Bruce Lee

Bruce Lee was a Hong Kong-American Martial artist and Actor

Date of Birth	:	27 Nov, 1940
Date of Death	:	20 Jul, 1973
Place of Birth	:	Chinese Hospital, San Francisco, California, United States
Profession	:	Actor, American Martial Artist
Nationality	:	American
Social Profiles	:	Facebook Twitter

Bruce Lee (ব্রুস লি) was a Hong Kong-American martial artist and actor whose career spanned Hong Kong and the United States. He was the founder of Jeet Kune Do, a hybrid martial arts philosophy drawing from different combat disciplines that is sometimes credited with paving the way for modern mixed martial arts (MMA). Lee is considered by some commentators and martial artists to be the most influential martial artist of all time and a pop culture icon of the 20th century, who bridged the gap between East and West. He is credited with promoting Hong Kong action cinema and helping to change the way Chinese people were presented in American films.

Born

Born in San Francisco and raised in British Hong Kong, Lee was introduced to the Hong Kong film industry as a child actor by his father. However, these were not martial arts films. His early martial arts experience included Wing Chun (trained under Yip Man), tai chi, boxing (winning a Hong Kong boxing tournament), and apparently frequent street fighting (neighbourhood and rooftop fights). In 1959, Lee moved to Seattle. In 1961, he enrolled in the University of Washington. It was during this time in the United States that he began considering making money by teaching martial arts, even though he aspired to have a career in acting. He opened his first martial arts school, operated out of home in Seattle. After later adding a second school in Oakland, California, he once drew significant attention at the 1964 Long Beach International Karate Championships of California by making demonstrations and speaking. He subsequently moved to Los Angeles to teach, where his students included Chuck Norris, Sharon Tate, and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. In the 1970s, his Hong Kong and Hollywood-produced films elevated the Hong Kong martial arts films to a new level of popularity and acclaim, sparking a surge of Western interest in Chinese martial arts. The direction and tone of his films dramatically influenced and changed martial arts and martial arts films worldwide. He is noted for his roles in five feature-length Hong Kong martial arts films in the early 1970s: Lo Wei's The Big Boss (1971) and Fist of Fury (1972); Golden Harvest's The Way of the Dragon (1972), directed and written by Lee; and Golden Harvest and Warner Brothers' Enter the Dragon (1973) and The Game of Death (1978), both directed by Robert Clouse. Lee became an iconic figure known throughout the world, particularly among the Chinese, based upon his portrayal of Chinese nationalism in his films, and among Asian Americans for defying Asian stereotypes in the United States. Having initially learnt Wing Chun, tai chi, boxing, and street fighting, he combined them with other influences from various sources into the spirit of his personal martial arts philosophy, which he dubbed Jeet Kune Do (The Way of the Intercepting Fist)

Lee died in July 1973, aged 32. Since his death, Lee has continued to be a prominent influence on modern combat sports, including judo, karate, mixed martial arts, and boxing, as well as modern popular culture, including film, television, comics, animation, and video games. Time named Lee one of the 100 most important people of the 20th century.

Early life

Bruce Lee's birth name was Lee Jun-fan. His father Lee Hoi-chuen was a Cantonese opera singer based in Hong Kong. His mother Grace Ho was born in Shanghai, and she was of Eurasian ancestry. In December 1939, his parents traveled to California for an international opera tour in Chinatown, San Francisco. He was born there on November 27, 1940, allowing him to claim U.S. citizenship due to the United States' jus soli citizenship laws. When he was four months old (April 1941), the Lee family returned to Hong Kong.[15] Soon after, the Lee family experienced unexpected hardships over the next four years as Japan, in the midst of World War II, launched a surprise attack on Hong Kong in December 1941 and ruled the city for the next four years.

Lee's maternal grandfather was Cantonese, his maternal grandmother was English and his maternal great-uncle, Robert Hotung, was a Hong Kong businessman of Dutch Jewish and Cantonese descent.

Career and Education

Lee's father Lee Hoi-chuen was a Cantonese opera star. As a result, the junior Lee was introduced to the world of cinema at a very young age and appeared in several films as a child. Lee had his first role as a baby who was carried onto the stage in the film Golden Gate Girl. He took his Chinese stage name as lit. Lee the Little Dragon, for the fact that he was born in both the hour and the year of the Dragon by the Chinese zodiac. As a nine-year-old, he co-starred with his father in The Kid in 1950, which was based on a comic book character, "Kid Cheung", and was his first leading role. By the time he was 18, he had appeared in 20 films. After attending Tak Sun School several blocks from his home at 218 Nathan Road, Kowloon), Lee entered the primary school division of the Catholic La Salle College at age of 12

Lee and Yip Man in 1958

In 1956, due to poor academic performance and possibly poor conduct, he was transferred to St. Francis Xavier's College, where he was mentored by Brother Edward Muss, F.M.S., a Bavarian-born teacher and coach of the school boxing team. After Lee was involved in several street fights, his parents decided that he needed to be trained in the martial arts.In 1953, Lee's friend William Cheung introduced him to Ip Man but he was rejected from learning Wing Chun Kung Fu under him because of the long-standing rule in the Chinese martial arts world not to teach foreigners. additional citation(s) needed, His one quarter European background from his mother's side was an initial obstacle towards his Wing Chun training. Cheung spoke on his behalf and Lee was accepted into the school. Lee began training in Wing Chun with Yip Man. Yip tried to keep his students from fighting in the street gangs of Hong Kong by encouraging them to fight in organised competitions.

After a year into his Wing Chun training, most of Yip Man's other students refused to train with Lee when they had learned of his mixed ancestry, as the Chinese were generally against teaching their martial arts techniques to non-Asians. Lee's sparring partner, Hawkins Cheung, states, "Probably fewer than six people in the whole Wing Chun clan were personally taught, or even partly taught, by Yip Man". However, Lee showed a keen interest in Wing Chun and continued to train privately with Yip Man, William Cheung, and Wong Shun-leung. In 1958, Lee won the Hong Kong schools boxing tournament, knocking out the previous champion, Gary Elms, in the final.[18] That year, Lee was also a cha-cha dancer, winning Hong Kong's Crown Colony Cha-Cha Championship.

1959–1964: Continuous studies and martial arts breakthroughUntil his late teens, Lee's street fights became more frequent and included beating the son of a feared triad family. In 1958, after students from a rival Choy Li Fut martial arts school challenged Lee's Wing Chun school, he engaged in a fight on a rooftop. In response to an unfair punch by another boy, Bruce beat him so badly that he knocked out one of his teeth, leading to a complaint by the boy's parents to the police.

Unproduced works

Lee had also worked on several scripts himself. A tape containing a recording of Lee narrating the basic storyline to a film tentatively titled Southern Fist/Northern Leg exists, showing some similarities with the canned script for The Silent Flute (Circle of Iron) Another script had the title Green Bamboo Warrior, set in San Francisco, planned to co-star Bolo Yeung and to be produced by Andrew Vajna. Photoshoot costume tests were organised for some of these planned film projects.

Personal life

Lee's Cantonese birth name was Lee Jun-fan The name homophonically means "return again", and was given to Lee by his mother, who felt he would return to the United States once he came of age. Because of his mother's superstitious nature, she had originally named him Sai-fon which is a feminine name meaning "small phoenix". The English name "Bruce" is thought to have been given by the hospital attending physician, Dr. Mary Glover.

Lee had three other Chinese names: Lee Yuen-cham a family/clan name; Lee Yuen-kam which he used as a student name while he was attending La Salle College, and his Chinese screen name Lee Siu-lung Siu-lung means "little dragon").[citation needed] Lee's given name Jun-fan was originally written in Chinese as however, the Jun Chinese character was identical to part of his grandfather's name, Lee Jun-biu [citation needed] Hence, the Chinese character for Jun in Lee's name was changed to the homonym instead, to avoid naming taboo in Chinese tradition.

Friends, students, and contemporaries

Lee's brother Robert with his friends Taky Kimura, Dan Inosanto, Steve McQueen, James Coburn, and Peter Chin were his pallbearers. Coburn was a martial arts student and a friend of Lee. Coburn worked with Lee and Stirling Silliphant on developing The Silent Flute. Upon Lee's early death, at his funeral Coburn gave a eulogy Regarding McQueen, Lee made no secret that he wanted everything McQueen had and would stop at nothing to get it. Inosanto and Kimura were friends and disciple of Lee. Inosanto who would go on to train Lee's son Brandon. Kimura continued to teach Lee's craft in Seattle. According to Lee's wife, Chin was a lifelong family friend and a student of Lee.

James Yimm Lee (no relation) was one of Lee's three personally certified 3rd rank instructors and co-founded the Jun Fan Gung Fu Institute in Oakland where he taught Jun Fan Gung Fu in Lee's absence. James was responsible for introducing Lee to Ed Parker, the organiser of the Long Beach International Karate Championships, where Lee was first introduced to the martial arts community. Hollywood couple Roman Polanski and Sharon Tate studied martial arts with Lee. Polanski flew Lee to Switzerland to train him. Tate studied with Lee in preparation for her role in The Wrecking Crew. After Tate was murdered by the Manson Family, Polanski initially suspected Lee Screenwriter Stirling Silliphant was a martial arts student and a friend of Lee. Silliphant worked with Lee and James Coburn on developing The Silent Flute. Lee acted and provided his martial arts expertise in several projects penned by Silliphant, the first in Marlowe (1969) where Lee plays Winslow Wong a hoodlum well versed in martial arts. Lee also did fight choreographies for the film A Walk in the Spring Rain (1970), and played Li Tsung, a Jeet Kune Do instructor who teaches the main character in the television show Longstreet (1971). Elements of his martial arts philosophy were included in the script for the latter.

Death

Bruce Lee is buried next to his son Brandon at Lake View Cemetery in Seattle.

On May 10, 1973, Lee collapsed during an automated dialogue replacement session for Enter the Dragon at Golden Harvest film studio in Hong Kong. Because he was having seizures and headaches, he was immediately rushed to Hong Kong Baptist Hospital, where doctors diagnosed cerebral edema. They were able to reduce the swelling through the administration of mannitol. The headache and cerebral edema that occurred in his first collapse were later repeated on the day of his death.

On Friday, July 20, 1973, Lee was in Hong Kong to have dinner with actor George Lazenby, with whom he intended to make a film. According to Lee's wife Linda, Lee met producer Raymond Chow at 2 p.m. at home to discuss the making of the film Game of Death. They worked until 4 p.m. and then drove together to the home of Lee's colleague Betty Ting Pei, a Taiwanese actress. The three went over the script at Ting's home, and then Chow left to attend a dinner meeting. Later, Lee complained of a headache, and Ting gave him the painkiller Equagesic, which contained both aspirin and the tranquiliser meprobamate. Around 7:30 p.m., he went to lie down for a nap. When Lee did not come for dinner, Chow came to the apartment, but he was unable to wake Lee up. A doctor was summoned, and spent ten minutes attempting to revive Lee before sending him by ambulance to Queen Elizabeth Hospital. Lee was declared dead on arrival at the age of 32.

In a 2018 biography, author Matthew Polly consulted with medical experts and theorised that the cerebral edema that killed Lee had been caused by over-exertion and heat stroke; heat stroke was not considered at the time because it was then a poorly understood condition. Furthermore, Lee had his underarm sweat glands removed in late 1972, in the apparent belief that underarm sweat was unphotogenic on film. Polly further theorised that this caused Lee's body to overheat while practising in hot temperatures on May 10 and July 20, 1973, resulting in heat stroke that in turn exacerbated the cerebral edema that led to his death In an article in the December 2022 issue of Clinical Kidney Journal, a team of researchers examined the various theories regarding Lee's cause of death, and concluded that his fatal cerebal edema was brought on by hyponatremia, an insufficient concentration of sodium in the blood. The authors noted that there were several risk factors which predisposed Lee to hyponatremia, including excessive water intake, insufficient solute intake, alcohol consumption, and use or overuse of multiple drugs which impair the ability of the kidneys to excrete excess fluids. Lee's symptoms prior to his death were also found to closely match known cases of fatal hyponatremia.