An Action Star Moves to the Lead
By SONIA KOLESNIKOV-JESSOP
Published: August 19, 2009
SHANGHAI — Over the past 26 years, the actor Donnie Yen has developed a dedicated following in Asia for his impressive martial arts skills, and a cult status internationally for his roles in popular action movies, including “Once Upon a Time in China II,” “Hero,” “Shanghai Knights” and “Seven Swords.” But until recently, he had, he said, “never tasted what it meant to be a superstar.” Instead, in big-budget movies, he often played in the shadow of established Asian stars like Jet Li and Jackie Chan.
But with “Painted Skin” and “Ip Man,” two Asian-box-office successes in 2008, Mr. Yen’s star is finally rising. “He’s been around as along as the two Js,” said Daniel Yun, managing director of MediaCorp Raintree Pictures, referring to Mr. Li and Mr. Chan. “For a long time he was the third choice; but with his films making big money at the box office, he’s become the leading man to watch.”
“Painted Skin,” which was co-produced by Raintree Pictures, grossed 230 million yuan, or about $33 million, at the Chinese box office last year, making it the second most successful film of the year there, behind John Woo’s “Red Cliff.”
“Donnie is the ‘it’ action person right now,” said the producer and director Peter Ho-Sun Chan, who cast Mr. Yen, 46, in “Bodyguards & Assassins,” a big-budget period action film directed by Teddy Chen that is set for release in Asia in December, and about six months later in Europe and North America. “He has built himself into a bona fide leading man, who happens to be an action star.”
Mr. Yen seems to approach his newfound success with healthy skepticism. In a recent interview in Shanghai, where he was filming his final scene for “Bodyguards & Assassins,” the actor commented that he had “a lot of new friends” now — whereas in the late ’90s he couldn’t find anybody to help finance “Ballistic Kiss,” his second film as a director and producer.
“Now all the producers are calling me and I’m having films lining up all the way to 2012,” he said. “It’s beginning to sink in that after 26 years in the industry I’m finally having my break.”
In addition to completing “Bodyguards & Assassins,” in which he plays a gambler who agrees to protect the Chinese revolutionary Sun Yat-Sen during his brief 1905 visit to Hong Kong, Mr. Yen also recently finished work on Daniel Lee’s “14 Blades.” In the $20 million Ming-era martial arts movie, to be released in February in Asia, he plays Green Dragon, a sword-fighting special agent.
Mr. Yen acknowledges that he has tended to avoid expanding his acting abilities. “I came in to the industry by total accident,” he said. At 19, he was spotted in Hong Kong by the director Yuen Woo-ping while traveling from Beijing — where he had been studying martial arts — back to the United States, where his family had been living since he was 11. Mr. Yuen was looking for a new kung fu movie hero and, impressed by Mr. Yen’s skills, offered him the part.
“Even though I was learning all the dramatic techniques, it never sunk in that at the end of the day I should be an actor,” Mr. Yen said.
He also believes that directors had never really encouraged him to act. “It was more ‘come in, fight, look cool, show your muscles,”’ he said, laughing.
That is changing, however, and Mr. Yen said his confidence has grown. “It’s only in the last three years I started to concentrate on acting,” he said. He added that it wasn’t until the 2008 martial arts epic “An Empress and the Warriors” that he felt he “was the character.”
“When I made people cry on the set I thought ‘I must have done something right,”’ he said.
This month, he started shooting the sequel to “Ip Man,” in which he plays the title role — a part which Mr. Yun of Raintree Pictures said he felt would ultimately define Mr. Yen as an actor. The “Ip Man” films are based on the life of the eponymous martial arts master, who taught, among others, the kung fu superstar Bruce Lee. While the first installment focused on Ip Man’s life in China in the 1930s, the sequel will look at his early years in Hong Kong and his first meeting with a young Bruce Lee. “Ip Man 2” is set for release in Asia in May, and Mr. Yen has already committed to shooting “Ip Man 3” if the sequel is successful.
The actor said that he had prepared very seriously for the film. “I’m a very energetic man, but Ip Man was the opposite, he was very slow,” he said. “So for months, I was talking slow, walking slow, even drinking tea slowly.”
Despite his growing success, Mr. Yen is realistic about the type of films he will potentially be offered. “I don’t think there will be heavy, complicated characters written for me, even if they now know I can do emotional,” he said. “I don’t think you’re going to see me in a film without action because I don’t think investors are going to put their money in such a film. That’s not what the audience wants to see me in.”
And as a veteran action star, he’s also aware the career clock is already ticking. He said that he had noticed that, with age, the time he needed to recuperate from an action sequence was increasing. “I’ve actually given myself a retiring deadline for acting of 50,” he said. “I want to push myself to the limit, but I don’t want to be hanging around.” But, he said, he still planned to be involved in movies.
“I know I can still have some influence in the action directing department and raise the bar,” he said. “I still have a lot of ideas.”
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Originally Posted by doug maverick
