martial arts school in Seattle.

He and Linda soon moved to California, where Lee opened two more schools in Oakland and Los Angeles. He taught mostly a style he called Jeet Kune Do, or "The Way of the Intercepting Fist." Lee was said to have deeply loved being an instructor and treated his students like a clan, ultimately choosing the world of cinema as a career so as not to unduly commercialize teaching.

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Lee gained a measure of celebrity with his role in the television series The Green Hornet , which aired in 26 episodes from 1966 to '67. In the show, which was based on a 1930s radio program, the wiry Lee displayed his acrobatic and theatrical fighting style as the Hornet's sidekick, Kato. He went on to make guest appearances in such TV shows as Ironside and Longstreet , while a notable film role came in 1969's Marlowe , starring James Garner as the notable detective created by Raymond Chandler. (The screenwriter for the film, Stirling Silliphant, was one of Lee's martial arts students. Other Lee students included James Coburn, Steve McQueen and Garner himself.)

Lee, who was devoted to a variety of workouts and physical training activities, suffered a major back injury that he gradually recovered from, taking time for self-care and writing. He also came up with the idea that became the basis for the Buddhist monk TV series Kung Fu ; however, David Carradine would get the starring role initially slated for Lee due to the belief that an Asian actor wouldn't pull in audiences as the lead. Confronted with a dearth of meaty roles and the prevalence of stereotypes regarding Asian performers, Lee left Los Angeles for Hong Kong in the summer of 1971.

Breaking Box Office Records

Lee signed a two-film contract, eventually bringing his family over to Hong Kong as well. The Big Boss , aka Fists of Fury in the U.S., was released in 1971 and featured Lee as the factory worker hero who has sworn off fighting yet enters combat to confront a murderous drug smuggling operation. Combining his smooth Jeet Kune Do athleticism with the high-energy theatrics of his performance in The Green Hornet , Lee was the charismatic center of the film, which set new box office records in Hong Kong.

Those records were broken by Lee's next film, Fist of Fury , aka The Chinese Connection (1972), which, like The Big Boss , received poor reviews from some critics upon the U.S. release.

By the end of 1972, Lee was a major movie star in Asia. He had co-founded with Raymond Chow his own company, Concord Productions, and had released his first directorial feature, Return of the Dragon . Though he had not yet gained stardom in America, he was poised on the brink with his first major Hollywood project, Enter the Dragon .

Mysterious Death

On July 20, 1973, just one month before the premiere of Enter the Dragon , Lee died in Hong Kong , China, at the age of 32. The official cause of his sudden and utterly unexpected death was a brain edema, found in an autopsy to have been caused by a strange reaction to a prescription painkiller he was reportedly taking for a back injury. Controversy surrounded Lee's death from the beginning, as some claimed he had been murdered. There was also the belief that he might have been cursed, a conclusion driven by Lee's obsession with his own early death.

More rumors of the so-called curse circulated in 1993, when Brandon Lee was killed under mysterious circumstances during the filming of The Crow . The 28-year-old actor was fatally shot with a gun that supposedly contained blanks but somehow had a live round lodged deep within its barrel.

With the posthumous release of Enter the Dragon , Lee's status as a film icon was confirmed. The film, said to have a budget of $1 million, went on to gross more than $200 million. Lee's legacy helped pave the way for broader depictions of Asian Americans in cinema and created a whole new breed of action hero -- a mold filled with varying degrees of success by actors like Chuck Norris, Jean-Claude Van Damme, Steven Seagal and Jackie Chan.

Lee's life has been depicted in the 1993 film Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story , based on the 1975 Linda Lee memoir Bruce Lee: The Man Only I Knew , and the 2009 documentary How Bruce Lee Changed the World . And in the summer of 2013, the Hong Kong Heritage Museum opened the exhibition "Bruce Lee: Kung Fu. Art. Life."

Lee's legacy as a premier martial artist continues to be revered as well. Daughter Shannon Lee was largely involved in the 2011 update of her father's instructional guide Tao of Jeet Kune Do .

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Bruce Jun Fan Lee (Lee Siu Loong) was born in 1940 in San Francisco, CA while his parents were on tour with the Chinese Opera. Ultimately raised in Hong Kong, Bruce Lee was a child actor appearing in more than 20 films. At the age of 13, Bruce took up the study of wing chun gung fu under renowned wing chun master, Yip Man.

Bruce left Hong Kong at the age of 18, came to the United States and made his way to Seattle, Washington where he worked in the restaurant of a family friend. He soon enrolled in the University of Washington where he pursued a degree in philosophy. Bruce began to teach gung fu in Seattle and soon opened his first school, the Jun Fan Gung Fu Institute. Two more schools followed in Oakland and Los Angeles. Concurrently Bruce married his wife, Linda and had his two children, Brandon and Shannon. In the mid sixties, Bruce was discovered while doing an exhibition at the Long Beach Internationals and a role as Kato in the tv series The Green Hornet soon followed. During this time, Bruce was also developing his own martial art, which he ultimately named Jeet Kune Do (translated: the way of the intercepting fist ).

Bruce's art was steeped in a philosophical foundation and did not follow long held martial traditions. Instead it had at its core the ideas of simplicity, directness and personal freedom. After The Green Hornet series was canceled, Bruce encountered resistance while working in Hollywood and so headed to Hong Kong to pursue a film career. In Hong Kong he made 3 films, which consecutively broke all box office records and showcased martial arts in an entirely new way. Hollywood took notice and soon Bruce was making the first Hollywood / Hong Kong coproduction with a film called Enter the Dragon . Unfortunately, Bruce Lee died in 1973 before this film was released. This film catapulted him to international fame. Today Bruce Lee’s legacy of self expression, equality, and pioneering innovation continues to inspire people all around the world.

At the age of three months, Lee Hoi Chuen, his wife Grace and baby Bruce returned to Hong Kong where Bruce would be raised until the age of 18. Bruce’s most prominent memory of his early years was the occupation of Hong Kong by the Japanese during World War II (1941-1945). At the age of 13, Bruce was introduced to Master Yip Man, a teacher of the Wing Chun style of gung fu. For five years Bruce studied diligently and became very proficient. He greatly revered Yip Man as a master teacher and wise man and frequently visited with him in later years.

In high school, one of Bruce’s accomplishments was winning an interschool Boxing Championship against an English student in which the Marquis of Queensbury rules were followed and no kicking was allowed. Bruce was also a terrific dancer, and in 1958 he won the Hong Kong Cha Cha Championship. He studied dancing as assiduously as he did gung fu, keeping a notebook in which he had noted 108 different cha cha steps. In addition to his studies, gung fu and dancing, Bruce was also a child actor under the tutelage of his father who must have known from an early age that Bruce had a streak of showmanship. By the time he was 18, he had appeared in 20 films.

At the age of 18, Bruce was looking for new vistas in his life, as were his parents who were discouraged that Bruce had gotten into some trouble fighting and had not made more progress academically. In April of 1959, with $100 in his pocket, Bruce boarded a steamship in the American Presidents Line and began his voyage to San Francisco.

Bruce did not stay long in San Francisco, but traveled to Seattle where a family friend, Ruby Chow, had a restaurant and had promised Bruce a job and living quarters. By now Bruce had left his acting and dancing passions behind and was intent on furthering his education. He enrolled at Edison Technical School where he fulfilled the requirements for the equivalent of high school graduation and then enrolled at the University of Washington. At the university, Bruce majored in philosophy. His passion for gung fu inspired a desire to delve into the philosophical underpinnings and many of his written essays during those years would relate philosophical principles to certain martial arts techniques.

In the three years that Bruce studied at the university, he supported himself by teaching gung fu, having by this time given up working in the restaurant, stuffing newspapers or various other odd jobs. The small circle of friends that Bruce was teaching encouraged him to open a real school of gung fu and charge a nominal sum for teaching in order to support himself while attending school. One of his students in 1963 was a freshman at the University of Washington, Linda Emery. Linda knew who Bruce was from his guest lectures in Chinese philosophy at Garfield High School where she had been a student, and in the summer after graduating, at the urging of her Chinese girlfriend, Sue Ann Kay, Linda started taking gung fu lessons.

Bruce and Linda were married in 1964. By this time, Bruce had decided to make a career out of teaching gung fu. Leaving his Seattle school in the hands of Taky Kimura, Bruce and Linda moved to Oakland where Bruce opened his second school with James Lee.

Having now been in the United States for five years, Bruce had left behind any thought of acting as a career, and devoted himself completely to his choice of martial arts as a profession. In 1964 Bruce was challenged by some gung fu men from San Francisco who objected to his teaching of non-Chinese students. Bruce accepted the challenge and the men arrived at the kwoon in Oakland on the appointed day for the face off. The terms were that if Bruce were defeated, he would stop teaching the non Chinese. It was a short fight with his opponent giving up when Bruce had him pinned to the floor. Even though he had won, he was winded and discouraged about his inability to put the man away in under three minutes. This marked a turning point for Bruce in his exploration of his martial art and the enhancement of his physical fitness. Thus began the evolution of Jeet Kune Do.

Just as Bruce was cementing his plans to expand his martial arts schools, fate stepped in to move his life in another direction. In August of 1964, Ed Parker, widely regarded as the father of American Kenpo, invited Bruce to Long Beach, CA to give a demonstration at his First International Karate Tournament. A member of the audience was Jay Sebring, a well-known hair stylist to the stars. Jay told his producer client, William Dozier, about having seen this spectacular young Chinese man giving a gung fu demonstration just a few nights before. Mr. Dozier obtained a copy of the film that was taken at Ed Parker’s tournament. The next week he called Bruce at home in Oakland and invited him to come to Los Angeles for a screen test.

About this time things were changing in Bruce’s personal life as well. His own number one son, Brandon Bruce Lee, was born February 1, 1965. One week later Bruce’s father, Lee Hoi Chuen, died in Hong Kong. Bruce was pleased that his father had known about the birth of the first grandchild in the Lee family. Bruce was in a period of transition at this time, deciding whether to make acting his career or continue on the path of opening nationwide schools of gung fu. His decision was to focus on acting and see if he could turn it into a productive career, which showcased his passion for the martial arts. Bruce loved to teach gung fu, and he loved his students. However, he had begun to see that if his schools became more numerous, he would lose control of the quality of the teaching. His love for martial arts was such that he did not wish to dilute the quality with which he approached it.

The years between 1967 and 1971 were lean years for the Lee family. Bruce worked hard at furthering his acting career and did get some roles in a few TV series and films. (See Filmography) To support the family, Bruce taught private lessons in Jeet Kune Do, often to people in the entertainment industry. Some of his clients included Steve McQueen, James Coburn, Stirling Silliphant, Sy Weintraub, Ted Ashley, Joe Hyams, James Garner, Kareem Abdul Jabbar and others. One more blessing was the arrival of a daughter, Shannon Emery Lee, on April 19, 1969. She brought great joy into the Lee household and soon had her daddy around her little finger. During this time Bruce continued the process he had started in Oakland in 1964, the evolution of his way of martial arts, which he called Jeet Kune Do, “The Way of The Intercepting Fist.”

Bruce was devoted to physical culture and trained devotedly. It was actually his zealousness that led to an injury that was to become a chronic source of pain for the rest of his life. On a day in 1970, without warming up, something he always did, Bruce picked up a 125-pound barbell and did a “good morning” exercise severely injuring his back. After much pain and many tests, it was determined that he had sustained an injury to the fourth sacral nerve. He was ordered to complete bed rest and told that undoubtedly he would never do gung fu again. For the next six months, Bruce stayed in bed. It was an extremely frustrating, depressing and painful time, and a time to redefine goals. It was also during this time that he did a great deal of the writing that has been preserved. After several months, Bruce instituted his own recovery program and began walking, gingerly at first, and gradually built up his strength.

In 1970, when Bruce was getting his strength back from his back injury, he took a trip to Hong Kong with son Brandon, age five. Hong Kong producer Raymond Chow contacted Bruce to interest him in doing two films for Golden Harvest. Bruce decided to do it, reasoning that if he couldn’t enter the front door of the American studios, he would go to Hong Kong, establish himself there and come back in through the side door.

In the summer of 1971, Bruce left Los Angeles to fly to Hong Kong, then on to Thailand for the making of “The Big Boss,” later also called “Fists of Fury.” Although the working conditions were difficult, and the production quality substandard to what Bruce was accustomed, “The Big Boss” was a huge success.

In September of 1971, with filming set to commence on the second of the contractual films, Bruce moved his family over to Hong Kong. “Fist of Fury,” also called “Chinese Connection” was an even bigger success than the first film breaking all-time box office records. Now that Bruce had completed his contract with Golden Harvest, and had become a bankable commodity, he could begin to have more input into the quality of his films. For the third film, he formed a partnership with Raymond Chow, called Concord Productions. Not only did Bruce write “The Way of the Dragon,” also called “Return of the Dragon,” but he directed and produced it as well. Once again, the film broke records and now, Hollywood was listening.

In the fall of 1972, Bruce began filming “The Game of Death,” a story he once again envisioned. The filming was interrupted by the culmination of a deal with Warner Bros. to make the first ever Hong Kong-American co-production. The deal was facilitated mainly by Bruce’s personal relationship with Warner Bros. president, Ted Ashley and by Bruce’s successes in Hong Kong. It was an exciting moment and a turning point in Hong Kong’s film industry. “The Game of Death” was put on hold to make way for the filming of “Enter the Dragon.”

“Enter the Dragon” was due to premier at Hollywood’s Chinese theater in August of 1973. Unfortunately, Bruce would not live to see the opening of his film. On July 20, 1973, Bruce had a minor headache. He was offered a prescription painkiller called Equagesic. After taking the pill, he went to lie down and lapsed into a coma. He was unable to be revived. Extensive forensic pathology was done to determine the cause of his death, which was not immediately apparent. A nine-day coroner’s inquest was held with testimony given by renowned pathologists flown in from around the world. The determination was that Bruce had a hypersensitive reaction to an ingredient in the pain medication that caused a swelling of the fluid on the brain, resulting in a coma and death.

The world lost a brilliant star and an evolved human being that day. His spirit remains an inspiration to untold numbers of people around the world.

Overview (4)

Mini bio (1).

Bruce Lee remains the greatest icon of martial arts cinema and a key figure of modern popular media. Had it not been for Bruce Lee and his movies in the early 1970s, it's arguable whether or not the martial arts film genre would have ever penetrated and influenced mainstream North American and European cinema and audiences the way it has over the past four decades. The influence of East Asian martial arts cinema can be seen today in so many other film genres including comedies, action, drama, science fiction, horror and animation... and they all have their roots in the phenomenon that was Bruce Lee. Lee was born Lee Jun Fan November 27, 1940 in San Francisco, the son of Lee Hoi Chuen, a singer with the Cantonese Opera. Approximately one year later, the family returned to Kowloon in Hong Kong and at the age of five, a young Bruce begins appearing in children's roles in minor films including The Birth of Mankind (1946) and Fu gui fu yun (1948). At the age of 12, Bruce commenced attending La Salle College. Bruce was later beaten up by a street gang, which inspired him to take up martial arts training under the tutelage of Sifu Yip Man who schooled Bruce in wing chun kung fu for a period of approximately five years. This was the only formalized martial arts training ever undertaken by Lee. The talented and athletic Bruce also took up cha-cha dancing and, at age 18, won a major dance championship in Hong Kong. However, his temper and quick fists got him in trouble with the Hong Kong police on numerous occasions. His parents suggested that he head off to the United States. Lee landed in San Francisco's Chinatown in 1959 and worked in a close relative's restaurant. He eventually made his way to Seattle, Washington, where he enrolled at university to study philosophy and found the time to practice his beloved kung fu techniques. In 1963, Lee met Linda Lee Cadwell (aka Linda Emery) (later his wife) and also opened his first kung fu school at 4750 University Way. During the early half of the 1960s, Lee became associated with many key martial arts figures in the United States, including kenpo karate expert Ed Parker and tae kwon do master Jhoon Rhee . He made guest appearances at notable martial arts events including the Long Beach Nationals. Through one of these tournaments Bruce met Hollywood hair-stylist Jay Sebring who introduced him to television producer William Dozier . Based on the runaway success of Batman (1966), Dozier was keen to bring the cartoon character the Green Hornet to television and was on the lookout for an East Asian actor to play the Green Hornet's sidekick, Kato. Around this time Bruce also opened a second kung fu school in Oakland, California and relocated to Oakland to be closer to Hollywood. Bruce's screen test was successful, and The Green Hornet (1966) starring Van Williams aired in 1966-1967 with mixed success. His fight scenes were sometimes obscured by unrevealing camera angles, but his dedication was such that he insisted his character behave like a perfect bodyguard, keeping his eyes on whoever might be a threat to his employer except when the script made this impossible. The show was canceled after only one season (twenty-six episodes), but by this time Lee was receiving more fan mail than the series' nominal star. He then opened a third branch of his kung fu school in Los Angeles and began providing personalized martial arts training to celebrities including film stars Steve McQueen and James Coburn as well as screenwriter Stirling Silliphant . In addition he refined his prior knowledge of wing chun and incorporated aspects of other fighting styles such as traditional boxing and Okinawan karate. He also developed his own unique style Jeet Kune Do (Way of the Intercepting Fist). Another film opportunity then came his way as he landed the small role of a stand over man named Winslow Wong who intimidates private eye James Garner in Marlowe (1969). Wong pays a visit to Garner and proceeds to demolish the investigator's office with his fists and feet, finishing off with a spectacular high kick that shatters the light fixture. With this further exposure of his talents, Bruce then scored several guest appearances as a martial arts instructor to blind private eye James Franciscus on the television series Longstreet (1971). With his minor success in Hollywood and money in his pocket, Bruce returned for a visit to Hong Kong and was approached by film producer Raymond Chow who had recently started Golden Harvest productions. Chow was keen to utilize Lee's strong popularity amongst young Chinese fans, and offered him the lead role in The Big Boss (1971). In it, Lee plays a distant cousin coming to join relatives working at an ice house, where murder, corruption, and drug-running lead to his character's adventures and display of Kung-Fu expertise. The film was directed by Wei Lo , shot in Thailand on a very low budget and in terrible living conditions for cast and crew. However, when it opened in Hong Kong the film was an enormous hit. Chow knew he had struck box office gold with Lee and quickly assembled another script entitled Fist of Fury (1972). The second film (with a slightly bigger budget) was again directed by Wei Lo and was set in Shanghai in the year 1900, with Lee returning to his school to find that his beloved master has been poisoned by the local Japanese karate school. Once again he uncovers the evildoers and sets about seeking revenge on those responsible for murdering his teacher and intimidating his school. The film features several superb fight sequences and, at the film's conclusion, Lee refuses to surrender to the Japanese police and seemingly leaps to his death in a hail of police bullets. Once more, Hong Kong streets were jammed with thousands of fervent Chinese movie fans who could not get enough of the fearless Bruce Lee, and his second film went on to break the box office records set by the first! Lee then set up his own production company, Concord Productions, and set about guiding his film career personally by writing, directing and acting in his next film, The Way of the Dragon (1972). A bigger budget meant better locations and opponents, with the new film set in Rome, Italy and additionally starring hapkido expert In-shik Hwang , karate legend Robert Wall and seven-time U.S. karate champion Chuck Norris . Bruce plays a seemingly simple country boy sent to assist at a cousin's restaurant in Rome and finds his cousins are being bullied by local thugs for protection. By now, Lee's remarkable success in East Asia had come to the attention of Hollywood film executives and a script was hastily written pitching him as a secret agent penetrating an island fortress. Warner Bros. financed the film and also insisted on B-movie tough guy John Saxon starring alongside Lee to give the film wider appeal. The film culminates with another show-stopping fight sequence between Lee and the key villain, Han, in a maze of mirrors. Shooting was completed in and around Hong Kong in early 1973 and in the subsequent weeks Bruce was involved in completing overdubs and looping for the final cut. Various reports from friends and co-workers cite that he was not feeling well during this period and on July 20, 1973 he lay down at the apartment of actress Betty Ting Pei after taking a headache medicine called Equagesic and was later unable to be revived. A doctor was called and Lee was taken to hospital by ambulance and pronounced dead that evening. The official finding was death due to a cerebral edema, caused by a reaction to the headache tablet Equagesic. Fans worldwide were shattered that their virile idol had passed at such a young age, and nearly thirty thousand fans filed past his coffin in Hong Kong. A second, much smaller ceremony was held in Seattle, Washington and Bruce was laid to rest at Lake View Cemetary in Seattle with pall bearers including Steve McQueen , James Coburn and Dan Inosanto . Enter the Dragon (1973) was later released in the mainland United States, and was a huge hit with audiences there, which then prompted National General films to actively distribute his three prior movies to U.S. theatres... each was a box office smash. Fans throughout the world were still hungry for more Bruce Lee films and thus remaining footage (completed before his death) of Lee fighting several opponents including Dan Inosanto , Hugh O'Brian and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar was crafted into another film titled Game of Death (1978). The film used a lookalike and shadowy camera work to be substituted for the real Lee in numerous scenes. The film is a poor addition to the line-up and is only saved by the final twenty minutes and the footage of the real Bruce Lee battling his way up the tower. Amazingly, this same shoddy process was used to create Game of Death II (1980), with a lookalike and more stunt doubles interwoven with a few brief minutes of footage of the real Bruce Lee. Tragically, his son Brandon Lee , an actor and martial artist like his father, was killed in a freak accident on the set of The Crow (1994). Bruce Lee was not only an amazing athlete and martial artist but he possessed genuine superstar charisma and through a handful of films he left behind an indelible impression on the tapestry of modern cinema.

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Bruce Lee Biography

Born: November 27, 1940 San Francisco, California Died: July 20, 1973 Hong Kong American actor and martial arts master

Actor and martial arts expert Bruce Lee combined the Chinese fighting art of kung fu with the grace of a ballet dancer. He helped make kung fu films a new art form before his sudden and mysterious death in 1973.

The "strong one"

In 1939 Lee Hoi Chuen, a Chinese opera singer, brought his wife Grace and three children from Hong Kong to San Francisco, California, while he performed in the United States. On November 27, 1940, the Lees had another son. His mother called the boy Bruce because the name meant "strong one" in Gaelic. His first film appearance, at the age of three months, was in Golden Gate Girl (1941). Although Hong Kong was occupied by Japanese troops, the Lees then decided to return home, where Lee's film appearances continued, numbering around twenty by the time he graduated from high school.

As a teenager Lee was both a dancer, winning a cha-cha championship, and a gang member, risking death on the Hong Kong streets. To improve his fighting skills, he studied the Chinese martial arts of kung fu. He absorbed the style called wing chun, which was developed by a woman named Yim Wing Chun, and he began adding his own improvements. Lee's film career continued, and he was offered a large contract. But when he got into trouble with the police for fighting, his mother sent him to the United States to live with friends of the family.

Teacher and actor

After finishing high school in Edison, Washington, Lee enrolled at the University of Washington, supporting himself by giving dance lessons and waiting tables. While teaching kung fu to fellow students, he met Linda Emery, whom he married in 1964. Lee developed a new fighting style called jeet kune do and opened three schools on the West Coast to teach it. He also landed a part in the television series The Green Hornet as Kato, the Hornet's assistant. Kato used a dramatic fighting style quite unlike that which Lee taught in his schools. The show was cancelled after one season, but fans would long remember Lee's role.

Lee went on to appear on shows such as Longstreet and Ironside and in the film Marlowe (1969), playing a high-kicking villain. Unhappy with the number and quality of roles available to Asian Americans in Hollywood, Lee and his family, including son Brandon and daughter Shannon, moved back to Hong Kong in 1971. Lee soon released the movie known to U.S. audiences as Fists of Fury. The story, featuring Lee as a fighter seeking revenge on those who had killed his kung fu master, was not very original, but with his graceful movements, his good looks and charm, and his acting ability, Lee was a star in the making.

Sudden death

Fists of Fury set box-office records in Hong Kong that were broken only by Lee's next film, The Chinese Connection (1972). Lee established his own film company, Concord Pictures, and began directing movies. The first of these would appear in the United States as Way of the Dragon. Lee was excited about his future. He told a journalist, "I hope to make … the kind of movie where you can just watch the surface story, if you like, or can look deeper into it." Unfortunately, on July 20, 1973, three weeks before his fourth film, Enter the Dragon, was released in the United States, Lee died suddenly.

The official cause of Lee's death was brain swelling as a reaction to aspirin he had taken for a back injury. But there were rumors that he had been poisoned by either the Chinese mafia or powerful members of the Hong Kong film industry. Others said that Lee's purchase of a house in Hong Kong had angered neighborhood demons, who then placed a curse on him to last for three generations. This theory was revived on June 18, 1993, when Lee's son Brandon also died under strange circumstances. While filming the movie The Crow, he was shot by a gun that was supposed to contain only blanks (which produce the appearance of a gunshot but cause no bullet to be fired) but in fact had a live round in its chamber.

Bruce Lee. Reproduced by permission of Archive Photos, Inc.

Bruce Lee's movies, though few in number, created a new art form. By the 1990s Enter the Dragon alone had earned more than $100 million, and Lee's influence could be found in the work of many Hollywood action heroes such as Jean-Claude Van Damme, Steven Seagal, and Jackie Chan. In 1993 Jason Scott Lee (no relation) appeared in Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story.

For More Information

Bleecker, Tom. Unsettled Matters: The Life and Death of Bruce Lee. Lompoc, CA: Gilderoy Publications, 1996.

Clouse, Robert. Bruce Lee: The Biography. Burbank, CA: Unique Publications, 1988.

Hoffman, Charles. Bruce Lee, Brandon Lee, and the Dragon's Curse. New York: Random House, 1995.

Jahn, Michael. Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story. New York: Jove Books, 1993.

Lee, Bruce. Bruce Lee: Artist of Life. Compiled and edited by John Little. Boston: Tuttle, 1999.

Roensch, Greg. Bruce Lee. New York: Rosen Pub. Group, 2002.

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Film and Television: Biographies

At the time of his sudden and mysterious death in 1973, actor and martial arts expert Bruce Lee (1940-1973) was on the verge of international super-stardom. Rooted strongly in both Oriental and Western cultures, Lee brought to the ancient Chinese fighting art of kung fu the grace of a ballet dancer. He was an actor as well, and infused his performances with humor and a dramatic sensibility that assured a place for king fu films as a new form of cinematic art.

Raised in San Francisco , California, Hong Kong , and Seattle, Washington, Lee had gained his first American audience with a groundbreaking role on the 1966-67 television series The Green Hornet. Eager to challenge Hollywood's stereotypical images of Asian Americans , he returned to Hong Kong and ultimately developed his own style of kung fu. On the strength of his film, Enter the Dragon (1973), Lee returned to the attention of American audiences and posthumously ushered in a new era of cinematic art. Stars such as David Carradine, Chuck Norris, Jean-Claude Van Damme, Steven Seagal, and fellow Hong Kong martial artist Jackie Chan would follow his example, making Lee the father of an enduring style of action hero.

The "Strong One"

In 1939 Lee's father, a popular Chinese opera star, brought his wife and three children with him from Hong Kong to San Francisco while he toured the United States as a performer. At the end of the following year, on November 27, 1940, another son was born to the Lees. In accordance with Chinese tradition, they had not named him, as his father was away in New York ; therefore the mother took the advice of her physician and called the boy Bruce because it meant "strong one" in Gaelic. Lee reportedly had a number of Chinese names, but it would be by the name of Bruce that he would become famous.

Stardom began early, with his first film appearance at age three months in a movie called Golden Gate Girl. By then it was 1941, and though their native Hong Kong was occupied by Japanese troops, the Lees decided to return home. According to Chinese superstition, demons sometimes try to steal male children. Out of fear for the young boy's safety, they dressed him as a girl, and even made him attend a girl's school for a while. Meanwhile Lee grew up around the cinema, and appeared in a Hong Kong movie when he was four. Two years later, a director recognized his star quality and put him in another film. By the time he graduated from high school, Lee had appeared in some twenty films.

As a teenager, he became involved in two seemingly contradictory activities: gang warfare and dance. As a dancer he won a cha-cha championship, and as a gang member he risked death on the streets of Hong Kong. Out of fear that he might be caught at some point without his gang, helpless before a group of rivals, Lee began to study the Chinese martial arts of kung fu. The style that attracted his attention was called wing chun, which according to legend was developed by a woman named Yim Wing Chun, who improved on the techniques of a Shaolin Buddhist nun. Lee absorbed the style, and began adding his own improvements. This proved too much for the wing chun masters, who excommunicated him from the school.

Lee's film career continued, and he was becoming a popular actor in the Hong Kong film scene. Producer Run Run Shaw offered the high schooler a lucrative contract, and Lee wanted to take it. But when he got into trouble with the police for fighting, his mother sent him to the United States to live with friends of the family.

Teacher and Actor

Lee finished high school in Edison, Washington, near Seattle. He then enrolled as a philosophy major at the University of Washington, where he supported himself by giving dance lessons and waiting tables at a Chinese restaurant. As a kung fu teacher instructing fellow university students, he met Linda Emery, whom he married in 1964.

The newlyweds moved to California, and Lee-who had begun developing a new fighting style called jeet kune do-ultimately opened three schools in Los Angeles , Oakland, California, and Seattle. He also began to pursue his acting more seriously, and landed a part in the TV series The Green Hornet. The show was based on a 1930s radio program, and Lee played the role of the Hornet's Asian assistant, Kato. He virtually created the role, imbuing Kato with a theatrical fighting style quite unlike that which Lee taught in his schools. The show would be cancelled after one season, but fans would long remember Lee's role.

After the end of The Green Hornet, Lee made guest appearances on TV shows such as Longstreet and Ironside. His most notable role during this time was in the film Marlowe (1969) with James Garner, when he played a memorable part as a high-kicking villain. Clearly Lee had the qualities of a star; but it was just as clear that an Asian American faced limitations within the Hollywood system, which tended to cast Oriental actors in stereotypical roles. Therefore in 1971, the Lees, including son Brandon (born 1965), and daughter Shannon (born 1967) moved to Hong Kong.

Dramatic Rise, Tragic End

Back in Hong Kong, Lee soon signed a two-film contract, and released the movie known to U.S. audiences as Fists of Fury late in 1971. The story, which featured Lee as a fighter seeking revenge on those who had killed his kung fu master, was not original in itself; but the presentation of it was, and the crucial element was Lee. He combined the smooth, flowing style of jeet kune do that he taught in his schools with the loud, aggressive, and highly theatrical methods he had employed as Kato. With the graceful, choreographic qualities of his movements; his good looks and charm; his sense of humor and his acting ability, Lee was one of a kind-a star in the making.

Fists of Fury set box-office records in Hong Kong which were broken only by his next picture, The Chinese Connection, in 1972. Lee established his own film company, Concord Pictures, and began directing movies. The first of these would appear in the U.S. as Way of the Dragon. Lee was enthusiastic about his future, not merely as a performer, but as an artist: "With any luck, " he told a journalist shortly before his death, "I hope to make … the kind of movie where you can just watch the surface story, if you like, or can look deeper into it." Unfortunately, Lee would not live to explore his full potential as a filmmaker: on July 20, 1973, three weeks before his fourth film, Enter the Dragon, was released in the United States, he died suddenly.

Lee's death became a source of controversy. Officially the cause of death was brain swelling as a reaction to aspirin he had taken for a back injury. But the suddenness of his passing, combined with his youth, his good health, and the bizarre timing on the verge of his explosion as an international superstar, spawned rumors that he had been killed by hit men. Some speculated he had run afoul of the Chinese mafia and other powerful interests in the Hong Kong film industry, and had been poisoned. Throughout his life, Lee had been obsessed by fears of his early death, and some believed that the brilliant young star had some sort of bizarre "curse" on him.

According to legend and rumor, when Lee bought a house in Hong Kong shortly before his death, he incurred the wrath of the neighborhood's resident demons. The curse is said to last for three generation. Tragically, the notion of a curse gained eerie credence on June 18, 1993-a month and two days before the 20th anniversary of Lee's death-when Brandon Lee died under equally strange circumstances. While filming a scene for the movie The Crow, he was shot by a gun that supposedly contained blanks but in fact had a live round lodged in its chamber. Like his father, Brandon Lee was on the verge of stardom.

Lee gave the world an enormous artistic legacy, in the process virtually creating a new cinematic art form. By the 1990s, Enter the Dragon alone had grossed more than $100 million, and Lee's influence could be found in the work of numerous Hollywood action heroes. In 1993, Jason Scott Lee (no relation) appeared in Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story, directed by Rob Cohen. Actress Lauren Holly played Lee's wife Linda, and Holly became friends with Lee's daughter Shannon.

Shannon Lee once told People that she had not inherited any of her father's or brother's fighting abilities. Although she became host of a TV show featuring martial arts competitions, she has said in most respects she was quite unlike her father.

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Nationality: American. Born: Lee Yuen Kam in San Francisco , California, 27 November 1940, of Chinese parents. Education: Attended the University of Washington, Seattle. Family: Married Linda (Lee), son the actor Brandon Lee (deceased). Career: Lived in Hong Kong as a child, and made a number of films as a child actor; appeared as Kato in the Green Hornet TV series, 1966–67, and also in Batman , Ironside , Blondie , and Longstreet series, usually as a karate practitioner or teacher; from 1971, associated with series of kung-fu films made in Hong Kong ; he directed one himself (released posthumously). Died: In Hong Kong, 20 July 1973.

Films as Actor:

(as Lee Siu Lung)

The Birth of Mankind

My Son A-Chen

A Mother's Tears ; Blame It on Father ; Countless Families ( A Myriad Homes )

In the Face of Demolition

An Orphan's Tragedy ; We Owe It to Our Children ; Orphan's Song

Those Wise Guys Who Fool Around ; Too Late for Divorce

Thunderstorm

The Orphan ( The Orphan Ah-Sam )

A Goose Alone in the World

(as Bruce Lee )

Marlowe (Bogart) (as Winslow Wong)

Fists of Fury ( The Big Boss ) (Lo Wei) (as Chen)

The Chinese Connection ( Fist of Fury ) (Lo Wei) (as Chen Chen)

Enter the Dragon ( The Deadly Three ) (Clouse) (as Lee); The Unicorn Fist

Kato and the Green Hornet (compilation of three Green Hornet episodes) (as Kato)

Game of Death ( Bruce Lee 's Game of Death ) (Clouse) (as Billy Lo)

The Best of the Martial Arts Films (Weintraub—compilation)

Film as Actor, Director, and Scriptwriter:

Return of the Dragon ( The Way of the Dragon ) (as Tang Lung)

Other Films:

The Wrecking Crew (Karlson) (karate adviser)

Circle of Iron ( The Silent Flute ) (co-story)

Publications

By lee: books—.

Chinese Gung Fu: The Philosophical Art of Self Defense , Oakland, California, 1965.

Tao of Jeet Kune Do , Burbank, California, 1975.

Bruce Lee's Fighting Method: Advanced Techniques , with M. Uyehara, Burbank, California, 1977.

Bruce Lee's Fighting Method: Basic Training , with M. Uyehara, Burbank, California, 1977.

The Art of Expressing the Human Body , Boston, 1998.

Letters of the Dragon: an Anthology of Bruce Lee's Correspondence with Family, Frieds & Fans, 1958–1973, Boston, 1998.

Bruce Lee: Artist of Life: Vol. 6 , Boston, 1999.

By LEE: articles—

"Bruce Lee: The Final Screen Test," interview with C. Golden, in Interview ( New York ), November 1974.

Interview with Liu Chia-Liang, in Cahiers du Cinéma (Paris), September 1984.

On LEE: books—

Block, Alex Ben, The Legend of Bruce Lee , New York , 1974.

Bruce Lee, King of Kung Fu , edited by Lynne Waites, London, 1974.

Dennis, Felix, Bruce Lee, King of Kung Fu , London, 1974.

Lee, Linda, Bruce Lee: The Only Man I Knew , New York, 1975.

Château, René, Bruce Lee: La Légende du petit dragon , Paris, 1976.

Clouse, Robert, Bruce Lee: The Biography , Burbank, California, 1988.

Uyehara, M., Bruce Lee: The Incomparable Fighter , Burbank, California, 1988.

Lee, Linda, and Tom Bleecker, The Bruce Lee Story , Burbank, California, 1989.

Thomas, Bruce, Bruce Lee , New York, 1993.

Chunovic, Louis, Bruce Lee: The Tao of the Dragon Warrior , New York, 1996.

Little, John R., Bruce Lee: Words of a Master , Lincolnwood, 1998.

Crompton, Paul, Bruce Lee Anthology: Films & Fighting , Paul H. Crompton, Ltd., 1999.

Bishop, James, Remembering Bruce: The Enduring Legend of the Martial Arts Superstar , Nipomo, 1999.

Tagliaferro, Linda, Bruce Lee , Minneapolis, 2000.

Little, John, editor, Bruce Lee's Striking Thoughts , Boston, 2000.

On LEE: articles—

Flanigan, B. P., "Kung Fu Krazy, or The Invasion of the 'Chop Suey Easterns'," in Cineaste (New York), vol. 6, no. 3, 1974.

Kaminsky, S. M., "Kung Fu Film as Ghetto Myth," in Journal of Popular Film ( Bowling Green , Ohio), Spring 1974.

Ochs, P., "Requiem for a Dragon Departed," in Take One (Montreal), May 1974.

Moore, J., "I Was Bruce Lee's Voice," in Take One (Montreal), March 1975.

Braucourt, G., "Bruce Lee, superstar posthume," in Ecran (Paris), April 1975.

Gauthier, C., "Quand Superman se fit Chinois," and "Bruce Lee: repères biographiques et filmographiques," by D. Sauvaget, in Image et Son (Paris), March 1976.

Chiao, Hsiung-Ping, "Bruce Lee: His Influence on the Evolution of the Kung Fu Genre," in Journal of Popular Film and Television (Washington, D.C.), Spring 1981.

Weinraub, B., "Bruce Lee's Brief Life Being Brought to Screen," in New York Times , 15 April 1993.

Sharkey, B., "Fate's Children: Bruce and Brandon," in New York Times , 2 May 1993.

Appelo, Tim, "Tears of the Dragon," in Entertainment Weekly (New York), 14 May 1993.

"The Big Picture," in Boxoffice (Chicago), October 1993.

Lo, Kwai-Cheung, "Muscles and Subjectivity: A Short History of the Masculine Body in Hong Kong Popular Culture," in Camera Obscura (Bloomington), September 1996.

Brown, B., "Global Bodies/Postnationalities: Charles Johnson's Consumer Culture," in Representations , Spring 1997.

On LEE: films—

Bruce Lee: The Legend , documentary, 1984.

Bruce Lee: The Man/The Myth , film biography, 1984.

Bruce Lee: Curse of the Dragon , documentary, 1993.

Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story , directed by Rob Cohen, 1993.

Bruce Lee was a phenomenon—a martial artist who, as an actor, became the hero and teacher of millions. As a child, Lee appeared in at least 20 Hong Kong film productions. Pursuing a career there and in the United States as a martial artist, Lee became well known and frequently taught actors, developing his own style of martial arts known as Jeet Kune Do. Due to his reputation, he was offered the role of Kato in the television series The Green Hornet .

After a few small parts in American films, Lee's breakthrough came when he returned to Hong Kong with his family in 1970. Due to the popularity of The Green Hornet , Lee found himself greeted by Hong Kong citizens as a local hero. Raymond Chow, the founder of Golden Harvest Productions, saw in Lee the great potential of a superstar and signed him for a two-film contract. With the immense box-office success of both Fists of Fury and The Chinese Connection , Lee went on to make his first English-language production, Enter the Dragon . Three months after the completion of the film and one month before its premiere, Lee's sudden death at the moment of his emerging international stardom shocked and saddened the world.

Another explanation for Lee's status as a cult figure may have something to do with his screen image. Because he was physically a small man, with the persona of a shy incompetent or a bumbling boy-next-door, it was hard to imagine that he could destroy any number of armed opponents singlehandedly. To many, Lee was the avenger of the underprivileged and oppressed, the "little man" rising up to battle the corruption surrounding him. He was a member of an oppressed minority who reflected the frustrations of minorities everywhere; he was the underdog who came out on top.

The 1990s have seen not only Jet Li's remake of Fists of Fury but also Jackie Chan 's breakthrough in the United States with Rumble in the Bronx ; like Lee, in the late 1970s Chan was discovered by Raymond Chow, who groomed him as a new Bruce Lee. People still remember Lee. A new generation of kung-fu movie stars, though employing different styles and incorporating more modern techniques, still have to prove that they can match up with—in terms of physical agility and fighting ability—the legendary Bruce Lee.

—Maryann Oshana, updated by Guo-Juin Hong

Oshana, Maryann " Lee, Bruce . " International Dictionary of Films and Filmmakers . . Encyclopedia.com. 22 Feb. 2023 < https://www.encyclopedia.com > .

Oshana, Maryann "Lee, Bruce ." International Dictionary of Films and Filmmakers . . Encyclopedia.com. (February 22, 2023). https://www.encyclopedia.com/movies/dictionaries-thesauruses-pictures-and-press-releases/lee-bruce

Oshana, Maryann "Lee, Bruce ." International Dictionary of Films and Filmmakers . . Retrieved February 22, 2023 from Encyclopedia.com: https://www.encyclopedia.com/movies/dictionaries-thesauruses-pictures-and-press-releases/lee-bruce

Born: November 27, 1940 San Francisco , California Died: July 20, 1973 Hong Kong American actor and martial arts master

The "strong one"

In 1939 Lee Hoi Chuen, a Chinese opera singer, brought his wife Grace and three children from Hong Kong to San Francisco , California, while he performed in the United States . On November 27, 1940, the Lees had another son. His mother called the boy Bruce because the name meant "strong one" in Gaelic. His first film appearance, at the age of three months, was in Golden Gate Girl (1941). Although Hong Kong was occupied by Japanese troops, the Lees then decided to return home, where Lee's film appearances continued, numbering around twenty by the time he graduated from high school.

Teacher and actor

Lee went on to appear on shows such as Longstreet and Ironside and in the film Marlowe (1969), playing a high-kicking villain. Unhappy with the number and quality of roles available to Asian Americans in Hollywood , Lee and his family, including son Brandon and daughter Shannon, moved back to Hong Kong in 1971. Lee soon released the movie known to U.S. audiences as Fists of Fury. The story, featuring Lee as a fighter seeking revenge on those who had killed his kung fu master, was not very original, but with his graceful movements, his good looks and charm, and his acting ability, Lee was a star in the making.

Sudden death

Bruce Lee's movies, though few in number, created a new art form. By the 1990s Enter the Dragon alone had earned more than $100 million, and Lee's influence could be found in the work of many Hollywood action heroes such as Jean-Claude Van Damme, Steven Seagal, and Jackie Chan . In 1993 Jason Scott Lee (no relation) appeared in Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story.

For More Information

Bleecker, Tom. Unsettled Matters: The Life and Death of Bruce Lee. Lompoc, CA: Gilderoy Publications, 1996.

Clouse, Robert. Bruce Lee: The Biography. Burbank, CA: Unique Publications, 1988.

Hoffman, Charles. Bruce Lee, Brandon Lee, and the Dragon's Curse. New York : Random House, 1995.

Jahn, Michael. Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story. New York : Jove Books, 1993.

Lee, Bruce. Bruce Lee: Artist of Life. Compiled and edited by John Little. Boston: Tuttle, 1999.

Roensch, Greg. Bruce Lee. New York : Rosen Pub. Group, 2002.

" Lee, Bruce . " UXL Encyclopedia of World Biography . . Encyclopedia.com. 22 Feb. 2023 < https://www.encyclopedia.com > .

"Lee, Bruce ." UXL Encyclopedia of World Biography . . Encyclopedia.com. (February 22, 2023). https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/lee-bruce

"Lee, Bruce ." UXL Encyclopedia of World Biography . . Retrieved February 22, 2023 from Encyclopedia.com: https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/lee-bruce

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Bruce Lee Profile, Height, Age, Wife, Death, Net Worth, Biography & More

Bruce Lee was born November 27, 1940 – died July 20, 1973, born Lee Jun-fan was an American actor, director, martial artist, martial arts instructor, and philosopher from Hong Kong. He was the founder of Jeet Kune Do, a hybrid martial arts philosophy drawing inspiration from different combat disciplines and often credited with paving the way for modern mixed martial arts (MMA). Lee is considered by commentators, critics, media and other martial artists to be the most influential martial artist of all time and a pop culture icon of the 20th century, who bridged the gap between East and the West. He is credited with helping to change the way Asians were portrayed in American films.

In the 1970s, his films produced in Hong Kong and Hollywood rose to high traditional martial arts film to a new level of popularity and acclaim, sparking renewed interest in the Chinese nation and Chinese martial arts in the West. The direction and tone of his films significantly influenced and changed martial arts and martial arts films around the world.

He is known for his roles in five martial arts feature films in the early 1970s: The Big Boss (1971) and Fist of Fury (1972) by Lo Wei; Golden Harvest’s Way of the Dragon (1972), directed and written by Lee; and Enter the Dragon (1973) and The Game of Death (1978) by Golden Harvest and Warner Brothers, both directed by Robert Clouse.

Lee has become an iconic figure known around the world, especially among the Chinese, based on his portrayal of Chinese nationalism in his films, and among Asian Americans for challenging stereotypes associated with the Asian man. emasculated. Having first learned Wing Chun, Tai Chi, Boxing, and Street Fighting, he combined them with other influences from various sources in the spirit of his personal martial arts philosophy, which he took to. nicknamed Jeet Kune Do Lee had residences in Hong Kong and Seattle.

Lee died on July 20, 1973, at the age of 32. There was no visible external injury; however, according to autopsy reports, Lee’s brain had swelled considerably. The autopsy found Equagesic in his system. When doctors announced Lee’s death, it was officially ruled to be “death by accident.” Since his death, Lee has continued to have a significant influence on modern combat sports including judo, karate, mixed martial arts and boxing, as well as modern popular culture including film, television, comics, animation and video games. Time named Lee one of the 100 most important people of the 20th century.

While studying at the University of Washington, he met his future wife Linda Emery, another student who is studying to become a teacher. As relations between people of different races were still prohibited in many American states, they were married in secret in August 1964. Lee had two children with Linda: Brandon (1965-1993) and Shannon Lee (born 1969). After Lee’s death in 1973, she continued to promote Bruce Lee’s Jeet Kune Do martial art. She retired in 2001 from the family estate.

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The Work and Life of Bruce Lee Essay (Biography)

The work and life of bruce lee, fight history, acting career, july 26, 1973, works cited.

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Bruce Lee (born Lee Jun-fan, 1940-1973) was a Chinese American and Hong Kong martial arts actor, martial arts coach, philosopher, and film director. He was born in November 27, 1940 in San Francisco, California, United States to parents of Hong Kong origin. His father was a singer and Lee was born while his father was on tour in the US.

Lee and his parents returned to Hong Kong in 1941, he appeared in his first movie at the age of three, and altogether appeared in an estimated 20 movies as a child actor. Besides acting, Bruce studied dance and later became a member of a Hong Kong Street gang. In 1953, he started learning kung fu.

Bruce Lee moved in to the US at the age of 18 to claim his citizenship by virtue of birth, and to further his education. He completed his high school in Edison, Washington and consequently joined the University of Washington, majoring in philosophy (Bio, para. 2). It is while he was in university that he began his martial arts job, coaching fellow students and teachers on the Wing Chun technique of martial arts that he had studied in Hong Kong.

It is also through the teaching job that he met Linda Emery, whom he married in 1964 (Thomas, pp. 57). By then, he had established his own martial arts schools in California, Los Angeles, and Oakland. In these schools, Bruce Lee mainly taught the Jeet Kune Do technique (Tagliafero, pp. 17).

Lee became widely known in the US when he was chosen to play a role in the television show The Green Hornet , which was televised between 1966 and 1967. The show was adopted from an earlier radio show and the small and slender Lee showed his athletic and theatric fighting technique as the Hornet’s faithful assistant, Kato.

He also made cameo appearances in other TV shows such as Ironside and Longstreet , his most noteworthy role came in the 1969 movie Marlowe , in which the main actor was James Garner (Thomas, pp. 116). However, with the reduction in major film roles and the commonness of stereotypes aimed at actors of Asian descent, Lee left Los Angeles and returned to Hong Kong in 1971, together with his wife, Linda Lee Cadwell, and two children, Brandon Lee (1965-1993) and Shannon Lee (born 1967).

Unknown to Lee, The Green Hornet had been aired in Hong Kong and was widely received, he was surprised to be identified on the streets upon his return to Hong Kong. He signed a contact with Raymond Chow to release two movies with the Golden Harvest Company. Lee had his first leading role in The Big Boss (1971) which was a huge success across Asia, and propelled him to prominence.

He shortly followed this with Fist of Fury (1972) which was even more successful than its predecessor, The Big Boss. In Fists of Fury , Lee was presented as a fighter on a mission to revenge the killing of his master, the film set new box office records in Hong Kong.

After finishing his two-movie contract, Lee discussed another contact with Golden Harvest. He later formed his own film company, Concord Production Inc. He released another film, The Chinese Connection (1972) which broke previous records held by Fists of Fury, however, the film, just like Fists of Fury , received widely negative reviews from critics when released in the US.

Lee starred in yet another movie; Way of the Dragon (1972), he was offered full control of the movie’s writing and directing. In Way of the Dragon , Lee brought in Chuck Norris, whom he had earlier met in California, as his challenger in the last death fight at the Colosseum in Rome, this is today considered as one of Lee’s most famous fight scenes and one of the most brilliant fights in the history of martial arts (Tagliafero, pp. 52).

In the late 1972, Lee started working on another film, Game of Death, to be produced by his production firm. He began shooting some scenes including his fight progression with the Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, his old student and an American athlete. However, production was halted when Warner Brothers gave Lee the chance to star in Enter the Dragon.

The film would later thrust Lee into the US and Europe. However, a few months after production was completed and six days to its release (July 26, 1973), Lee died at the age of 32. Enter the Dragon became one of the year’s top grossing films and reinforced Lee as a martial arts superstar. The film cost $850,000 to make in 1974, this is today equal to $4 million.

Since its release, the movie has grossed more than $0.2 billion globally. The film ignited a short trend in martial arts, seen in songs such as Kung Fu Fighting and television broadcast such as Kung Fu. Robert Clouse, the director of Enter the Dragon, and Chow tried to complete the Game of Death as Lee had made more than 100 shots before he was stopped for the Enter the Dragon role.

Besides starring in films, Lee also participated in some competitive fights. He beat Gary Elms,a British fighter and three-time champion, by knockout, in the 1958 Hong Kong Inter-School Amateur Boxing Championships. He made use of Wing Chun traps and upper and lower straight blows.

In fact, it was said that had he ventured into professional boxing, he could perhaps have been a champion in the junior-welterweight category. In 1959, he became a member of a street gang and participated in numerous of their fights. During one of the fights, he broke the arm of an opponent and police were later called in. It is at this moment that his parents decided he ought to be trained in martial arts. His father was his main teacher and gave him the fundamentals of the tai chi technique.

In 1962, he took 10 seconds to defeat Uechi, a Japanese karate expert, and in 1964 he had a private match with Wong Jack Man, a student of the Ma Kin Fung who was known for his mastery of many martial arts techniques. Lee once stated that the Chinese had asked him to stop teaching martial arts to Americans, and when he defied the order, he was challenged for a fight with Wong. The agreement was that if he lost the fight, he would close down his school, but when he won, he would have the freedom of teaching martial arts to anyone.

However, Wong denies this, saying that the fight had been due to Lee’s direct request, and that Wong did not show favoritism for the Chinese, nor hatred against Caucasians or any other persons. The fight went Lee’s way, with conflicting statements on the duration of the fight, Bruce Lee and Linda Lee Cadwell indicated that the fight went for 3 minutes with a big win for Lee, however, Wong and a few others say the fight lasted almost 25 minutes.

Lee’s celebrity status put him in the path of several individuals who wanted to become famous by facing Lee. Once, a man broke into his compound and challenged him to a fight. Bruce Lee finished off the fight with a brutal kick, angered by the man’s invasion of his private home.

Lee’s father, Lee Hoi-Chuen, was a renowned opera singer, because of this, Bruce Lee began his acting career at a very tender age. Lee had acted in twenty movies at the time he was 18. During his stay in the US, Lee discarded the notions of a film career, instead opting to take up martial arts.

However, a martial arts show on Long Beach in 1964 led to the invitation of Lee to for a trial for Number One Son, the show was no successful, but this led to him obtaining the role of Kato in The Green Hornet , playing a supporting role for Van Williams. The show aired for a single season. Lee also appeared in 3 episodes of Batman and later made cameo appearances in a few other shows such as Ironside (1967) and Here Comes the Bride (1969).

During this time, two of Lee’s learners were Hollywood scriptwriters, and in 1969, the three came up with a script for a movie known as The Silent Flute , and went to search of a suitable location in India. The mission was not achieved, but the 1978 movie, The Circle of Iron was based on the script.

In 1969, Lee made a short-lived appearance in Marlowe in which he took part as a villain hired to frighten private investigator Philip Marlowe by crashing his office with flying kicks and fast punches, only to fall of a building while attempting to kick Marlowe. He also directed fight scenes for The Wrecking Crew (1969). He again directed fight scenes for A Walk in the Rain . He played the role of a martial arts trainer in the TV series, Longstreet, vital facets of his martial arts philosophy were exposed on the show.

On his return to Hong Kong, he was given leading roles inn several high-profile movies, as earlier mentioned. These include The Big Boss (1971), Fist of Fury (1972), Way of the Dragon (1972), Game of Death, and finally Enter the Dragon .

Although mainly known as a martial arts professional, Bruce Lee studied drama and Philosophy while staying in the US. His martial arts books contain many philosophical statements both within and out of the sphere of martial arts.

His diverse philosophy often reflected his fighting principles, though he never hesitated to declare that his martial arts were merely a symbol for the teachings. Bruce Lee asserted that acquiring any information eventually led to self-knowledge, and that his preferred mode of communication was martial arts. In contrast, his philosophy was greatly in resistance to the conservative world outlook pushed by Confucianism.

It is claimed that Lee did not believe in God’s existence. When questioned on his religious beliefs in 1972, he answered “none whatsoever”, again in the same year, when questioned whether he believed in God, he replied “To be perfectly frank, I really do not” (HubPages, para. 5).

On may 10, 1973, Lee became unconscious at the Golden Harvest studios while working on the movie Enter the Dragon , he was instantly taken to the Hong Kong Baptist Hospital and was diagnosed with cerebral edema. The doctors lessened the swelling and he was given a mannitol prescription. These symptoms later were later repeated during his death.

Lee had travelled to Hong Kong, to have dinner with George Lazenby, a fellow actor with whom he had planned to release a movie. According to Linda, her husband met Raymond Chow at 2pm at the house to talk about the shooting of the film, Game of Death that he had earlier halted. The meeting lasted until 4 pm and then went to the home of Betty Ting, Lee’s associate and a Taiwanese actress, Chow left them for a dinner meeting.

Later, Lee had a mild headache, and was given Equagesic, a painkiller, which had Aspirin and Meprobamate. Just about 7:30 in the evening, he went to have some light sleep. When he did not show up for dinner, Chow came looking but could not awaken him from the sleep. He immediately called for a doctor, who spent ten minutes trying to resuscitate him before putting moving him Queen Elizabeth Hospital. However, he was declared dead on reaching the hospital.

There were no observable external injuries, however, according to the autopsy details, his brain had distended significantly, from 1,400 to 1,575 g, a 13% rise. He was 32 at the time of his death. The only material found in his body was the painkillers he had been given by Ting. On October 15, 2005, Chow stated during an interview that Lee had died from a hypersensitivity to meprobamate that was present in the Equagesic. However, the doctors had ruled Lee’s death to be due to a “death by adventure”.

An argument ensued when Lee’s personal physician, Don Langford, who had attended to Lee when he had first become unconscious, stated that Lee’s death had not been the cause of Lee’s first attack. However, it was later concluded that the death had been as a result of acute cerebral edema because of a reaction to the substances contained in the prescription drug, Equagesic. Lee was buried at Lakeview Cemetery in Seattle, Washington.

Lee’s status and early death led to many theories about the cause of his demise, including murder and curse. However, Black Belt magazine claimed that Lee’s death had been as a result of “delayed reaction to a dim mark strike he received several weeks before becoming unconscious” (World Black Belt Bureau, para. 3). Others said he had died because of a “Vibrating Palm Technique” (World Black Belt Bureau, para. 2).

Bio. Bruce Lee Biography , 2010. Retrieved from https://www.biography.com/video/bruce-lee-mini-biography-2078933688

HubPages. Legend of Bruce Lee, 2010. Retrieved from https://hubpages.com/entertainment/Legend-Of-Bruce-Lee

Tagliafero, Linda. Bruce Lee. 2000. Minneapolis: Lerner Publications Company Thomas, Bruce . Bruce Lee: fighting spirit, 1994. California: Frog Publishers World Black Belt Bureau. Dim Mark, (No date). Web.

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