Bruce Lee

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Bruce Lee (born Lee Jun-fan, San Francisco, California, November 27, 1940-Kowloon, Hong Kong, July 20, 1973) was a Hong Kong martial artist, martial arts master, actor, filmmaker, philosopher and writer. Despite being born in San Francisco, California, he grew up in Hong Kong from the age of four months. Lee is widely considered by critics, pundits, media and major martial artists as the most influential martial artist of all time and a 20th century pop culture icon, bridging the gap between East and West. He is often credited with helping to change the way Asians were portrayed in American movies. He was an innovator and the foremost exponent of martial arts, dedicating his life to the discipline, seeking perfection and truth, eventually creating his own method of combat and philosophy of life, Jun Fan Gung-Fu, which later and added to his philosophical concept would be called Jeet Kune Do or "the way of the interceptor fist".

His films, interviews and mainly his charisma and influence spread the rise of passion for martial arts throughout the West, generating a wave of followers throughout the world.

Bruce Lee was born in Chinatown (San Francisco), on November 27, 1940, in the year of the dragon (according to the Chinese calendar); However, Bruce grew up in Kowloon (Hong Kong), where he began training at the age of thirteen and formally practicing the Chinese martial arts of Tai Chi with his father, and later the Wing Chun style with Master Ip Man. From a very young age, he appeared in films playing children and later adolescents. At eighteen, Bruce returned to the United States, where he began his studies in philosophy at the University of Washington. Being an innovator and thinker, he applied what he learned to his art; he studied the thought of various western and eastern philosophers from Taoism such as Lao-tzu and Chuang-tzu and, in addition, he began to train his university classmates in the art of Chinese kung-fu .

During that time, Bruce opened his first martial arts school: the Jun Fan Gung-Fu Institute, located in Seattle; Some time later, he opened two more schools in Oakland and Los Angeles (California). Quickly, based on everything he learned from his martial experiences in the disciplines of boxing, western fencing (by his brother Peter Lee), judo (by from his friend and student Taki Kimura), Filipino eskrima (from his friend and student Dan Inosanto), muay thai, and tangsudo (from his friend and fellow actor Chuck Norris), Bruce began to develop new ideas about martial arts training, which led to the creation of his system, the Jun Fan Gung-Fu. This later evolved into physical and philosophical concepts, giving rise to his own combat method, which he called Jeet Kune Do or "the way of the intercepting fist", which he always preached should not be taken. as a simple predetermined "style" or "system". Later he regretted having given it a name, since that made it another martial art and since then he insisted that Jeet Kune Do it was just a name, emphasizing "non-style" or "non-form".

At the same time that he was doing this, Bruce became a celebrity through the American series The Green Hornet, in addition to his subsequent and popular films: The Big Boss, Fist of Fury, Way of the Dragon, Enter the Dragon and Game of Death, achieving the exposure of Chinese martial arts to the Western world. Bruce became a recognized icon throughout the world, especially among the Chinese.

Bruce Lee married Linda Cadwell in 1964 and they later had their son Brandon Lee born in 1965, as well as their daughter Shannon Lee, born in 1969. Bruce Lee's life was cut short on July 20, 1973, when he died as a result of a stroke of unknown cause. His body rests in Lake View Cemetery on Capitol Hill, Seattle, next to his son Brandon, who died in 1993 after being accidentally shot in the filming of the movie The Crow.

The legacy left by Bruce Lee ranges from movies to books such as The Tao of Jeet Kune Do, where he shows much of his philosophy and fighting methods. His image endures over time and has has gone down in history as a great legend of martial arts, being even chosen by TIME magazine as one of the hundred most influential men of the century XX, as well as being considered one of the heroes and icons of history.

Early Years

Childhood

Bruce Lee (baby) and his parents Grace Ho and Lee Hoi-chuen.

Bruce Lee was born between 6 and 8 in the morning, on November 27, 1940, at the Chinese Hospital, located on Jackson Street in Chinatown, San Francisco (California).). He was born in the hour and year of the dragon, which according to the traditions of Chinese astrology is a good luck omen; those born under this sign are considered noble, charismatic, powerful, wise and creative people.

The marriage between his father, Lee Hoi-chuen, of Han ethnicity, and his mother, Grace Ho, of Chinese-German descent, produced five children. Bruce was the fourth of those children; His siblings were: Phoebe Lee, Agnes Lee, Peter Lee, and Robert Lee. Bruce's birth in the United States occurred by chance, since his father, who worked as an actor in Cantonese films and a comedian in Chinese opera, was on tour presenting a work by the & # 34; Opera Company & # 3. 4; which passed through San Francisco at the time.

According to papers released by the United States Department of Labor, Lee was registered under a Chinese and an American name. The Chinese name Jun-Fan was given to him by his mother and was registered him as Lee Jun-Fan, while the English name, Bruce, was suggested by a nurse at the Chinese Hospital, Maria Glover, in order for the newborn to carry a western name in order to avoid any kind of problems with his American birth certificate; finally his parents agreed with what the nurse said and he too was registered with that name, Bruce Lee.

When Bruce was three months old, his parents received a letter from Hong Kong telling them not to return as the Japanese invasion of Manchuria made the situation very difficult, but Lee Hoi-chuen chose to return anyway., since his other children, Peter, Agnes and Phoebe, were there.

Already in Hong Kong, the Lee family lived in a residence with only two rooms at 218 Nathan Road, Kowloon, but they had problems due to the Japanese occupation during the years of World War II (1939-1945).; Grace Ho spent those years worrying that across the street were the Japanese military camps and Bruce constantly challenged them by raising his fists in a fight, also when Japanese Mitsubishi A6M Zero fighter planes flew at low altitude, Bruce would go to the roof of the building where they lived to try to hit them with anything within his reach.

When World War II ended in 1945, Lee Hoi-chuen returned to his acting job and was often accompanied by his son Bruce, who was 6 years old at the time; Through this, Bruce passed a casting and participated in the film The Birth of Mankind.

Names

Bruce Lee during his childhood.

As Chinese custom puts the family name before the given name, Bruce was inscribed as "Lee Jun-Fan", but the name "Jun-Fan" has its own explanation. The meaning of the name "Jun" is "to awaken or make something prosperous" while the syllable "Fan" refers to the Chinese name of the city of San Francisco, but its true meaning is to defend small countries from the abuse of large ones; The name "Fan" was widely used by the Chinese born in Hong Kong since in those days they felt inferior to the invading countries and their desire was to outshine and be superior to foreign powers, in addition to recovering the golden age. of China. Therefore, the true meaning of the name "Jun-Fan" was to "awaken and make a small nation prosperous", as well as protect them from the abuse of invading countries, these being Japan and China. the UK.

However, during the first years of his life, Lee Hoi-chuen's mother decided to call him under the female pseudonym "Sai Fon" which means "little phoenix", following an old and superstitious tradition in which it was to hide the sex of the newborn before the evil spirits that steal the male baby; Bruce's parents had already suffered the loss of a first child in the early years of their marriage, which is why Bruce's parents and grandmother began calling him that so that the spirits would pass by.

The Western name "Bruce" was first used when he turned twelve and was enrolled in La Salle Secondary School, a Catholic high school in Hong Kong where he was first taught the English language. Until then, he did not know what his western name was and as the students were asked to write their name, Bruce copied the name of the student next to him.

Their screen names were Lee Siu Lung (Cantonese) and Li Xiao Long (Hanyu pinyin 李小龙, Simplified Mandarin), which literally means "Li the Little Dragon". These names were first used in the 1950 film My Son, A Chung.

Wing chun practitioner and student of Ip Man

As a child, he began attending Tak Sun Elementary, which was a few blocks from his home, and when he was around twelve he was enrolled in an English-speaking Catholic high school, Colegio de La Salle, where he was expelled for bad behavior; At that time, he was not interested in school, his attitude towards the teachers and directors of the La Salle school was defiant, his grades were not high, and his reputation as a gang member led to expulsion.

"I was a dislocated boy who was looking for fights... We used chains and pens with hidden knives inside. »
Bruce Lee about his adolescence, for the magazine Black Belt in October 1967.

Master Ip Man and Bruce Lee practicing wing chun.

One day, when he was coming home from school, Bruce, without the support of his gang, was surprised by some thugs who tried to beat him up, and after getting out of that situation unscathed, his father taught him the basics of martial art of tai chi chuan as a defense system and also to keep him from the path of violence, but Bruce found this style a bit slow and too complicated, so he considered learning another martial art.

At that time, Bruce knew a boy his age or a little older, William Cheung, who was always in fights and never lost. One day, Bruce asked him the reason why he always won and he told him that it was because of his martial arts training. On that occasion, William proposed to learn the Chinese style of wing chun and Bruce accepted. Bruce's behavior when he first entered Ip Man's academy was not very respectful, especially for an oriental boy, so Ip Man decided that Bruce was not qualified to learn the art of Wing chun, and so he They communicated it through William Cheung. Bruce decided to come back the next day with humility and respect and then the teacher Ip Man gave him a chance. Bruce spent three to four years learning Wing Chun under Ip Man, although most of his training was received from one of his best students, Wong Shun-leung.

Read in 1958, dancing cha-cha-cha.

After being expelled from La Salle College, his parents quickly enrolled him in another Catholic school called Saint Francis Xavier (San Francisco Xavier College), in Kowloon; at that time there were interscholastic tournaments in sports, since These were schools with a marked English influence, where they held Western boxing tournaments among themselves. Bruce decided to take part in one of them, which was held at St. George's College; he won it after beating three-time champion Gary Elms by knockout in the third round. Before reaching the final, Bruce had knocked out boxers Yang Huang, Lieh Lo and Shen Yuen in the first round, and was introduced to the art of Western fencing by his brother Peter Lee, whose brother he was champion. All these influences had an impact on him when it came to creating his own style years later.

At the same time that Bruce was practicing Wing Chun, he enrolled in dance classes, which later led him to become a cha-cha-cha champion. This unlikely departure from the world of violence that surrounded Bruce made him turn more seriously and professionally into the field of artistic expression and entertainment.

Leaving Hong Kong

Bruce Lee with his brothers in Hong Kong.

In early 1959, a kung-fu school challenged Ip Man's school to a fight, so they met on the roof of one of the apartment buildings. Bruce represented Wing chun and faced off against the representative boy from the Choi Li Fut school; during the match, Bruce was attacked with an illegal blow, leaving his eye injured, but he reacted quickly and delivered a series of blows to his rival leaving him unconscious, to the point of breaking a few teeth. This boy's parents did not hesitate to report Bruce to the police, something that led him to be arrested until his mother came to pick him up.

In time, Lee's parents decided that the only alternative left to them was to send the troublesome Bruce away from Hong Kong, so that he could lead a safer and healthier life. His parents were afraid that Bruce would be attacked or recruited by a criminal organization like the Triad, since he had previously fought with members of this gang when trying to help a friend of his; police have him in their sights and there was a possibility that he would end up in prison.

“The police officer came and said to my father, “Excuse Mr. Lee, your son fights a lot at school. If he gets in a fight more, I will have to put him in jail.” »
Robert Lee about Bruce's return to the United States.

In April of that year and already after that fight, Bruce left for the United States to stay with his older sister, Agnes Lee, who was already living with some family friends in San Francisco. older siblings, Peter and Agnes, had already been to the United States on student visas, finishing their higher education. Bruce had not formally graduated from high school and was more interested in martial arts, dancing and acting, however his family decided it was time for him to return to the land where he was born and find his future there.

New life in America

On April 29, 1959, at the age of eighteen and with one hundred dollars in his pocket, Bruce left Hong Kong for San Francisco, United States, on the steamer American Presidents Line. Bruce began his journey on the lower deck of the ship, but was quickly invited to the first-class accommodations to give passengers dance lessons as a cha-cha-cha teacher and earn some money along the way. Eighteen days After getting on the ship and after a brief stopover in Osaka, in which Bruce took the opportunity to go to Tokyo, the ship arrived in San Francisco. The official reason for his trip was to obtain American nationality, since having Born in San Francisco, he could get it if he returned to reside there when he reached the age of majority. Washington state, where he stayed I also work at the restaurant of an old family friend, Ruby Chow.

At that time, Bruce did not think about acting or dancing, since he had the intention of finishing his secondary education, which is why he enrolled in the Edison Technical School, from where he graduated. he graduated in 1960. He then enrolled at the University of Washington, in the faculty of philosophy, drama, and psychology, in 1961.

Career as a martial artist

Read in 1967.

During the four years (1961-1964) that he studied at the university, Bruce worked various small jobs in restaurants, newspapers and more; however, he had to give these up in order to make a living teaching wing chun kung-fu in the windowless room that Ruby Chow lent him from time to time and in public parks, as well as teaching in empty garages on Saturdays..

There Bruce Lee had installed a bag and a wooden dummy so he could train whenever the weather allowed, although the neighbors complained about the noise he made when he trained and he had to leave it. Since he had no friends, he began to attend the meetings of a Chinese society, where there were people who also practiced kung fu and other styles from northern China, in which the use of the legs predominated, use that Bruce was unaware of, since the wing chun works legs at a very low level. The society decided to give a demonstration and so Bruce was able to meet who would be one of his best friends there in Seattle, Jesse Glover.

Jesse had always been interested in martial arts (he had done judo), but when he saw Bruce he felt he should train with him. Bruce accepted the proposal to teach him. The first place they trained was the dining room of Jesse Glover's apartment. In their first meeting, Bruce asked Jesse to show him everything he knew about kung fu. Jesse had never trained kung fu with a master before; all the knowledge he had about kung fu had been taken from a book by James Yimm Lee. Bruce asked him to show him the book, and after leafing through it for a long time, he let him know that the style shown belonged to the Hung family, and that he had once practiced it in Hong Kong, as it was a well-known style there.

Later, Jesse had the opportunity to travel to California with a couple of friends. Jesse's main goal was to visit James Yimm Lee. Once in Oakland, they went to James's home and introduced themselves saying they knew him from the book he had written. He invited them in and immediately began to show them his knowledge. This visit would become decisive in Bruce's life, as it made it easier for Bruce Lee and James to meet.

Jun Fan Gung Fu Institute

In Seattle, Bruce accepted a new student, Ed Hart, Jesse Glover's roommate, and this sparked Bruce to accept more and more students, so Jesse and Ed convinced Bruce to charge more for their classes. Soon they had to look for a place, which soon became too small for them. Around this time he met the Japanese Taky Kimura (who had also trained in Judo, earning his 1 Dan black belt), who became Bruce's first assistant instructor at the Jun Fan Gung Fu Institute, the name with which he named his training room. training or kwoon. Therefore, the name of the institute was alluding to the combat system that was taught by Bruce Lee at the time, the jun fan gung fu, that is, Bruce Lee's kung fu; this, since gung fu is a synonymous phrase for kung fu, while the phrase jun fan refers to the Chinese name of Bruce Lee.

Allan Joe, a student of James Y. Lee, came to visit Bruce. The year was 1962, and Bruce was studying philosophy at Seattle University. Bruce invited Joe to see some of the wing chun techniques on the wooden dummy he kept in the backyard of Ruby Chow's restaurant. Allan Joe was impressed and thought that James Lee would be equally impressed if he saw it. After this, James called Bruce from Oakland asking if he could pay him a visit to teach him some of his kung fu; he accepted, considering it a good opportunity to spread his teachings. The following week he left for Oakland, staying with James.

There he had the opportunity to meet Wally Jay, a jiu-jitsu practitioner with whom he was able to exchange knowledge and learn some locking and submission techniques. James had his garage full of training devices invented by him. There they were practicing and Bruce gave him some suggestions on how to improve these devices. On a later trip, Bruce met two other martial artists, who would eventually become the most famous in the United States, Ralph Castro and Ed Parker, with whom he shared knowledge and from whom he earned respect. This meeting was also vital in Lee's life and future, as it was Ed Parker who opened the doors to Hollywood for him.

Bruce continued to travel repeatedly to Oakland, to teach wing chun to James Lee, and even spent his vacations there training with James. The Seattle group continued to grow and Taky Kimura was taking on more responsibility, since he was not in vain the assistant instructor of Bruce Lee. Given his success, he thought of expanding his teaching horizons and dreamed of a chain of gyms spread throughout the California area, so he proposed to James to be the head instructor of the Jun Fan Gung Fu Institute in Oakland..

James shared an academy called Hayward California with a student of his, Al Novak, and he thought of transforming it into a Jun Fan Gung Fu Institute, convinced that his student would share his conversion plans. At that time James was thinking of publishing a book for Bruce. When the tests were ready he called him to go to Oakland to review them and this time Bruce came accompanied by Taky Kimura. The three of them were training in James's garage and Bruce was surprised that James adapted so well to the Chi Sao moves. Neutralizing Taky's punching and throwing actions at the point of force, James had developed his body thanks to bodybuilding, and had even trained with Steve Reeves, the famous Mr. Universe bodybuilder who starred in so many movies like Hercules. James had always relied on strength to be effective and had a hard time adjusting to new concepts of softness.

The book was finally ready shortly before Bruce returned to Hong Kong to visit his family and was titled Chinese Gung Fu, The Philosophical Art of Self Defense. Once in Hong Kong, Bruce took the opportunity to visit his teacher, Yip Man. They spent many hours drinking tea, in which Yip Man informed Bruce about subjects he did not know, such as art history, etc. Bruce thought that Yip was too old to defend himself, but during this stay in Hong Kong he realized that he was still in good shape despite his age, especially after having practiced Chi Sao with him. There, at Yip Man's school, he was also able to see other of his classmates, such as William Cheung, who was on vacation, having lived in Australia since he was 18 years old. Bruce spent five weeks in Hong Kong, after which he returned to Seattle to continue his teachings.

When he returned to Seattle, a draft letter was waiting for him, and he began to fear for his future if he had to go into the army. He asked James for advice on avoiding the military, although it seemed very difficult since strong and agile people is precisely what the Army demands. Bruce attended the medical examination at the Recruitment Center, and to his surprise he was declared unfit for military service due to having an excessive arch of the foot, a congenital defect, and for being nearsighted.

Long Beach Karate Tournament

In 1964, the founder of Kenpo Karate, Ed Parker, organized the Long Beach Karate Tournament and for the occasion invited Bruce Lee, who surprised the audience with his demonstrations and skills, such as doing two-finger push-ups (using the thumb and index finger of the hand) and the one-inch punch against Bob Baker.

"I told Bruce not to repeat this kind of demonstration again... The last time he hit me, I had to stay home and I didn't go to work because chest pain was unbearable. »
Bob Baker remembers the one-inch hit received by Bruce Lee.

It was at that 1964 championship that Lee first met Dan Inosanto, who served as occasional sparring partner for Bruce's demonstrations. Inosanto was impressed with his style, and he also asked him to accompany him in the demonstrations that he did. Bruce Lee accepted Inosanto as a student at the Jun Fan Gung Fu Institute in Los Angeles, taught him, and certified him as his first instructor (and is currently fully certified to teach Lee's style). While Bruce was making movies, Inosanto was teaching at the institute.

"I couldn't sleep thinking how that man defeated me so easily, he had the feeling of having learned a trade for years, and suddenly someone comes and says, "We don't need him anymore, he gets fired." »
Dan Inosanto, about how he met Bruce Lee.

Bruce also met taekwondo master Jhoon Goo Rhee. The two developed a friendship from which they both benefited as martial artists. Goo Rhee taught Bruce the high side kick and others in detail, while Lee taught Rhee the "non-telegraphic" punch.

Lee returned to this tournament again in 1967 and performed various demonstrations, such as the famous unstoppable punch against the world karate champion of the United States Karate Association, Vic Moore. Bruce threw eight punches at Vic Moore, who was a black belt, 10th degree; Moore was unable to parry any blows, despite Bruce telling him where they were going to go.

The real challenges

Bruce Lee received many challenges during his life but only accepted a few of them, which were recounted later. Bruce's thinking about the challenges being thrown at him was win or win since being in a real fight, he could die.

"They always ask me, "Hey, Bruce, you're really so good?" and I say, "Well, if I say yes, you'll think I'm boasting and if I say I'm not, I'm sure you'll call me a liar"... well, I'll try to be honest, I'll say otherwise... I'm not afraid of any opponent, I know I'm self-sufficient and I'm not worried about it. When I make the decision to fight or defend myself, there is no more to speak, it is over, and you better kill me first."
Bruce.

Fight with Yoichi Nakachi

Yoichi Nakachi, a Japanese classmate of Bruce Lee's at Edison Technical School (where he attended his high school), used to attend Bruce Lee's demonstrations. On one occasion, Bruce mentioned that the internal styles of kung-fu are considered better than the external styles. At this, Yoichi, who at the time was a karate black belt, got upset (since karate comes from the latter) and started a campaign to fight him. He often used to tease Bruce with gestures and looks, and even sent his friends over in order to challenge Bruce; he later openly challenged him in public, wherever he performed kung-fu demonstrations, Bruce asked his students if they thought it would be good to fight him but they all advised him to ignore it. But, despite what was said by his students, Bruce accepted the fight with Yoichi. Initially, the fight would be on the top floor of the school, but Jesse Glover convinced him to fight on the YMCA basketball field. The rules of the fight were: three two-minute rounds, and if one was knocked down, the fight would be over; In addition, if one person could not continue, the opponent would end the fight.

According to Glover, Bruce wanted to go fight with everything but he recommended that he not do it since it could kill him. So he decided to only use his fists and feet, meanwhile Yoichi started the fight from a classic deep and long karate stance, but quickly switched to cat stance. Bruce was standing in the classic tall short Wing Chun stance. Yoichi launched a front kick at him but Bruce blocked it with his forearm and countered with a series of wing chun chain straights, sending Yoichi backing across the basketball court. As Yoichi ran into the wall, he tried to grab Bruce, but Bruce dodged and hit him with a double punch to the chest and head. Off balance, Yoichi flew through the air, Bruce quickly chased after him until he delivered a kick to the abdomen and finally, Yoichi's knee hit the ground, and he surrendered.

Glover, who was the referee for the fight, yelled for them to stop. Yoichi got up but fell back unconscious on the ground. After a long time, he regained consciousness. The assistants in that fight saw how Yoichi's face seemed to have been hit by baseball bats; besides his skull, which was cracked and bleeding from the eye.

"Both went to the same school in Seattle. And whenever Bruce made a demonstration this guy took it to staff... in exhibitions he stood up and challenged Bruce openly on stage. Finally came the point where Bruce had to tell him that if he did, they would have to fix this situation. Of course, Yoichi was ready and Bruce said, "I'll tell you directly, you're challenging me, right?" and the Japanese karateka (whose years later would become the Yoichi Nakachi sensei) replied, "Yes, I'm challenging you."
Then they decided to go to a local basketball camp and lock themselves up there. "When they started, the karateka opened the fight with a kick that Bruce blocked and then hit him with direct fists across the whole predium. When he hit the wall and was falling, Bruce kicks it.
It's all over in eleven seconds.
"After that, this guy wanted to become a member of our class. He wanted to become a disciple of Bruce. To show you what kind of guy Bruce was, he let him go to our class for a period, after which the karateka, is not well known why, surely because of the humiliation he implied, he did not appear again."
Interview with Taky Kimura by Paul Bax (The Seattle Years: The Taky Kimura Interview).

Jesse Glover, Bruce Lee's first student, also recounted this encounter in the book Bruce Lee Between Wing Chun and Jeet Kune Do (1976), where, according to Glover: «The karateka who He was on the ground after receiving the kick that disfigured his face, he asked worried about the duration of the fight and Ed Hart, his partner also present and in charge of controlling the time, more merciful, doubled it and told him: twenty-two seconds ».

Fight with Wong Jack-man

In Oakland, California's Chinatown, Bruce Lee was officially challenged in front of the traditional Chinese community, who disagreed with Bruce teaching kung fu to non-Chinese students; Bruce had a controversial fight with Wong Jack-man, a direct student of Ma Kin Fung, known for being a master of Xing Yi Quan and Wushu.

According to his widow, Linda Emery, officially commented, the Chinese community gave Bruce an ultimatum to stop teaching their traditions to non-Chinese, considered barbarians at the time, something Bruce did not comply with, so who was challenged to a fight with a renowned exponent of San Francisco Kung Fu at the time, Wong Jack-man, trained in the northern Shaolin style (which has a wide repertoire of kicking techniques, rather than the Wing chun used by Bruce Lee at the time). A date was then set for the match (the date was December 1964), which would take place in the room where Lee taught his classes. The arrangement of the fight was that if Bruce lost he would have to stop teaching foreigners, in addition to closing his schools; but if he won, he would be free to teach white Caucasians or anyone else, Chinese or not. Although later, Wong Jack-man denied this, saying that a friend of his gave him a paper where Bruce invited him to to fight; Wong attended a demonstration that Bruce performed at a theater in Chinatown and there, after hearing Bruce say that he could beat any martial artist, he agreed to fight and gave Lee a role. Wong also mentions that he does not discriminate against Caucasians and non-Chinese. In an interview, Bruce commented, "That paper had all the names of the Chinatown sifus on it, but it doesn't scare me."

The wrestler representing the traditional Chinese community of San Francisco, Wong Jack-man, tried to put certain rules to the fight, such as not hitting the genitals or the eyes, but Lee told him that the conditions were set by him, who was the challenged, and the combat would take place without any rules.

There are several versions of this encounter. There is that of Linda Emery, who recounts in the book she wrote about the life of her husband, Bruce Lee: The Man Only I Knew and in accordance with what Bruce Lee himself declared in a radio interview, the Chinese wrestler after an exchange of blows, began to circle around the gym after which Bruce catches up with him, knocks him to the ground giving him punches to the head, and keeping him there with an immobilization technique asks him, three times, in the Cantonese language: "Is it enough?", receiving the answer "yes, it is enough".

Other explanations say that the challenger began attacking and Bruce responded with three straight fists, although only the first clearly impacted his jaw; This one was placed at a distance in which Bruce Lee could not reach with his short movements and gave him a blow that hit Bruce in the left part of his jaw, this made him react and he launched himself after Wong Jack-man, who seemed to run away Bruce Lee chases him through the entire room, hitting him on the back and on the head (as a result of which he recounts in the aforementioned radio interview that his fists had swollen, thus beginning to realize the limitations of Wing Chun, in the long distance). The man was trying not to face him, turning to face him, but finally Bruce cornered him and he gave up.

Bruce later realized that the fight had lasted longer than he thought and that he was exhausted, so he decided to improve his physical condition to have more resistance. On the other hand he decided to modify his Kung Fu to work better against circular blows and added a wide range of displacements. He also started training his fists with bags of hard sand and stones. As he made modifications to the style, he disassociated himself from Wing Chun and began to call the new style Jun Fan Gung Fu ("Bruce Lee's Kung Fu"), which three years later he would label it Jeet Kune Do, even more evolved.

Filming of Enter the Dragon

During the filming of Enter the Dragon (Operation Dragon), which was the last film Bruce Lee shot and finished just weeks before his death, producer Fred Weintraub and co-stars Bob Wall and Bolo Yeung have publicly recounted the constant challenges Bruce Lee received behind the scenes from Chinese extras hired for the film, many of whom were martial artists and members of local criminal organizations or triads. Chinese. Bruce usually tried to ignore them for the most part but found it difficult on some occasions.

The film's co-star, Bob Wall, recounts a challenge he witnessed in which, despite the loss of filming time and work involved, Bruce Lee accepted:

"The man came out of a leap and was much bigger than Bruce, definitely wanted to hurt him, but he started the fight and Bruce started hitting him, making him keys in his feet, keys in his hands, played with him. Bruce wasn't bad, but he did show him who sent... Chief Bruce was an excellent street fighter... then he ended up and said "Go ahead, let's work"... this fight with the extra was documented. Bruce Lee literally swept the ground with him."
Bob Wall, on the challenges Bruce Lee received in the documentary The Curse of the Dragon (1993).

Bolo Yeung, who also participated in Enter the Dragon, recounts that during the filming of the aforementioned film while Bruce Lee was teaching the choreography to his colleagues, that extra made indirect and offensive comments to Lee behind the scenes, making him understand that his fighting style was not real. Given this, Yeung recounts in Cantonese:

«When we filmed Enter the Dragon (Operation Dragon), a double challenged Lee Siu Lung ("The Little Dragon" in Chinese), this wanted to try the Jeet Kune Do, and Bruce says, "OK, come and go then." They moved a little, until she got a kick from Bruce Lee. That was enough. And it all ended... very fast».
Bolo Yeung, about the extras that challenged Bruce Lee in the documentary The Life of Bruce Lee (1994).

Fred Weintraub, who was the producer of the film and was also constantly with Bruce Lee during the filming of the film, also talks about the challenges that occurred during filming:

"I was worried that someone would get hurt because there were challenges every day...they had a rite where they challenged where they crossed their hands and beat their feet...but the fights for luck didn't last long because Bruce, Dad, Pa!, knocked them out and went on."
Fred Weintraub, on the challenges to Bruce Lee, in the documentary The Curse of the Dragon (1993).

You can also find other eyewitness accounts, such as that of Paul Heller, the other producer of Enter the Dragon, who refers to Bruce Lee as someone "incredibly fast".

In the interview with Bruce Lee between 1971 and 1973 by his disciple George Lee (Knowing is not enough: Interview with Bruce Lee) mentions a martial artist and extra from the aforementioned film, called Lo Tai Chuen, who openly challenged Bruce Lee in the media.

Film career

Beginnings in acting

Bruce Lee is the baby of the movie Golden Gate Girl.

Her first film appearance was at the age of two months in Golden Gate Girl, also known as Tears of San Francisco; this film was shot in San Francisco in the year 1940, but it was released a year later, in 1941.

Subsequently, Bruce made around twenty more films, all of which featured his stage name, Lee Siu Lung , meaning "Little Dragon Lee"; this nickname stuck with him for the rest of his life and was acquired in the 1948 film, Wealth is Like a Dream. The 1950 film The Kid is the only one in the one who worked with his father, but curiously they do not appear together in any scene.

In February 1965, Bruce and his wife Linda had their first child, Brandon, and 6 days later, Lee Hoi-Chuen (Bruce's father) died in Hong Kong, so he left immediately to attend to the funeral; When he returned to Oakland, Bruce received the phone call from Ed Parker, who told him to audition in Hollywood with William Dozier, executive producer of the TV series Batman, who had seen him a year earlier. at the martial arts exhibition he had given in Long Beach. Dozier then asked Bruce if he would be interested in playing the role of Lee Chan (The Number One Son) in a film adaptation. Charlie Chan television. Bruce expressed interest in the project and just a week later he left for Hollywood, where he auditioned. Bruce signed an option contract and immediately began drama classes; the studio, 20 Century Fox, gave him drama and acting classes, in order to better exploit his expressive skills and adapt it to the American film market, but his hopes were dashed when he received a call from Dozier informing him that the series had been suspended. Dozier knew about Bruce through a mutual friend of his and Parker's (Jay Sebring, the Hollywood hairdresser who was a friend of Sharon Tate, both of whom were killed in the Charles Manson-led massacre).

Lee playing Chow Chung in the movie The Thunderstorm(1957)

In February of the following year (1966), Bruce was offered a supporting role in the television series The Green Hornet, playing Kato, where he worked alongside Van Williams. Once the contract was signed, he packed up his things and moved with his family to Los Angeles, where he bought a small apartment on Wilshire Boulevard in Westwood. His friend, James Y. Lee, was very sad, but Bruce promised to visit him. as often as he could, to train with him and his students. The success that this series obtained went beyond the screens, since Bruce was showing an innovative fighting technique, unknown at that time to the American public accustomed to boxing fights; this series lasted one season and ended successfully in 1967. Also, Bruce returned to his character as Kato and appeared in three episodes of the series Batman.

In 1967, Bruce opened his third Jun Fan Gung-Fu Institute, which was his last kwoon; This one was located at 628 College Street, in Los Angeles' Chinatown, and, unlike the ones he had in Seattle and Oakland, this one had no identifying mark, and even to maintain anonymity the windows were painted. Bruce did not need the gym to live, because, fortunately, he could do it from his appearances on television and movies. So, in this way, the people of Chinatown were handpicked from among talented martial artists, film stars, and show business people that Bruce had known, like Joe Lewis, Mike Stone, Steve McQueen, James Coburn, Stirling Siliphant, Kareem Abdul Jabbar, among others.

Read as Kato (right) next to Van Williams on TV show The Green Hornet (1966).

Bruce did not like crowded classes, as he wanted the classes to be as close to personal training as possible, giving the example of a boxing trainer who could only teach two or three max if he wanted them to. the boxer answered him above, in the ring. It was for this reason that he rejected the offer to found a chain of gyms under the name of Kato.

Around those years, Bruce had small roles in Ironside and Here Come the Brides. In 1969, Lee made a cameo appearance in his first American film, Marlowe, in which he portrayed a thug hired to intimidate private detective Philip Marlowe, who was played by James Garner.

In 1970, after suffering a back injury while lifting weights and receiving less than encouraging results from the doctors, Bruce began to recover in a matter of months. He wanted to resume his artistic career, so he began working on the script for The Silent Flute together with James Coburn and Stirling Silliphant; said film should have launched him to stardom. This script is sent to Warner Brothers and after a few months they give the project the green light on the condition that it be shot in India, so Bruce, Coburn and Silliphant travel to the aforementioned place, exactly in New Delhi. There they spend ten days looking for locations for the film without any success. By the beginning of 1971, Bruce had The Warrior in mind (The Warrior), a film that would deal with a Shaolin monk from the American Old West in search of knowledge and adventure. Paramount Pictures and Warner Brothers received Bruce's proposal but both wanted him to act in a more contemporary type of series, that related to the old west. By June 1971, Bruce felt badly emotionally since he could not find work in the world of acting, and he also wanted to capture his fighting system on the screens, so his friend Stirling Silliphant write a script exclusively This is a time for him in which Bruce can show his views on fighting and the philosophy of martial arts. Lee began recording the first episode of the television series Longstreet, which was titled "The Way of the Intercepting Fist", the same name as his fighting system.

«... You know, I did. Longstreet For Paramount, and the Paramount wanted me to be on a TV show. On the other hand, Warner Brothers wants me somewhere else. But both of you, in my opinion, want me to be in a modern type of something and think the Western idea is out... »
Bruce Lee, about Paramount Pictures and Warner Brothers.

Finally, Warner Brothers accepted the idea of The Warrior and carried it out under the main name Kung-fu; However, Bruce was greatly disappointed when he found out that the creator of the series was not him but another person named Ed Spielman, in addition to the fact that ABC Network, which worked in conjunction with Warner Brothers, appointed the American actor David Carradine for the leading role, being discriminated against for his Chinese ancestry, not well seen in American forums. Later, Warner Brothers executive Harvey Frand acknowledged that he and Jerry Thorpe, who was the director of the series, wanted Carradine as the lead, claiming that they didn't use Bruce as the lead actor because it was supposed to be a very risky bet commercially, but that, even so, a large part of the studio wanted Lee as Caine.

Consecration

Bruce Lee in The Big Boss (1971).

In mid-1971, while visiting Hong Kong, Bruce was surprised to learn that the series he had filmed a few years earlier, The Green Hornet (The Green Hornet), it was a hit, and even there they called it The Kato Show. After that he returned home to Los Angeles, but immediately received a call from a film producer in China, Raymond Chow, of Golden Harvest; he offered Bruce $15,000 commission if he would agree to star in two of his movies, which Lee agrees to, though before leaving he finishes filming the first episode of the Longstreet series, "The Way of the Intercepting Fist".

At that moment he decides to go live in Hong Kong, and asks Taky Kimura (head of the Seattle school), James Lee (head of the Oakland school) and Dan Inosanto (head of the Los Angeles school), that they close their activities, and that they no longer dedicate themselves to teaching commercially what they had been taught.

After arriving in Hong Kong, Bruce immediately leaves for Pak Chong, Thailand, to shoot his first film The Big Boss (El Gran Jefe or Karate to the death in Bangkok). In Bruce Lee's first in-person meeting with Raymond Chow, upon shaking his hand, Bruce told him, "I'm going to be the biggest Chinese star in the world." Filming of the film, which lasted six weeks, began in very harsh conditions, and with a budget of one hundred thousand dollars; during the first week of the film, Bruce sprained his ankle and caught a bad flu during his recovery process, and recordings were sometimes cut due to cockroach infestations. Bruce and the other actors lost weight during filming; they did not eat due to the poor conditions in which the food was prepared and instead took vitamin pills to be able to endure the shooting.Finally, the director, Wu Chai Wsaing, is replaced by his bad character and as a replacement comes Lo Wei; the problems between him and Bruce started quickly. After finishing the recordings, Bruce and part of the recording team returned to Hong Kong, and immediately, while still at the Kai Tak airport, they held an impromptu press conference where they announced the date. premiere for October 3 of that same year in Hong Kong.

Three days later, Bruce returned to the United States for just three more episodes of Longstreet, where he appeared as the martial arts teacher of Mike Longstreet (James Franciscus). In early October, Lee returned to Hong-Kong for the premiere of The Big Boss; film that became a resounding success, managing to raise three hundred and seventy-two thousand dollars on its first day, after three days it reaches one million and reaches a total of three million two hundred thousand dollars. After the premiere of The Big Boss, Bruce rose to the height of Chinese popularity, where he was considered a national hero.

After the film, several production companies wanted to have Bruce in their ranks; they even sent him a blank check in order to leave Chow. On the other hand, Warner Brothers wanted to resume and speed up the project of The Silent Flute , offering him twenty-five thousand dollars., Lee decided to reject them all and fulfill the contract he had with Golden Harvest, dedicating himself completely to his next film, Fist of Fury (Eastern Fury or Fists of Fury), where the superiority of Kung Fu over the Japanese martial arts of karate, judo and samurai fencing was exploited. This as a way to ward off the feeling of Chinese inferiority in the face of the Japanese invasion of Manchurian territory during the war. The success achieved in Fist of Fury exceeded all expectations and managed to raise USD 4,431,423 in his native Hong Kong, breaking a box office record set by his previous film The Big Boss; with this, Bruce Lee became an established star of martial arts films.

Logo of Concord Production Inc.

In 1972, and the contract with Golden Harvest had expired, Raymond Chow offered him a new contract to return to work with the director Lo Wei in the film Yellow Faced Tiger, but Bruce refused. He denied that he himself wanted to direct his own films, so Bruce and Chow created Concord Production Inc., in which Bruce contributed the creative aspect and Chow the economic one.

Lee and Chow's first project was Way of the Dragon, a film in in which Bruce was an actor, screenwriter, co-producer and director, and was also in charge of playing the percussion on the central theme of the soundtrack. The recording of this film took place in Rome, Italy, where the actress Nora also performed Miao, the actor Bob Wall and the seven-time world champion of "sports karate" in the modality of full contact and stylist of Tang Soo Do Chuck Norris. After a month of filming in Rome, Bruce returned to Hong Kong with Norris and Wall. A day later, the three appeared on the television show Enjoy Yourself Tonight to promote the film.

Bruce Lee intended Way of the Dragon to be the first in a trilogy, though before doing so he began what would become his next film, Game of Death (Game of Death), recording scenes with his friends and disciples Dan Inosanto, Tse Hon Joi and Kareem Abdul Jabbar.

In December of that year (1972), Bruce attended the premiere of Way of the Dragon, a film that became another box office success in the Chinese circuit, since Bruce did not want it to come out of him, grossing more than five million dollars and breaking again all the records set by his previous films. This film is considered a classic of martial arts, and the fight in the Roman coliseum is one of the most memorable in filmography. from Bruce Lee; It is known as the fight of the century.

A few days after the release of Way of the Dragon, Bruce intended to continue filming Game of Death but this was interrupted after he received an offer of five hundred thousand dollars from Ted Ahley, president of Warner Brothers, to be the lead actor and co-director of the fight scenes in the martial arts film Blood and Steel; Bruce did not like the name and asked that it be called Enter the Dragon (Operation Dragon), a title that the producers accepted. This was the first Chinese martial arts film to be released. be produced by a major Hollywood studio (Warner Brothers), in association with the company Concord Production Inc.

Game of Death was put on hold to make way for filming on Enter the Dragon, which began filming in January 1973, in Hong Kong. The cinematographic production of this new film was better than the previous ones, but even so Bruce was nervous, since it was his first international project, which delayed the start of production. There were problems with the translation of the script, in addition to some cultural conflicts, since the American team did not want to eat typical Chinese food, and there were also frequent injuries due to the lack of special equipment to guarantee safety in the most risky scenes. Bruce suffered several injuries and accidents during the recording, such as a cut with a bottle that hit him and the bite of a cobra. I was restless and highly strung; he wanted the film to be good and accepted by western audiences.

Bruce and some film crews saw the entire project of Enter the Dragon at a special review preview where neither the music nor the special effects had been added yet; Bruce felt that he was finally going to become an international star. The premiere was set for August 29, 1973, at Grauman's Chinese Theater (Hollywood Chinese Theater).

«... Bruce could see the final version of Enter the Dragon and he could see his work done. He really liked it. Between the day of his death in July and the premiere in August, some scenes of the film were cut, especially those of philosophical content. He had a lot of determination and knew what he wanted to communicate about martial arts and their philosophy. I was determined that your dream was part of the movie... I am very happy that the viewers know Bruce with the version that he liked best, Bruce would feel very proud to be able to say and that people would say of him: "He was a real human being." He was vibrant and full of life being faithful to himself. »
Linda Lee Cadwell, about Bruce Lee and Enter the Dragon.

Enter the Dragon was shown in Hong Kong six days after his death, while the US premiere was only in August of that year. The film was an overwhelming box office success, grossing $200 million upon its opening, and coming in second only to The Exorcist (which grossed $357,500,000 upon its opening), but surpassing other films like Serpico, by Al Pacino, High Plains Drifter, by Clint Eastwood, The Gallows Noose, by John Wayne, among other; Bruce Lee gained posthumous fame among the American public and is considered his masterpiece. One of the most remembered scenes of this film is the fight that Lee, the name of Bruce's character, has with Mr. Han (Shih Kien) in the hall of mirrors. Said film was cataloged in 2004 as "culturally significant and important" by the Library of Congress of the United States (Library of Congress) and was selected to be preserved in the National Film Registry (National Film Registry) of said country.

Game of Death was the next film in his filmography; filming began in late 1972, before the start of Enter the Dragon, so Bruce Lee only recorded forty minutes of the film before his untimely death. The film was finished by Golden Harvest and premiered in 1978, making use of a double and notorious -even crude- montages. Only eleven minutes of the initial shooting were added.

Last months and death

Private life

Bruce Lee and his son Brandon in 1966.

In March 1961, Bruce Lee began studying at the University of Washington, where he majored in philosophy; During the fall of 1962 he began to give kung fu classes at the "Space Needle" Restaurant in Seattle and it was during the course of one of his classes that he met a young woman named Linda Emery Cadwell (a Caucasian woman of English and Swedish parents).), which had been invited by one of Bruce's friends. After dating for a while, they became engaged. During the year 1963, Bruce opened the "Jun Fan Gung Fu Institute" on University Route 4750 in Seattle, which soon became a famous martial arts academy; the price to be a student was twenty-two dollars per month. Still, Bruce felt that Seattle did not offer him the possibilities that California could and decided to move there.

In June 1964, Bruce Lee decided to continue his studies at the University of Washington in Oakland, California, in order to open his second martial arts school there (Oakland Gung Fu Institute) and thus achieve greater economic stability. After leaving, Bruce promised Linda that he would return, although she did not believe him at first since her parents were opposed to the relationship. After several months in which they continued to maintain contact through letters, Bruce returned to Seattle and he proposed to Linda. They were married on August 17, 1964, and that same day they left for Oakland, California.

Bruce and Linda lived in the home of James Y. Lee and his wife. At that time, Bruce did not have money to rent an apartment, and until the gym was put into operation, he did not have the possibility to support his new family, so they were financially dependent on James, who was delighted to have them in his house. They got a place whose rent was not too excessive to open their kwoon, and they set out to fix it to start school as soon as possible. The first students soon arrived.

In early 1965, Bruce Lee's enthusiasm for martial arts became his greatest burden. His institute located in Oakland, which had such a good start, began to decrease in number of students, something that translated into economic losses. In February of that year, his son Brandon was born. However, a week later he is informed of the death of his father Lee Hoi-Chuen. A few years later, in 1969, Bruce and Linda had Shannon Lee. film career and from film to film, he managed to position himself as the best martial artist not only in his personal life, but also in the world of cinema.

In 1973, at the height of his fame, he served as technical editor of a book devoted entirely to wing chun, written by the only one of the three students Bruce Lee certified to teach his view of martial arts who was of Chinese descent, James Yim Lee. J. Lee learned his wing chun from Bruce Lee, and only photos of people of Chinese origin appear in the book, including Ip Man (thank you), Ted Wong, and Bruce Lee himself.

Philosophy

Bruce Lee's interest in philosophy began when he was under the tutelage of sifu Ip Man in wing chun. Ip Man had always been interested in the philosophy of wing chun, and this he passed on to Bruce, something that had a great influence in it.

"If there is something Ip Man gave Bruce and that he could have crystallized Bruce's direction in life, he was interested his students in the philosophical teachings of Buddha, Confucius, Lao-Tse, and other great Chinese thinkers and philosophers. As a result, Bruce's mind became the distillation of the wisdom of such teachers. »
Linda Lee Cadwell in her book The Bruce Lee Story.

The second major philosophical influence on Bruce Lee was the Indian philosopher Jiddu Krishnamurti. Bruce discovered that Krishnamurti's way of looking at life was the same as his own, such as knowing that: "Seeking knowledge leads to self-knowledge.". Bruce emphasized this teaching. It was one of the most important concepts that they derived from their study of Krishnamurti.

One thing Bruce Lee practiced throughout his life was self-motivation; he had various motivational books from which he drew positive-everyday thoughts from him.In 1969, when he was 29 years old, Bruce left behind the ideas of earning money by teaching martial arts; In addition, he was mentally ill since he could not unite his two artistic passions such as acting and martial arts, and for this reason, he began to apply what he had read in the books of Napoleon Hill. Bruce Lee began to write his goals in his journal (which he carried wherever he went), and mentioned to his wife Linda that he needed a plan to work with. One of the goals he wrote down was as follows:

"My main definitive objective:
I, Bruce Lee, will be the first best paid Eastern superstar in the United States. In return I will give you the most exciting performances and make the best quality, in the capacity of actor. Starting in 1970, I will start the route to be world famous and from there on, until the end of 1980, I will have in my possession the sum of ten million dollars. I will follow the path that I please and, I will achieve inner harmony and happiness. »
Bruce Lee, January 1969.

Jeet Kune Do

Main article: Jeet Kune Do

The Jeet Kune Do uses the Taijitu emblem, which represents the concepts of yin and yang. The Chinese characters indicate: "The use of "non-form" as form and "non-limitation" as limitation." The arrows represent the endless interaction between the yin and the yang.

In 1967, Bruce decides to call the method of combat he had been doing as "the way of the interceptor fist"; these words appeared for the first time in January of that year, in his diary and written in Chinese: 截拳道, which phonetically is heard as "zit kyun dou". After a few months, exactly in In July 1967, Bruce decided to correct the English phonetic translation of "zit kyun dou" (the way of the intercepting fist), finally calling it Jeet Kune Do. However, Bruce regretted having put a name on it. name, since that turned it into another martial art, something he did not want since his idea was to exist outside of parameters and limitations. Bruce insisted that Jeet Kune Do was just a name, as he used to say. it had been Jun Fan Gung-Fu (the name he gave to the combat method he practiced before calling it Jeet Kune Do). That is why he emphasized "no style" or "no form". In this sense, he mentioned: "The difference between having no form and having the & # 34; no-form & # 34;, is that the first shows incompetence and the second transcends."

Many of the concepts of Jeet Kune Do are drawn from wing chun, western boxing, eskrima, judo, kickboxing, western fencing, tangsudo, Greco-Roman wrestling, and other martial arts that Lee trained throughout his life. With the experience gained in the training he had, Bruce realized that the classic styles were too mechanized and limited, which is why he created Jun Fan Gung-Fu ("Bruce Lee's Kung-fu"), a system that has the basic training methods, techniques and strategies for a fight, in addition to being used as self-defense. He also discovered that whatever the style, there are only five distances in which every fight is divided (long, medium, short, melee and ground) and five attack methods (simple direct/simple angular, progressive indirect, by combination, by induction and by immobilization of the hand). This is something that differentiates it from being a style of wrestling or a martial art; Well, a style, whatever it may be, marks a certain way of fighting according to the distance that that style manages; on the contrary, a practitioner of Jun Fan Gung-Fu/Jeet Kune Do, is not limited to one or two distances, since he handles all five and that gives him total freedom of choice. Bruce felt that his Jun Fan Gung-Fu it was good but a bit restrictive for combat so using the philosophy he studied and the system he created, Bruce began to apply what worked best for him in combat and it eventually became a philosophy that was later called Jeet Kune Do. In other words, Jun Fan Gung Fu was the basis for the Jeet Kune Do process to begin.

"I don't teach only "karate" because I don't believe in styles, I don't think there is a Chinese fighting style or a Japanese fighting style or any other country... there would have to be humans with three arms or four legs so there would be another style of struggle. If there are no other human beings on Earth with a structure other than ours, there are no other fighting styles and because I say that, because we have two arms and two legs, the important thing is to use them to make the most of it... With the arms you can follow a straight line, a curved line, draw circles, you can hit slow but sometimes they don't seem so slow, with the legs the same occurs, up and down... And after all that, you ask yourself how you can sincerely express yourself at every moment."
Bruce Lee, about fighting styles.

Jeet Kune Do is an idea, but not a system; With his practice, the individual can find the cause of his own ignorance since he looks for his own way and takes advantage of everything that best suits his way of being, he also uses all the means that one believes are necessary in his life but is not limited to none in particular. It is a process of constant evolution and improvement without a specific goal, and with a philosophy of total freedom for those who use it. In the words of Bruce Lee: «The art of Jeet Kune Do is simply to simplify....”. This was Bruce Lee's personal expression of what worked best in combat.

“Can Jeet Kune Do be taught? I always say yes. Can it be standardized, obviously not... The original Jeet Kune Do is nothing but the Jun Fan Gung-Fu, material that Bruce Lee passed me while living. The Jun Fan Gung-Fu can be taught and more important can be systematized so that students can easily understand it, the Jun Fan Gung-Fu prepares you for your own personal growth method.
So make it clear that the Jeet Kune Do is not a new style of Karate or Kung Fu. Bruce Lee did not invent any new style, nor changed any existing styles, nor did he mix different styles in a kind of compound style. His main idea was to release his followers from fixed styles, moulds or patterns, is to return to the foundations, to the original concepts that give effectiveness to martial arts.
According to sifu Bruce, knowledge in martial arts means self-knowledge. The Jeet Kune Do is simply a mirror in which we reflect ourselves. Truth is like a journey without paths or paths... The Jeet Kune Do is not an organization or institution that one can be a member of, it is that easy. My truth is not your truth and your truth is not mine. The master of Jeet Kune Do is not a possessor of truth, it is merely a guide and the student must discover the truth by himself. »
Dan Inosanto, a pupil of Bruce Lee, explains the teaching of the Jeet Kune Do.

Jeet Kune Do is not a process of accumulation or a daily addition of techniques and more techniques, but quite the opposite, it is a process of continuous elimination of what is useless. Taking the useful and discarding the useless, but, Even so, a person can continue practicing various martial arts as long as they do not intend to cover the entirety of it, since only what really works for oneself in the combat system they are practicing should be used. Jeet Kune Do is not a martial art since it does not look for elaborate, complex techniques and stylized movements that are actually unnecessary, but instead goes for the direct and simple, and also focuses on realism in combat. For Bruce, the complicated and showy techniques served to amaze the public in exhibitions and films, but they were not usually effective in defending a street fight, which is why he used, together with his sparrings a team of protections that allowed to get as close as possible to the reality of combat.

"For me, the martial arts consist of knowing how to express themselves with sincerity, that is very difficult to do... for me it would be very easy to mount a show and boast, get rid of that feeling and make me tough and all that. I could do many false things and dazzle or teach very blossome movements but express yourself with sincerity, without fooling yourself, expressing yourself with all sincerity, that, my friend, is very difficult to do... You have to train a lot, you have to have good reflexes to use when you need to move, be able to move and do it with determination... If I hit the fist, I hit it hard, that's the most important part of the training. »
Bruce Lee, about his thinking about martial arts.

Training

Bruce Lee kept a detailed record in his diary of the different training sessions and the dates of each day to compare results and continually improve. He trained for eight hours a day and his activities, among others, were: calisthenics, exercises with weights and elastic bands, daily running for about 16 km with intervals, and the continuous improvement of a certain blow or technique, against the bags, the dummy of wood, various implements, and even against the Makiwara (hitting board used in traditional karate), and work in pairs (sparrings). He wanted to always be stronger, faster, more flexible, coordinated and resistant, he was 1.72 meters tall (5 feet 7½ inches) and weighed 62 kg.

Bruce Lee Statue at the Hong Kong Heritage Museum.

At a crucial moment in his life, he seriously injured his sciatic nerve and sacrum, for which he had to undergo a tedious rehabilitation process and remain inactive for a long time, around six months, which he dedicated to studying and compose notes that would be published after his death as The Tao of Jeet Kune Do. Although for some reason, despite later having the means to do so, in his lifetime he never published them. And although the doctor told him that perhaps he would never walk again, he not only walked again, but his kicks returned to what they were before and he continued with his arduous training in search of perfection in the art of combat..

Hard training allowed him to perform proverbial and unbelievable physical feats without tricks, including: doing a number of push-ups on two fingers on his hand, knocking down fighters twice his weight with his side kick , develop striking power at very close range through the one-inch punch, perform an agile and flawless flying kick, develop tremendous instantaneous punching speed (thirty-hundredths second) due to which their sparring men simply did not see the blow that knocked them down, in addition to a prowess in weapons such as the nunchaku, the Bō (or long stick) with the Filipino technique, including the management of the two medium sticks or «olisi». According to him he said:

"I do not represent a style but all styles. You don't know what I'm about to do, but I don't know either. My movement is the result of yours and my technique is the result of your technique."

In addition to Chinese Wing Chun, and throughout his life, Lee also adopted some techniques and tactics from various martial arts and combat sports, such as: boxing, Judo, eskrima, Greco-Roman wrestling, western fencing, Muay Thai and Tangsudo in his style, although he did not want to classify it and call it style, but rather said that they were principles; based on distance, individual physical characteristics and opportunity. For him there was not, nor did there have to be, a predefined style for fighting. Likewise, Lee developed his own grappling techniques, and adopted several of the boxing movements based on the large collection of films he owned where he watched them over and over again, but above all he studied the way of fighting the famous champion Muhammad Ali, al who meticulously observed and studied through his recorded matches; These videos would go back and project them in order to be able to realize each of the details and nuances of his movements.These techniques were not only going to be applied to himself; Bruce intended to duel Muhammad Ali, which was never consummated.

Lee stood out for technical perfection and balance, coordination, the impressive speed of his feints and feints, his admirable physical development and body control.

His image, charisma and influence on martial arts have made him a classic. In life he had great movie stars and renowned martial artists as his followers and also as his students during his stay in the United States, among them are: James Coburn, Steve McQueen, Dan Inosanto and Chuck Norris, who were also his friends.

Truncated projects

Way of the Dragon Trilogy

Prior to the release of Way of the Dragon (The Return of the Dragon or The Rage of the Dragon), Bruce intended that his character, Tang Lung, was the protagonist of about two more films, giving rise to a trilogy, but he postponed this idea since his friends went on vacation to Hong Kong and he did not miss the opportunity to record what, at that time, would be his next film, Game of Death. He then received a proposal from Warner Brothers to film Enter the Dragon, so he also left Game of Death for later. Death.

The Silent Flute and Southern Fist, Northern Leg

In 1970, Bruce sustained a severe back injury while lifting weights. During his recovery, he decided to write the script for a film that should have launched him to stardom, The Silent Flute, in conjunction with James Coburn and Stirling Silliphant. The script was sent to Warner Brothers and after a few months they accepted the project on the condition that they look for filming locations in India, so Bruce, Coburn and Silliphant traveled to that country and chose the city of New Delhi for the recordings. During the 10 days they spent looking for places for the film there were problems. The night they arrived in India the hotel staff where they stayed decided to give Coburn a star treatment, something that annoyed Bruce, so he he asked Silliphant to go complain, and further mentioned that one day he would be the biggest movie star in the world, much bigger than Coburn, but Silliphant ignored him. Another problem was when Bruce started to give kung fu demonstrations, this annoyed Coburn as he wanted privacy, but at Bruce's demonstrations people flocked closer. It was because of these problems that the project was eventually abandoned.

After a while, Warner Brothers tried to resume the project but Bruce decided to reject them and fulfilled the contract he had with Golden Harvest, devoting himself completely to his next film Fist of Fury ( Eastern Fury or Fists of Fury). Also, when the press learned about this project, Bruce did not want to film it.

In August 1972, Bruce Lee wrote a letter to his wife Linda mentioning that he had been working on a script for a new film called Southern Fist, Northern Leg. of the South, Northern Leg) and told him that: Without a doubt this film will have a place in the ninth heaven.

Bruce Lee wrote Southern Fist, Northern Leg as a way of scripting The Silent Flute in his own way. In the documentary Bruce Lee: The Man & The Legend (Golden Harvest / Concord Productions), which came out just after his death in 1973, Bruce talks, in Cantonese, about some plot facts.The meaning of the film is about the origin of martial arts. As in The Silent Flute, Bruce wanted to play a hero who travels in search of an external object, in other words, a book that will show him the whole truth about martial arts. After going through various tests and fighting various martial arts masters, he realizes that the answer lies within himself and that he has always been there.

Five years after Bruce's death, Warner Brothers reprized The Silent Flute but replaced some violent and erotic scenes with comedic content. The film was retitled Circle of Iron (Circle of Iron). This film was starred by David Carradine and Christopher Lee in 1978. Even so, Bruce Lee's philosophical content was maintained. The plot of this film is considered one of the best in martial arts although, according to critics, the choreographies of the fights in this film were very poorly elaborated. Currently, it is not known why Southern Fist, Northern Leg has not been carried out, despite the existence of a script.

Game of Death

Game of Death (The Game of Death) was released in 1978, but the reality is that until Bruce's death there was no original script, there was only ideas for what the film would be, as well as storyboards. The main idea Bruce Lee was working on was an international martial arts fighter named Hai Tien, who retires after winning the world tournament. The Mafia The Korean girl finds out about her fighting prowess and they do everything possible to make her part of a group sent to a 5-story pagoda, heavily guarded by skilled martial artists, who are protecting something (not identified at all in any material related to the film) lying on his last level. After having said no to the Korean mafia and being back home, Hai Tien is informed of the kidnapping of his family by the Korean mafia, forcing him to get involved. Hai Tien is then accompanied by two more martial artists (James Tien and Chieh Yuan), and the three of them make their way through the pagoda, encountering different challenges on each floor. The place where the pagoda is located is the Peobjusa temple. in Songnisan National Park in South Korea.

"I am currently working on the script for my next film. I have not really decided the title yet, but what I want to show is the need to adapt oneself to the changing circumstances. The inability to adapt brings destruction. I already have the first scene in my mind. When the film starts, the audience sees a great deal of snow. Then the camera focuses on a group of trees while the sounds of a strong window fill the screen. There's a big tree in the middle of the screen and it's all covered with thick snow. Suddenly there is a strong shawl and a large branch of the tree falls to the earth. He can't stand the weight of the snow, so he breaks. Then the chamber is fixed on a willow that is bending with the wind. As adapted to the environment, the willow survives. "
Bruce Lee on the start of Game of Death (Words of the Dragon16 August 1972.

Bruce conceived his idea after a visit to India in 1971 with actor James Coburn and writer Stirling Silliphant while scouting locations for their project The Silent Flute. While there, Bruce he noticed that the pagodas had ascending tiers. This gave him the idea to do fight scenes in a pagoda, where each level would have a different and more difficult threat.

The fights in this film came about thanks to the availability of actors Dan Inosanto, Tse Hon Joi and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, who were on vacation in Hong Kong, something Bruce took advantage of. These fights he planned to insert later length of the movie. Bruce also asked his friend Taky Kimura to participate in this film but the fight never came to pass due to his death. This film was not fully filmed since Warner Brothers offered him to shoot Enter the Dragon (Operation Dragon).

«I took the scenes of my father, Game of DeathAnd I threw the rest of the tape... I thought it was a good idea. »

— Brandon Lee, Bruce Lee actor and son about Game of Death.

In 1977 and in order to resume the project that was left unfinished, the production company Golden Harvest hired 8 writers to carry out Bruce's idea and 3 American writers to give the film an international appearance, and it even came to contact ex-soccer player Pelé in order for him to have a small appearance, but negotiations fell through. After half a year studying the character of Bruce Lee and giving a new plot to the film, Game of Death it premiered in 1978.

Shaw Brothers

At the beginning of 1971, shortly before Bruce Lee returned to Hong Kong, he decided to study the options available to him and thus find a studio capable of giving him everything he wanted to become an international star. Through his friend Unicorn Chan, Bruce met the owner and president of Shaw Brothers, Run Run Shaw, who offered Bruce a contract that included a salary of $2,000 per film. Bruce declined and decided to go with him. producer Raymond Chow, who was going bankrupt until he took out a loan and began making money shooting movies with Bruce. During that year, Run Run Shaw offered Bruce a blank check in order to leave Chow, but Lee did not accept since he had a word agreement and that was more important to him.

In 1972 and after the premiere of Way of the Dragon, Run Run Shaw accepted Lee's conditions and prepared all the necessary details to present him with a new film project, in which he would give life to two characters, one good and one bad. One of the characters would be that of Nian Kan Yao, a military legend of the Qing dynasty, known for being one of the greatest and most ruthless war heroes of his era.

The last letter Bruce wrote to the owner of Shaw Brothers expressed the ease he had in dealing with Run Run Shaw:

"Dear Run Run, From now on, consider the months of September, October and November (1973). A three-month period, reserved for Shaw Bros. The specific terms (of negotiation) will be discussed on my arrival. "
Bruce. (November 1972).

Legacy

"I have no doubt that he would have been world champion in the MMA, I have no doubt. [...] He was fluid, free, fast, his movement was very fluid, efficient and functional. There are many men who are addicted to strength, are conditioned, and when they barely get to increase their muscle mass, they become rigid and slow. Bruce was free and agile. »

—Conor McGregor, mixed martial arts wrestler and UFC, about Bruce Lee.

His legacy can be found in movies, interviews, books and more objects that serve to learn a little about his way of training, as well as his philosophy. The fact of having created a combat method such as Jun Fan Gung-Fu and then applying his philosophy of life where he discards the unnecessary of a fighting style to make it evolve and give rise to Jeet Kune Do, makes it considered the pioneer of contact combat and without rules such as mixed martial arts.

Bruce Lee's drawing.

Another of the things that encompasses his great legacy is having achieved the opening to the West of Chinese martial arts and the dissemination of Kung Fu in its true dimension, which before him were unknown and only predominated in fanciful Chinese movies with stunts produced, being Karate and Judo the only oriental martial arts known in the West in the 1950s.

It can also be said that Lee, due to his renown, was responsible for the international spread of the wing chun system, which, together with tai chi chuan, is the most widely practiced kung fu style in the world. Many of the current practitioners of martial arts do at least once a comparative review of their fighting technique and that of Lee, in such a way as to apply some of his concepts to his own style. After his explosive appearance through the schools and his subsequent films, the trail left by this unique martial artist began to be followed.

Even so, the Chinese film industry exploited to satiety the unsatisfied commercial sale of a Western and Eastern public eager to see films of the genre and style raised in the famous films where Bruce Lee acted. After his death, the Chinese industry placed any martial artist who was physically similar to Lee and his technique to make films of dubious script quality and technical expression to overexploit the film market with his figure, and they even placed Lee masks in natural size on the face of the actor.

The magazines dedicated to martial arts also fell into the overexploitation of the figure of Lee, revealing his techniques, training, personal life, blows, thoughts, etc. His ideas, philosophy and training methods have been reviewed and applied in many modern martial arts academies throughout the world. Today, it is still possible to find his portrait or posters of his person in many martial arts academies.

I owe my current state of development to my previous training in wing chun style, a great style. That art was taught by Mr. Ip Man, the current leader of the Ving Tsun System in Hong Kong, where I was raised.
Bruce Lee, interview for the magazine Black Belt.

Bruce Lee Statue on Hong Kong Star Avenue.

There are monuments erected in his honor in various parts of the world; a bronze statue was unveiled on Hong Kong's Avenue of Stars on November 27, 2005, to commemorate the 65th anniversary of his birth, and another statue was unveiled on the same day in Bosnia. A few years later, he was presented to the public another bronze statue in Chinatown, the Chinese neighborhood located in the city of Los Angeles; this was performed on the 40th anniversary of Lee's death, as well as the 75th anniversary of Chinatown.

Bruce Lee Star on Hong Kong Star Avenue.

Bruce Lee also earned a place on Hong Kong's Avenue of Stars as well as the Hollywood Walk of Fame. he was posthumously awarded the Hong Kong Film Industry Lifetime Achievement Gold Award. influential of the 20th century, in addition to being considered one of the heroes and icons of history; in the same year he was awarded America's Community of Fellow Actors Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2004, Enter the Dragon was honored by the United States Library of Congress (Library of Congress) as "culturally significant and important" and was selected to be preserved in the National Film Registry (National Film Registry) of that country.

Bruce Lee Star at the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

The life of Bruce Lee has been made into movies and television; In 1993 the movie Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story (Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story) was released, with the participation of Jason Scott Lee as Bruce Lee (no relation of kinship between them); In 2008, the television series The Legend of Bruce Lee (The Legend of Bruce Lee) premiered in Hong Kong, starring Chan Kwok-Kwan as Read; this series was produced by Yu Shengli and Shannon Lee.

His eldest son, Brandon Lee, was also an actor and, like his father, participated in some martial arts films, but his career was cut short after an accident where he died due to the negligence of third parties on the recording set of The Crow, being shot in a scene that was later burned. He is currently survived by his wife Linda Cadwell and his daughter Shannon Emery Lee, who continues to maintain and promote his father's legacy through the Bruce Lee Foundation.

Over the years, unpublished material by Bruce Lee has continued to come out, and the material produced by this artist has also been remastered; As a tribute, Lee has been mentioned and personified, as well as being taken as an inspiration in some film and television productions:

The Return of the Dragon (1974) and The fury of the dragon (1976) are the respective compilations of the series The Green Hornet (The green wasp), edited as telefilm.
Game of Death II (Last fight), from 1981, is a Japanese film that incorporates Bruce Lee inserts.
The Best of the Martial Arts Films is a 1990 documentary showing scenes of Bruce Lee's fights and other martial artists.
Bruce Lee and Kung Fu Mania1992 is a compilation clip of Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan and other martial artists.
Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story (Dragon: The Story of Bruce Lee), of 1993, is a famous biographical film about Bruce Lee.
Cinema of Vengeance1994 is a sample of the history of martial arts in the cinema.
Top Fighter, 1995, is another sample of the history of martial arts in cinema.
Bruce Lee's family appears in the second season of the program Famous Families in the 1999 "The Lee's: Action Speaks Louder" episode; this was the third episode of the program.
Modern Warriors2002 is a documentary about the great masters of martial arts.
The Art of Action: Martial Arts in Motion Picture2002 is a documentary narrated by actor Samuel L. Jackson.
Cinema Hong Kong: Kung Fu, of 2003, is a documentary on the cinema of martial arts of Hong Kong.
In the film starring Jackie Chan City Hunter, of 1993, shows a scene where the film is projected Game of Death; in that scene there is a fight similar to that of Bruce Lee with Kareem Abdul-Jabbar; finally Jackie Chan uses the techniques he observes and thanks the screen, receiving a response from Bruce Lee through the screen.
The Dutch actor Danny Chan Kwok-Kwan recognized Bruce as his idol, and for that reason and for his physical resemblance, he agreed to interpret it in some films, such as: The Legend of Bruce Lee, Ip Man 3 or homage in the film Shaolin Soccerwhere a suit resembling Lee's is placed in Game of Death; it should be noted that Chan is also a practitioner of Jeet Kune Do.
Stephen Chow claimed that Bruce is his idol and decided to pay tribute to him in his film Shaolin Soccer, making your character, at the beginning of the tape, say: My idol Bruce Lee used the same technique as me..
At the end of the movie Ip Man 2 a young Bruce Lee appears asking to be trained in wing chun by Ip Man.

"Bruce Lee... the greatest. [...] Imagine it in this movie (The Expendable 2). It was the James Dean of Asia, no more or less. »

— Jean-Claude Van Damme, actor and karate expert, about Bruce Lee.

In the movie No Retreat, No Surrender (Retreat never, surrender never), of 1996, played by Kurt McKinney and Jean-Claude Van Damme, appears an actor representing the ghost of Bruce Lee, who teaches Jeet Kune Do to the protagonist, Jason (interpreted by McKinney).
Once Upon a Time in High School (also known as The Spirit of Bruce Lee), of 2004, is a film that narrates a story of love and hatred, with some references to Bruce Lee.
Finishing the Game: The Search for a New Bruce Lee, of 2007, it is a comedy where the actors who are to interpret a posthumous film by Bruce Lee are sought.
Marshall Law and Forest Law characters from the video game series TEKKEN they are inspired by Bruce Lee; in the command list you can appreciate movements and techniques similar to those executed by Bruce Lee, and some of his poses of victory are equal to some poses that Lee executed in his films.
Liu Kang, from the video game saga Mortal KombatIt's inspired by Bruce Lee.
They are Goku on the sleeve and anime of Akira Toriyama Dragon Ball, in the final part, when faced with Piccolo Daimaho Junior, throws blows and even screams like Bruce's, besides that at the beginning of the series says that his grandfather Son Gohan taught him kung fu. In the saga Z, it trains on a ship heading for Namekusei, where you can appreciate Bruce's characteristic movements, such as making head-flips, that is, vertically, using his arms, and making lizards with his thumbs.
On the sleeve and anime Shaman King, the soul that possesses Jun Tao (len Tao's sister) is called Lee Bruce Long. This character, when he was alive, had a very similar story to that of Bruce Lee, being also considered a great master of martial arts.
Rock Lee, from the anime and manga series NarutoIt's inspired by Bruce Lee.
Might Guy, from the anime and manga series NarutoHe's also inspired by Bruce Lee.
Spike Spiegel, series Cowboy BebopHe's a Jeet Kune Do practitioner.
Kim Dragon, character of the video game World HeroesIt's inspired by Bruce Lee.
Maxi, one of the characters in the video game saga SoulCaliburHe uses nunchakus and screams similar to Bruce Lee's.
Hitmonlee, one of the characters Pokémon (as a fighter), he's inspired by Bruce Lee.
Bruce Lee makes an appearance in the second phase of the video game D.D.CrewSega.
Abyo, character of the series PuccaIt's a parody to Bruce Lee.
The Poof Fighting Techniques, Telefilm Wishology, compilation of the series Magic godfathersare similar to those used by Bruce Lee.
Kenshiro, main character of the sleeve Hokuto No Ken (The Fist of the North StarIt's a combination of Bruce Lee and Mad Max.
Jann Lee, video game Dead or AliveIt's inspired by Bruce Lee.
Cornell, character of the video game Castlevania Legacy of DarknessIt's inspired by Bruce Lee.
K' and Kula Diamond, characters from the video game series The King of FightersThey use techniques of Bruce Lee's Jeet Kune Do, like fist of an inch or the flying kick with regress.
Jacky and Sarah, from the video game saga developed by Sega Virtua Fighter, they practice the Jeet Kune Do, and even in the animated series of the same saga they use the kick with a mortal back, as Bruce Lee did in his movie Operation Dragon against O'Hara, and Jacky himself mentions in the third chapter of the series practiced by Jeet Kune Do, the martial art developed by Bruce Lee.
On the sleeve Tenjou Tenge, a character named Inosato Dan is similar both in appearance and in his way of fighting Bruce Lee. His name is also a clear reference to Dan Inosanto.
Lee Sin and his skin Dragon Finger of the video game League of Legends They're inspired by Bruce Lee.
The Fei Long character of the game saga Street Fighter, it is clearly inspired by Bruce Lee, as it uses similar movements, screams in the same way, and looks a lot physically, in addition to both being of hongkoné origin.

Media appearances

Books

Bruce Lee (1963), Chinese Kung Fu, the Phylosophical Art of Self-defense, ISBN 0-89750-112-8.

J. Yim Lee (1972), Wing chun kung fu, chinese art of self-defense, technical editor: Bruce Lee. Los Angeles: Ohara Publications, Incorporated.

The Tao of the Jeet Kune Do: a publication authorised by her widow Linda Lee Cadwell, years after her husband's death, in which her personal notes are gathered.

Bruce Lee's method of combat (4 volumes): a series published by an editor after his death, where he shows a facet of his interpretations of martial art.

Bruce Lee. The Man behind the Legend, the first original biography on Bruce Lee in Spanish (T fakeB Editores).

Bruce Lee. The Warrior of Bamboo, study on the philosophy of Bruce Lee (T street editors).

Revista Bruce Lee Mania, official publication of European Bruce Lee Clubwith support from the Bruce Lee Foundation.

Zen in martial artspublished in 1990. The author of the book, Joe Hyams, recounts in the book his experiences when practicing with Bruce Lee.

Filmography

Main article: Annex:Filmography of Bruce Lee

Cinema
Year	Title	Paper	Notes
1969	Marlowe (Marlowe, very private detective)	Winslow Wong
1971	The Big Boss (The Great Chief or Kárate to Death in Bangkok)	Cheng Chao-an
1972	Fist of Fury (Eastern Furia or Puños de Furia)	Chen Zhen	Also known as The Chinese Connection
1972	Way of the Dragon (The Return of the Dragon or The Dragon Furor)	Tang Lung
1973	Enter the Dragon (Operation Dragon)	Mr. Lee	Released six days after Bruce Lee's death
1978	Game of Death (The game of death)	Hai Ten/Billy Lo	Filmed in 1972

Television

Television
Year	Title	Paper	Notes
1966-1967	The Green Hornet (The Green Airplane or The Kato Show)	Kato	26 episodes
1966-1967	Batman	Kato	Episodes: "Spell of Tut", "A Piece of the Action" and "Batman's Satisfaction"
1967	Ironside	Leon Soo	Episode: "Tagged for Murder"
1969	Blondie (in) (The New Blondie)	Instructor	Episode: "Pick on Someone Your Own Size"
1969	Here Come the Brides (en) (Here come the brides)	Lin	Episode: "Marriage Chinese Style"
1971	Longstreet	Li Tsung	4 episodes
1971	The Pierre Berton Show (en) (The show by Pierre Berton)	Himself
1970-1973	Enjoy Yourself Tonight (in) (Have fun tonight)	Himself	3 episodes; his last television appearance was in this program.

Video Games

Video games
Year	Title	Character
1984	Bruce.	Bruce.
1987	China Warrior	Wang
1988	Vigilante	Bruce.
1989	Bruce Lee Lives: The Fall of Hong Kong Palace (en)	Bruce.
1991	D. D. Crew	Bruce.
1992	World Heroes	Kim
1993	World Heroes 2	Kim
1994	World Heroes 2 Jet	Kim
1994	Tekken	Marshall Law
1995	World Heroes Perfect	Kim
1995	Tekken 2	Marshall Law
1996	Tekken 3	Forest Law
1998	Street Fighter Alpha 3	Fei Long
1999	Tekken Tag Tournament	Forest Law
2001	Bruce Lee: Tower of Death	Bruce.
2002	Bruce Lee: Quest of the Dragon	Bruce.
2002	Tekken 4	Marshall Law
2003	Bruce Lee: Return of the Legend	Bruce. Hai Feng
2005	Tekken 5	Marshall Law
2006	Bruce Lee: Iron Fist 3D (only for mobile phones)	Bruce.
2007	Tekken 6	Marshall Law
2008	Ultimate Bruce Lee	Bruce.
2011	Tekken Tag Tournament 2	Marshall Law Forest Law
2014	Bruce Lee: Enter the Game	Bruce.
2014	EA Sports UFC	Bruce.
2016	EA Sports UFC 2	Bruce.
2016	Tekken 7	Marshall Law
2016	Broforce	Lee
2017	EA Sports UFC 3	Bruce.
2020	EA Sports UFC 4	Bruce.

Bruce-holding

Main article: Bruce-exploitation

Due to the enormous success of Bruce Lee's films, numerous imitators emerged, including three: Bruce Li, Dragon Lee (also known as Bruce Lei), and Bruce Le. The movies starring these copycats were mostly of low quality. This genre is known to fans as "Bruce-explotation". Notable is the 1977 film The Clones of Bruce, in which the various impersonating actors appeared together, along with some actors who used to appear in the real Bruce Lee films. The film is considered the ultimate expression of "Bruce-explotation".

Some of the most representative Bruce Lee impersonators are: Bruce Chen, Bruce Lai, Bruce Lau, Bruce Lei (different from Dragon Lee), Bruce Leung Siu-Lung, Bruce Liang, Bruce Lo, Bruce Ly, Bruce Thai, Dragon Sek (aka Dragon Shek), Judy Lee, Jun Chong (aka Bruce K.L.Lea, or Bruce Lea), Kim Tai-Jung (aka Tong Lung, Tang Lung, or Kim Tai-Chung), Li Hsiu-Hsien (aka Danny Lee), Sammo Hung, Tang Lung (another, not Kim Tai-Jung), among others.

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