A Thirtieth Anniversary Trip down Memory Lane
Back in 1971, a script came across my desk, so to speak (I actually had no desk: I barely had a front door) that was going to change my life and a whole lot of other people’s. It was called Kung Fu: The Way of The Tiger, The Sign of The Dragon. Jerry Thorpe, at Warner Brothers sent it to me because he’d seen my triumphant portrayal of The Emperor of The Incas on Broadway in ‘65, and had been interested in me ever since. This, he thought, was a perfect role for me.
My manager warned me that there was a series contract attached to the deal, and though I had said many times that I didn’t want to do another series, he was sure that I needed to look this one over. I was astounded. Not only was it a great script, and the kind of thing one rarely (one might say “never”) sees on TV, it also stuck a special resonance for me.
Back in 1967, the “Summer of Love”, I was appearing in a TV Special for CBS, called Johnnie Belinda, with Mia Farrow. One day I was standing by the coffee machine chatting with a man named Murray Susskind. He asked me, if I were to do another series, what would I like it to be about. I said, “I don’t want to do a series.” He said, “Yeah, but if you did, what would it be?” I said, “It would be about Cain, the first murderer, walking in the land of Nod, to the east of Eden, with the mark of God on him, trying to atone for the sin of killing his brother. And I’d set it in the Old West.” He said, “I’m talking about a commercial TV series.” I said, “So am I.” He just walked away, shaking his head.
And now, here it was just exactly what I’d ordered up, maybe mine for the taking. It also had this stuff in it I’d never heard of, called “kung fu.” I knew about Karate, of course. Though I was living on top of a mountain and didn’t even own a TV set, I wasn’t that far out of it. And Judo: I’d heard of that. And way back during the World War II, I’d known about something the Army Commandos used called Jui Jitsu, mostly from comic books, but this “kung fu” was relatively unknown to me. Actually, I’d heard the words twice before, once from a choreographer in New York, and once from a fellow actor. Well, I’d have to see what that was about.
As far as the series commitment went, I reasoned that there was no chance whatsoever of this great story becoming a network series. It was just to radical a departure. I was sure I could do the movie and then get on with my life.
I had, at that moment, for completely unrelated reasons (though, it might be said here that there may be no such thing as a coincidence) shaved my head. When I walked into Jerry Thorpe’s office at Warner Brothers, with my shiny pate, plus barefoot and with my dog in tow, I definitely turned some hairy heads. There wasn’t a lot of question about me playing the part. It was pretty much handed to me. I do remember Jerry asking me what I’d do about the martial arts. I replied that my background as a dancer and what I knew about gymnastics and boxing would see me through. Then, as I was leaving, I jumped up and planted my “Gene Kelly” version of a flying sidekick on the wall above the doorjamb. My bare footprint stayed up there for the whole length of the series.
They put me together with David Chow, and he taught me as much as he could in the short time we had before we would start the film.
We started shooting in October, at Vasquez Rocks, an otherworldly landscape in the mountains about two-hours from Los Angeles by car. I had a little Italian racecar, that I used for the trip every day. It was a super-cold trip. The car had no heater and no top, and the windshield was so tiny that the frigid wind hit me in the face, but the engine kept me warm up to the waist at least. Vasquez Rocks was even colder, and I was in shirtsleeves most of the time.
I got to know Kam Yuen on the shoot, and some other martial artists, and somehow managed to gain and keep the respect of these great fighters. I fell in love with Key Luke, and became kind of a big brother to Radames Pera, who played me as a boy.
I still had my doubts about wanting to do a series. One day, just before Christmas, I was standing next to Jerry Thorpe, the wind whistling around our heads. I said to him, “You know what I want to do? I want us to do our job so well, that it’s just too good for television.” Jerry smiled, and said, “Why don’t we do both?” And I guess that’s what we did.
By the time the network got around to giving the series a green light, I’d decided I could not in any conscience turn down the opportunity to put this great statement before a TV audience.
It worked out pretty well, didn’t it?
