Bruce Lee was the first star I idolized. Growing up as a Chinese American, there weren't many people like me on the big screen.

Daniel Wu

Categorized in : Me Like People Growing Up

I really dislike the fact that Asian males are constantly emasculated, whether it's American TV or films. You see it all the time, and it's so weird that they don't see sexuality in Asian men.

weird you time men

For most normal people, deadlifts stretch your hamstrings, but in my case, it tightened them, because I was already very flexible.

your because flexible people

When I was a kid, I loved watching kung fu movies - in San Francisco, we had 'Kung Fu Theater' on TV on Saturdays, and they'd air old Shaw Brothers movies with English dubbing, things like that.

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I was a hyperactive kid, and it took awhile for me to find the right teacher. My master was a Shaolin kung fu teacher, but he also taught tai chi, Chinese medicine, brush painting - he was adept at all facets of Chinese culture.

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Because my master was this renaissance man, I wasn't just learning a fighting style, I was learning how kung fu permeates all aspects of life, from eating to healthy living to mental state.

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I graduated from university with a degree in architecture and then ended up doing a series of internships with different firms. And once I was in an office environment, I realized that at school what I was doing was 98 percent creative, 2 percent makework, but in the real world, it was the other way around.

architecture way world school

In my 20s, it was easy. In your 40s, it's a lot more challenging. You have to look at it like you're an actor, but you're also a professional athlete. You have to train.

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To do eleven fights in four months is pretty crazy. In some shows that we do in Asia, there are three or four fights over a six-month period, so you have time to recover and gain your stamina.

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I turned 40, got married, got a kid, and my mother passed away. I experienced life and death, with the enjoyment of creating life and the loss, within one year.

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There's a huge interest in the Chinese market, and Hollywood has a huge interest in the Chinese market with films like 'Transformers' making more money over there than here.

here more like money

I've built a career in Asia for 18 years, playing roles that had nothing to do with my race because everybody's Chinese in the films.

playing career nothing race

I ended up falling in love with the whole movie-making experience.

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For us as Asian-Americans, I think the bane of our existence is one stereotype - 'Sixteen Candles,' the Long Duk Dong character.

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In 'The Matrix,' you see the fight between Keanu Reeves and Lawrence Fishburne. It's an amazing fight. But I know that they've rehearsed it for months beforehand. Because in some of the moves you can see them anticipating blocks before they actually happen.

amazing fight know you

Part of the Hong Kong style is the fact that a lot of the performers can perform the moves, and we don't over-rehearse this stuff.

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We'll see what I do after 'Badlands' to show audiences that I have more in my repertoire besides martial arts.

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It's not at all my objective to become an Asian-American star.

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It was 'Shaolin Temple,' Jet Li's first movie. That was the movie that got me to want to learn martial arts. Then I became a huge Jet Li/Jackie Chan fan after that.

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If you're down to 6% body fat, which I've done before, you burn out really quickly. Like, in a couple hours, you're pretty much done, and then you're useless.

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Asian Americans haven't had as many opportunities as other people to build their careers in Hollywood, just because there hasn't been that much of an interest, especially in Asian American males.

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