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Jackie Chan   by jekky

Early life Chan was born in 1954 in Victoria Peak in the former Crown colony of Hong Kong as Chan Kong Sang meaning born in Hong Kong to Charles and Lee Lee Chan refugees from the Chinese Civil War He was nicknamed Pao Pao Chinese literally meaning Cannonball because he was such a big baby weighing 12 pounds or about 5 4 kgs Since his parents worked for the French Consul to Hong Kong Chan spent his formative years within the grounds of the consul s residence in the Victoria Peak district Chan attended the Nah Hwa Primary School on Hong Kong Island where he failed his first year after which his parents withdrew him from the school In 1960 his father immigrated to Canberra Australia to work as the head cook for the American embassy and Chan was sent to the China Drama Academy a Peking Opera School run by Master Yu Jim Yuen Chan trained rigorously for the next decade excelling in martial arts and acrobatics He eventually became part of the Seven Little Fortunes a performance group made up of the school s best students gaining the stage name Yuen Lo in homage to his master Chan became close friends with fellow group members Sammo Hung and Yuen Biao the three of them later to be known as the Three Brothers or Three Dragons At the age of 8 he appeared with some of his fellow Little Fortunes in the film Big and Little Wong Tin Bar 1962 with Li Li Hua playing his mother Chan appeared with Li again the following year in The Love Eterne 1963 and had a small role in King Hu s 1966 film Come Drink with Me In 1971 after an appearance as an extra in another Kong Fu film A Touch of Zen Chan began his adult career in the film industry initially signing to Chu Mu s Great Earth Film Company At the age of 17 he worked as a stuntman in the Bruce Lee films Fist of Fury and Enter the Dragon under the stage name Chen Yuen Long He received his first starring role later that year in Little Tiger of Canton which had a limited release in Hong Kong in 1973 Due to the commercial failures in his early ventures into films and trouble finding stunt work in 1975 Chan starred in a comedic adult film All in the Family the only film he has made to date that did not feature a single fight scene or stunt sequence Chan joined his parents in Canberra in 1976 where he briefly attended Dickson College and worked as a construction worker A fellow builder named Jack took Chan under his wing earning Chan the nickname of Little Jack which was later shortened to Jackie and the name Jackie Chan stuck with him ever since In addition in the late 90s Chan changed his Chinese name to Fong Si Lung since his father s original surname was Fong Film career The 1978 film Drunken Master brought Jackie Chan into the mainstream Jackie Chan began his film career as a stuntman in the Bruce Lee films Fist of Fury 1972 and Enter the Dragon 1973 pictured Early exploits 19761979 In 1976 Jackie Chan received a telegram from Willie Chan a film producer in the Hong Kong film industry who had been impressed with Jackie s stuntwork Willie Chan offered him an acting role in a film directed by Lo Wei Lo had seen Chan s performance in the John Woo film Hand of Death 1976 and planned to model him after Bruce Lee with the film New Fist of Fury His stage name was changed to Sing Lung Chinese literally become the dragon to emphasise his similarity to Bruce Lee whose stage name was Lei Siu Lung Chinese meaning Little Dragon The film was unsuccessful because Chan was not accustomed to Lee s martial arts style Despite the film s failure Lo Wei continued producing films with similar themes resulting in little improvement at the box office Chan s first major breakthrough was the 1978 film Snake in the Eagle s Shadow shot while he was loaned to Seasonal Film Corporation under a two picture deal Under director Yuen Woo Ping Chan was allowed complete freedom over his stunt work The film established the comedic kung fu genre and proved to be a breath of fresh air for the Hong Kong audience Chan then starred in Drunken Master which finally propelled him to mainstream success Upon Chan s return to Lo Wei s studio Lo tried to replicate the comedic approach of Drunken Master producing Half a Loaf of Kung Fu and Spiritual Kung Fu He also gave Chan the opportunity to co direct The Fearless Hyena with Kenneth Tsang When Willie Chan left the company he advised Jackie to decide for himself whether or not to stay with Lo Wei During the shooting of Fearless Hyena Part II Chan broke his contract and joined Golden Harvest prompting Lo to blackmail Chan with triads blaming Willie for his star s departure The dispute was resolved with the help of fellow actor and director Jimmy Wang Yu allowing Chan to stay with Golden Harvest Success of the action comedy genre 19801987 The film Police Story nicknamed Glass Story for its stunt work is set in a modern period Willie Chan had become Jackie s personal manager and firm friend and has remained so for over 30 years He was instrumental in launching Chan s international career beginning with his first forays into the American film industry in the 1980s His first Hollywood film was Battle Creek Brawl in 1980 Chan then played a minor role in the 1981 film The Cannonball Run which grossed US 100 million worldwide Despite being largely ignored by audiences in favour of established American actors like Burt Reynolds Chan was impressed by the outtakes shown at the closing credits inspiring him to include the same device in his future films After the commercial failure of The Protector in 1985 Chan temporarily abandoned his attempts to break into the US market returning his focus to Hong Kong films Back in Hong Kong Chan s films began to reach a larger audience in East Asia with early successes in the lucrative Japanese market including The Young Master 1980 and Dragon Lord 1982 The Young Master went on to beat previous box office records set by Bruce Lee and established Chan as Hong Kong cinema s top star Chan produced a number of action comedy films with his opera school friends Sammo Hung and Yuen Biao The three co starred together for the first time in 1983 in Project A which won the Best Action Design Award at the third annual Hong Kong Film Awards Over the following two years the Three Brothers appeared in Wheels on Meals and the original Lucky Stars trilogy In 1985 Chan made the first Police Story film a US influenced action comedy in which Chan performed his own stunts It was named the Best Movie at the 1986 Hong Kong Film Awards In 1987 Chan played Asian Hawk an Indiana Jones esque character in the film Armour of God The film was Chan s biggest domestic box office success to date grossing over HK 35 million Acclaimed sequels and Hollywood breakthrough 19881998 Chan in his Hollywood breakthrough film Rumble in the Bronx In 1988 Chan starred alongside Sammo Hung and Yuen Biao for the last time to date in the film Dragons Forever Hung co directed with Corey Yuen and the villain in the film was played by Yuen Wah both of whom were fellow graduates of the China Drama Academy In the late 1980s and early 90s Chan starred in a number of successful sequels beginning with Police Story 2 which won the award for Best Action Choreography at the 1989 Hong Kong Film Awards This was followed by Armour of God II Operation Condor and Police Story 3 for which Chan won the Best Actor Award at the 1993 Golden Horse Film Festival In 1994 Chan reprised his role as Wong Fei Hung in Drunken Master II which was listed in Time Magazine s All Time 100 Movies Another sequel Police Story 4 First Strike brought more awards and domestic box office success for Chan but did not fare as well in foreign markets Jackie Chan rekindled his Hollywood ambitions in the 1990s but refused early offers to play villains in Hollywood films to avoid being typecast in future roles For example Sylvester Stallone offered him the role of Simon Phoenix a criminal in the futuristic film Demolition Man Chan declined and the role was taken by Wesley Snipes Chan finally succeeded in establishing a foothold in the North American market in 1995 with a worldwide release of Rumble in the Bronx attaining a cult following in the United States that was rare for Hong Kong movie stars The success of Rumble in the Bronx led to a 1996 release of Police Story 3 in the United States under the title Supercop which grossed a total of US 16 270 600 Jackie s first huge blockbuster success came when he co starred with Chris Tucker in the 1998 buddy cop action comedy Rush Hour grossing US 130 million in the United States alone This film made a star of Jackie Chan in Hollywood As a publicity stunt Jackie also wrote his autobiography in collaboration with Jeff Yang entitled I Am Jackie Chan Dramatization 1999resent In 1998 Chan released his final film for Golden Harvest Who Am I After leaving Golden Harvest in 1999 he produced Gorgeous a romantic comedy that focused on personal relationships Chan then helped create a PlayStation game in 2000 called Jackie Chan Stuntmaster to which he lent his voice and performed the motion capture Jackie Chan plays an anti hero for the first time in Rob B Hood a burglar with gambling problems Despite further success with Shanghai Noon in 2000 Rush Hour 2 in 2001 and Shanghai Knights in 2003 Chan became frustrated with Hollywood over the limited range of roles and lack of control over the film making process In response to Golden Harvest s withdrawal from the film industry in 2003 Chan started his own film production company JCE Movies Limited Jackie Chan Emperor Movies Limited in association with Emperor Multimedia Group EMG His films have since featured an increasing number of dramatic scenes while continuing to succeed at the box office examples include New Police Story 2004 The Myth 2005 and the hit film Rob B Hood 2006 Chan s next release was Rush Hour 3 in August 2007 It grossed US 255 million However it performed poorly in Hong Kong grossing only HK 3 5 million during its opening weekend The filming of The Forbidden Kingdom Chan s first onscreen collaboration with fellow Chinese actor Jet Li was completed on 24 August 2007 and the film was released in April 2008 Chan voiced the character Master Monkey in the DreamWorks Animation film Kung Fu Panda released in June 2008 appearing with stars Jack Black Dustin Hoffman and Angelina Jolie In addition he has signed up to assist Anthony Szeto in an advisory capacity for the writer director s upcoming film Wushu which is currently in pre production The film will star Sammo Hung and Wang Wenjie as father and son In November 2007 Chan began filming Shinjuku Incident with director Derek Yee which sees Chan take on the role of a Chinese immigrant in Japan The film was released on 2 April 2009 According to his blog Chan wishes to direct a film after completing Shinjuku Incident something he has not done for a number of years The film is expected to be the third in the Armour of God series and has a working title of Armour of God III Chinese Zodiac Chan originally stated that he would start filming on 1 April 2008 but that date had passed Because the Screen Actors Guild did not go on strike Chan started shooting his next movie The Spy Next Door at the end of October in New Mexico leaving the status of Armour of God III Chinese Zodiac up in the air In The Spy Next Door Chan plays an undercover agent whose cover is blown when he looks after the children of his girlfriend On 22 June 2009 Chan left Los Angeles to begin filming The Karate Kid a remake of the original in Beijing Stunts Jackie Chan prepares to slide down the side of a high rise building in New Police Story Jackie Chan performs most of his own stunts which are choreographed by the Jackie Chan Stunt Team He has stated in interviews that the primary inspiration for his more comedic stunts were films such as The General directed by and starring Buster Keaton who was also known to perform his own stunts Since its establishment in 1983 Chan has used the team in all his subsequent films to make choreographing easier given his understanding of each member s abilities Chan and his team undertake many of the stunts performed by other characters in his films shooting the scenes so that their faces are obscured The dangerous nature of his stunts makes it difficult for Chan to get insurance especially in the United States where his stunt work is contractually limited Chan holds the Guinness World Record for Most Stunts By A Living Actor which emphasizes no insurance company will underwrite Chan s productions in which he performs all his own stunts In addition he holds an unrecognised record for the most number of takes for a single shot in a film having shot over 2900 retakes for a complex scene involving a badminton game in Dragon Lord Chan has been injured numerous times attempting stunts many of them have been shown as outtakes or as bloopers during the closing credits of his films He came closest to death filming Armour of God when he fell from a tree and fractured his skull Over the years Chan has dislocated his pelvis and broken his fingers toes nose both cheekbones hips sternum neck ankle and ribs on numerous occasions Promotional materials for Rumble in the Bronx emphasized that Chan performed all of the stunts and one version of the movie

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