The Life of Bruce Lee
The Life of Bruce Lee
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Bruce Lee’s life was even more fascinating than you know. Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we’ll be looking at the life and career of Bruce Lee. Who we now know as Bruce Lee was born Lee Jun-fan in San Francisco, California, on November 27, 1940. His father, Hoi-chuen, was an opera singer. Ho-chuen - accompanied by his wife Grace-Ho - was in the midst of a one year tour of the United States when young Bruce kicked his way into the world. The then six-piece Lee family returned to Hong Kong in the early 1940s, and Bruce’s parents soon introduced him to the entertainment industry. Bruce began acting around 1946, with his first credited role in “The Birth of Mankind”. He subsequently appeared in over a dozen movies throughout the ‘50s. Bruce’s teenage years were certainly diverse. Aside from acting in movies, Bruce also studied dance and eventually became Hong Kong’s “Crown Colony Cha-Cha Champion” in 1958. Dancing aside, he was also a bit of a rebellious child, which led to him joining a gangand taking part in street fights. It was from these very fights that Bruce began to study the art of combat and analyzed different fighting styles and techniques. He began to hone his art, studying kung fu under Ip Man. The 16 year old Lee was a very diligent and hard-working student, and he even once tricked his classmates into thinking class had been cancelled leaving Bruce all alone with Ip Man for a unique one-on-one session. When Bruce was eighteen years old, he moved to the United States. The reason for the move is typically linked to his street fighting. Legend states that Lee beat up the son of a very dangerous Triad family and fled to the United States for safety. Robert Lee, Bruce’s younger brother, recalled a police officer told his father that Bruce would be thrown in jail if he didn’t stop fighting. Either way, Bruce’s lifestyle was getting him into trouble, and so it was off to the United States to live a more productive and peaceful life. Lee finished high school in the States and eventually enrolled in the University of Washington. To support himself financially, he opened a studio and taught kung fu. The studio, known as The Jun Fan Gung Fu Institute of Seattle, opened in 1960 and was active as a school until 1967. Lee married his girlfriend Linda Emery in 1964 and the two moved to California. Here they had their two children - Brandon, born in 1965, and Shannon, in 1969. This move proved fortuitous, as Bruce soon landed the iconic role of Kato in ABC’s “The Green Hornet.” Of course, the show and role are largely only iconic due to Lee’s later fame and tragic early death. At the time, “The Green Hornet” was not very popular and it was cancelled by ABC after just one season, from September 1966 to March 1967. Bruce subsequently opened two new martial arts studios in California - one in Oakland, and one in LA. In these schools, Lee taught his own unique style of fighting called Jeet Kune Do, or The Way of the Intercepting Fist. This style was a product of Lee’s philosophical mind. Lee took copious notes and kept a journal that highlighted his belief system. His philosophies helped shape his informal and formless fighting techniques. “Empty your mind,” he concluded. “Be formless, shapeless, like water. You put water into a cup, it becomes the cup. You put water into a bottle, it becomes the bottle. You put it into a teapot, it becomes the teapot. Now water can flow or it can crash. Be water, my friend”. While “The Green Hornet” was a failure, it did introduce Bruce Lee to an American audience and he was advised to leverage his newfound fame to teach kung fu to the Hollywood elite. He did just that, charging $150 an hour or $500 for ten lessons. He taught big-name celebrities like James Coburn, Roman Polanski, and Steve McQueen, who Lee called his greatest student. In Lee’s own words, “That son of a gun has the toughness in him”. Despite teaching A-list stars, this was a difficult time for the Lee family. Teaching wasn’t paying the bills, and acting work was hard to come by. As a result of these dire times, Bruce’s wife Linda worked evenings to help support the family. To make matters worse, Bruce was incapacitated for several months after suffering a debilitating back injury while exercising. Things were looking bad for the family, but a trip to Hong Kong with his son Brandon proved incredibly fortuitous for Bruce. “The Green Hornet” was very popular in Hong Kong and Bruce was a national celebrity. He was getting recognized on the streets and was even invited to a variety show to demonstrate his skills. He used his popularity to leverage a two-movie contract with distributor Golden Harvest. Bruce was paid $15,000 for the two movies, which eventually became “The Big Boss” and “Fist of Fury”. These two movies launched Bruce Lee to superstardom in his native Hong Kong, and he opened a production company with Raymond Chow called Concord Production Inc. The company produced “Way of the Dragon,” which Lee also wrote, directed, and starred in. The success of these movies garnered the attention of Warner Bros., and they entered an agreement with both Concord and Golden Harvest to help produce and distribute a movie called “Enter the Dragon”. The movie became an instant classic when it was released on August 19, 1973 and helped launch the martial arts craze of the 70s. Unfortunately, by then Bruce was not alive to enjoy it. Bruce began to experience signs of ill health in May of 1973. He was suffering from seizures and headaches, and on May 10, he collapsed during an ADR session for “Enter the Dragon”. He was rushed to the hospital and diagnosed with cerebral edema, or brain swelling. Sent to UCLA Medical Center, doctors determined that he’d had a grand mal seizure, but no cause. Granted a clean bill of health otherwise, Lee returned to Hong Kong to plan his next movie, “Game of Death.” He went to the apartment of Taiwanese actress Betty Ting and reported feeling ill and lightheaded. After taking some Equagesic given to him by Ting, Lee went to lie down for a nap to hopefully sleep off the sickness. Lee died in his sleep on the evening of July 20, 1973. The coroner identified his cause of death as another cerebral edema. Two months later, forensics expert Donald Teare was assigned to Lee’s case and claimed that Lee had a “hypersensitivity” to the drug given to him by Ting. Raymond Chow, the co-founder of Concord Production Inc., also holds this opinion and stated that Lee died from an allergic reaction to meprobamate, the active ingredient in Equagesic. Lee’s legacy lives on, and he is now known as one of the quintessential martial artists. He was named one of the 100 most influential people of the 20th century by Time. Various statues of him have been unveiled around the world, including in his native Hong Kong, Mostar, and Los Angeles. His movies are classics. Modern filmmakers like Quentin Tarantino still honor Lee’s legacy, and Tarantino even put Lee into his movie “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood”, portrayed by actor and martial artist Mike Moh. However, this portrayal drew criticism by various public figures, including Bruce’s daughter Shannon. She stated, “[Bruce] was continuously marginalized and treated like kind of a nuisance of a human being by white Hollywood, which is how he’s treated in the film”. Bruce is survived by his wife, Linda Lee Cadwell, and his daughter Shannon. Unfortunately, his son Brandon passed away after a shooting accident while filming “The Crow”. He passed away in 1993 - the 20th anniversary of his father’s death.