Quotes

I don't want to be remembered as the son of Bruce Lee.

I always had a pretty good knack for raising hell.

Because we do not know when we will die, we get to think of life as an inexhaustible well. And yet everything happens only a certain number of times, and a very small number really. How many more times will you remember a certain afternoon of your childhood, an afternoon that is so deeply a part of your being that you cannot conceive of your life without it? Perhaps four, or five times more? Perhaps not even that. How many more times will you watch the full moon rise? Perhaps twenty. And yet it all seems limitless.

[About The Crow (1994)] "It's a story about justice for victims".

[About The Crow (1994)] "I've done other films with violence in them, but I must say I've never done anything where I felt the violence was as justified as it is in this...This is justice".

I've done my work and I'm happy with it...I respect my father very much, but I'm a very different person than he was.

"I don't know if I was destined to play this role, but I feel very fortunate to be doing so." (on his last film, The Crow (1994)).

"The trip reinforced my suspicions that, despite my Pacific Rim heritage, I'm about as American as you get." (explaining that he feels no particular affinity for Asia and does not want to live there)

"It's either in the genes, or I watched too many of his movies as a kid" (on why his film roles echo those of his dad)

"It's such an intensely personal thing for me.. I'd probably have been a little too crazy" (On why he refused the role in Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story (1993)).

A fight can express things people might not be able to say with words.

"It's funny, [...] for that sequence the director just said, say something insulting to him, it doesn't matter what. So I said something pretty insulting, and they didn't subtitle it, and they never asked me what it meant. [..] (Laughter)" (on the insult he says in Cantonese in Rapid Fire (1992))

You only have the burdens on you that you choose to put there.

All I can tell you is that you cannot make choices in your own career, either career choices or choices when you're actually working as an actor, based on trying to downplay or live up to a comparison with somebody else. You just can't do that. You have to do your own work based on your own gut, your own instincts, and your own life.

[About Eric Draven] He has something he has to do and he is forced to put aside his own pain long enough to go do what he has to do."

[on why moving on after grief is important to realize your own dreams and purpose] Sometimes a personal tragedy provides the impetus we need to move on in life. It's easy to become stuck. We get lazy and we don't want to change. Change can be such a hassle. That's not to say that everyone requires a tragedy in their lives in order to get their ass moving, to take some kind of action or make some kind of decision: but if it happens, it can be definitely open your eyes. It can make you look at life differently, it can change your whole world, 'Why did this have to happen? What have I done? Why couldn't it have been somebody else?' Sometimes it can make you a better person, Or a different person.

Well, I don't think I'll get the chance to stop doing action films completely, anytime soon. But I'd like to be able to kind of flip flop back & forth. You know, do something that is a little more independent. (On what films he wants to do in the future. Big Breakfast, '92).

My only bad sin I guess is that I drink a lot of coffee.

Being brawny or brave only gets you so far. Soul can make up for anything.

I always wanted to be an actor, it was just a matter of time before I got there.

I have a lot of good memories of my dad, beginning when I was just a kid and I used to work out with him and his circle of students. He practiced Jeet-kune-do, a martial art that he invented himself using moves and principles from many of the martial arts.

My dad was a martial artist first and an actor second. I've devoted the majority of my time to being an actor.

Ever since I was young, I wanted to be an actor, I've watched my father's films literally hundreds of times, and I always get inspired by them.

[on doing 'Kung Fu: The Movie'] I felt it was some kind of justice that it was my first film, since the original idea for the pilot was conceived for my father.

I firmly believe that my father would not have wanted his life to be a problem to me. If I had a son, I would want to be a benefit, not a burden.

For an actor it's boring to always do the same kind of role. I want to do drama, comedy, farce...everything.

[on his desire to be an actor] I never wanted to do anything else even when I was in elementary school.

My mother is very wise and intelligent. If I have children and can do half as good a job as she did in keeping me in line, I'll be very happy.

[1992, on doing action films] I wouldn't want to refer to them as stepping stones. That seems to demean them. But I'm hoping they will get me to another place. I don't think of this ('Rapid Fire') as a stepping stone, but neither would I like to think it will be my bread and butter. I'd like to have the kind of career that would leave a wide body of work, like Mel Gibson, who does the 'Mad Max' and 'Lethal Weapon' films but can also step off and have credibility with 'The Year of Living Dangerously' or 'Hamlet.'

I appeared in several productions on the stage. Then I worked for a producer, reading scripts and rewriting synopses. And when I was 20 I did a TV movie.

[1992, eerie quote from 'The Seattle Times' newspaper] I really enjoy fight sequences. There's a tremendous sense of creativity about them. What worries me are the special-effects scenes. You're not in control if a roof is supposed to collapse on you and you have to trust that it's rigged properly. The accident on 'Twilight Zone' (which killed actor Vic Morrow) is always in the back of your mind. There's an ambulance standing by just in case.