Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2019/04/03/watch-1965-interview-of-bruce.html
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That was delightful (except for the sexist bit regarding Chinese opera, an artifact of the times). Not only is he an accomplished athlete with movie-star looks, but his erudition and thoughtfulness and sense of humour come through naturally and clearly.
he demonstrates some Kung Fu moves, which, even while wearing a suit in a formal setting, is so fast he become a blur.
The assistant director’s instinctive reactions to move away from the demonstration moves are slow as molasses in contrast. I’m enough of a klutz that I would have ended up getting hit despite Lee’s obvious control and precision.
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I don’t think I would care to take him on.
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So gorgeous! I was never a big fan of the movies but as a human, a philosopher & a fighter Lee is so courteous, powerful & refined that I may rethink that. Kudos to the director with the intelligence to first employ him.
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My Hapki-do instructor was the hugest fan of Bruce Lee, he’d roll out the film machine and load a film, stopping the film now and again to show us his mimic of the last move Lee did. Then we’d go back to having our asses handed to us for a few hours, fun times.
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He is the Master.
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丂卄ㄖ' 几ㄩ千千.
丂卄ㄖ' 几ㄩ千千.
丂卄ㄖ' 几ㄩ千千.
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It is probably a screen test for the green hornet TV show with van Johnson which was on in 1966 and 67. I loved him in that!
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I got a haircut from Bruce Lee’s old barber in Oakland once. He took a long time and the final result was actually kind of uneven but it was worth it for the conversation.
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Van Williams. 
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Definitely van Williams – he also played on lost in space as papa Robinson, and surprisingly as one of the brothers in seven brides for seven Brothers. They shot around him for the most part because he couldn’t dance.
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In one case, the guy is reacting to the previous punch Bruce threw, while he’s doing another.
Apparently they had to refilm his earliest footage for Green Hornet because he literally moved so fast that the camera didn’t detect his movements at all; on-camera, it looked like he was standing still (and his opponents were just falling down on their own).
After that, Bruce slowed down his movements for the camera, and then they also slowed down the film.
I will always be mad that they didn’t cast him in the Kung Fu tv series - he would have been amazing. Especially considering it was actually his show, essentially. (He was pitching a show he called “The Warrior” about a kung-fu fighter in the old West to Warner Bros; immediately after turning him down, they made Kung Fu.) They not only stole his concept, they wouldn’t cast an Asian guy to play an Asian role, either.
I only just realized they’ve finally made (some version of) the show, though - Justin “Fast and Furious” Lin is doing “Warrior” for Cinemax. It starts in a couple days, coincidentally.
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I never knew that Kung-Fu and David Carradine were essentially doing something that Bruce Lee created.
Very cool, already had a lot of respect for the guy but now I have even more.
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Right???
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I remember David Carradine saying something about how they had passed on casting Bruce Lee for the role - what I didn’t realize before was that the show was also Bruce Lee’s idea to begin with. It just makes me even more angry. Bruce Lee really never got his due.
On the one hand, Bruce Lee was too good for television of that era; to some degree his talents would have been wasted. On the other hand, he would have elevated the hell out of that show by being on it.
And while it’s nice they’re now honoring Lee by making a show “based on his idea,” it sounds pretty contemporary and probably not much like whatever Lee had in mind. Also: not actually starring Bruce Lee.
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Racism had everything to do with Bruce Lee not being cast in the show he’d thought of; he looked “too Asian,” instead of ‘ethnically ambiguous’ like the Irish Carradine.
SMH
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Yeah. Racism: why we can’t have nice things, example n-millionth.
The new adaptation of “his” show makes me sad that it’s still remarkable when a story about Asian-Americans has… actual Asian actors. (And none of them are Bruce Lee.)
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One of the greatest Americans of all time.
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