Bruce Lee faces a real dilemma. He is on the verge of a stardom in the United States, with a projected TV series on horizon, but he has just achieved super stardom as a film actor here in Hong Kong, so what does he choose? The East or the West? It’s a kind of problem most budding movie actors , so welcome.

 

It’s the Pierre Berton Show, the program that comes to you from the major capitals of the world. This edition comes to you from Hong Kong and Pierre's guest is the man who taught karate, judo and Chinese boxing to James Garner, Steve McQueen, Lee Marvin and James Coburn. The newest mandarin super star, known in the west for his appearances in Batman, the Green Hornet, Ironside and Long Street. His name is Bruce Lee and he doesn’t even speak mandarin. And here is Pierre.

 

Pierre：Well how can you play in mandarin movies if you don’t even speak mandarin? How do you do that?

Lee：Well first of all, I speak only Cantonese, yeah, so I mean, there is quite a difference as far as pronunciation and things like that kind.

Pierre：So somebody else's voice is used, right?

Lee：Definitely, definitely.

Pierre： You just make the words, sort of. Bruce, doesn’t that sound strange when you go to the movies especially in Hong Kong, in your hometown and you see yourself with somebody else’s voice?

Lee： Well not really, you see, because most of the mandarin pictures done here are dubbed anyway.

（They are dubbed anyway?） Anyway, I mean disregard. I mean they shoot without sound. So it doesn’t, you know, make any difference.

Pierre： Their lips never quite make the right words, do they?

Lee： Oh, yeah, well, that’s where the difficulty lies, you see, I mean in order to, because the Cantonese have a different way of saying things, you know, I mean different from the mandarin.(yeah.) so I have to find like something similar to that, and keep a kind of a feeling going behind them, something that matching the mandarin deal. Does it sound complicated?

Pierre：Like the silent days, like old silent days. But I gather in the movies made here, the dialogue is pretty stilted anyway.

Lee：Yeah, I agree with you. I mean, see, to me, a motion picture is motion, I mean, I mean, you gotta keep the dialogue down to the minimum.

Pierre： Did you go to… did you look at many Mandarin movies before you started to play in your first one?

Lee： yes, yes.

Pierre：What do you think of them when you saw them?

Lee： Quality-wise, I mean, I have to admit that it’s not quite up to the standard, however, it is growing and it’s getting higher and higher and going to, toward that standard, that what I would term quality.

Pierre：They say the secret of your success in that movie, the Big Boss--such a success here and (it) rocketed you to stardom in Asia, was that you did your own fighting. As an expert in the various martial arts in China, what did you think of the fighting that you saw in the movies that you studied before you became a star?

Lee： Well, I mean, definitely, in the beginning, I had no intention or whatsoever, that what I was practising and what I’m still practising now would lead to this, [Yeah, I know] to begin with. But martial art has a very, very deep meaning as far as my life is concerned because as an actor, as a martial artist, as a human being, all these I have learned from martial art.

Pierre： ：Maybe for our audience who doesn’t know what it means, you might explain exactly (All right) what you mean by martial art.

Lee：Right. Martial art include all the combative arts like karate, judo, Chinese kung fu, or Chinese boxing whatever you call it , all those, you see like aikido. I can go on and on and on. But it’s a combative form of fighting, I mean it’s not, some of them became sport but some of them are still not, I mean, they are used, for instance, kicking to the groin, jabbing fingers in the eyes and things like that.

Pierre： No wonder you are successful in it. Chinese movies are full of this kind of action anyway. They needed a guy like you could....
[Violence man]
So you didn’t have to use a double when you moved in the motion picture role here, you did it all yourself? Can you break five or six pieces of wood with your hand or your foot?

Lee：I’ll probably break my hand and foot.

Pierre： But tell me a little bit, you set up a school in Hollywood, didn’t you? For people like James Gardner, Steve McQueen and the others.[Yes.] Why would they want to learn Chinese martial art, because of a movie role?

Lee：Not really, most of them, you see, to me, at least the way that when, I mean, when I teach it, all type of knowledge ultimately means self knowledge. So therefore they’re coming in to, I mean, for, and ask me to teach them not so much of how to defend themselves or how to do somebody in. Rather, they want to learn to express themselves through some movement, be it anger, be it determination or whatsoever. So in other words, what I'm saying therefore is that he’s paying me to show him in combative form the art of expressing the human body.

Pierre：  Which is acting in a sense,[Well..] or it would be a useful tool for an actor to have?

Lee：It’s, I mean, I might, it might sound too philosophical, but it’s unacting acting or acting unacting, if you...

Pierre： You’ve lost me.

Lee：I have, so what I’m saying, actually you see, I mean, is a combination of both, I mean here is the natural instinct, and here is control. You are to combine the two in harmony, not, if you have one to the extreme, you’ll be very unscientific.…if you have another to the extreme, you'll become, all of a sudden, a mechanical man, no longer a human being. So (you) it is a successful combination of both, so therefore, it is not only, I mean, so therefore, it's not pure naturalness, or unnaturalness. The ideal is unnatural naturalness, or natural unnaturalness.

Pierre Berton: yin yang, eh?

Bruce Lee: right man, that's it.

Pierre Berton: uh, one of your students, James Coburn, played in a movie called Our Man Flint, in which he used karate. Was that what he learned from you?

Bruce Lee: Um, he learned it after the film. Not...

Pierre Berton: he went the, after he played in Our Man Flint.

Bruce Lee: Right, right. You see, actually, I do not teach, you know, karate, because I do not believe in styles anymore. I mean I do not believe that there is such thing as, like,  Chinese way of fighting or the Japanese way of fighting, or whatever way of fighting, because unless human being have three arms and four legs, we will have a different form of fighting. But, basically, we have only two hands and two feet. So styles tends to, uh, uh, uh, not only separate man, you know, because they have their own doctrines and then the doctrine became the gospel truth you know, that you cannot change, you know, and, but if you do not have styles, if you just say, "well, here I am, you know, as a human being, how can I express myself totally and completely?" now, that way, you won't create a style because style is a crystallization, you know, I mean, that way is a process of continuing growth.

Pierre Berton: You talk about Chinese boxing....how does it defer, from, say, our kind of boxing?

Bruce Lee: well, first we use the feet.

Pierre Berton: uh-huh, that's a start.

Bruce Lee: and then we use the elbow, and…

Pierre Berton: you use the thumb too.

Bruce Lee: you name it man, we use it!

Pierre Berton: you use it all?

Bruce Lee: you have to, you see, because I mean, that is the expression of the human body. I mean, the, everything, I mean, you know, not just the hand! And when you are talking about combat, well, I mean, if, if it is a sport now, now you talk about something else, you have regulations, you have rules, but when you're talking about fighting as it is…

Pierre Berton: thorough, a real fighting.

Bruce Lee: with no rules, well then, baby, you'd better train every part of your body! And when you do punch, now I'm leaning forward a little bit hoping not to hurt any camera angle, I mean you gotta put the whole hit into it, and snap it! And get all your energy in there and make this into a weapon.

Pierre Berton: I don't want to tangle with you on any dark night, I'll tell you that right now! You came up to me pretty fast there! What…

Pierre Berton: What is the difference between Chinese boxing and what we see the young man doing at eight o'clock every morning on the rooftops (eha) and in the parks called "shadowboxing," which they're always...?

Bruce Lee: well, actually, you see, that is part of Chinese boxing (it is). There are so many schools, different schools...

Pierre Berton: Everybody here seems to be you know, going like this all the time.

Bruce Lee: Haha, well, that's good. I mean, I mean I'm very glad, I'm very glad to see that because at least somebody is caring for their own bodies, right?

Pierre Berton: yeah.

Bruce Lee: I mean that's a good sign. Well it's a kinda of a slow form of exercise which is called "tai chi chuan". I'm speaking mandarin just now (yeah), in Cantonese, "Kai di kune", haha, Okay? (I see) And it's more than an exercise for the elderly, not so much for the young.

Pierre Berton: Give me a demonstration, show me, can you do a little bit of it, just …?

Bruce Lee: I mean, hand-wises, it's very slow and you push it out but all the time you are keeping the continuity going: bending, stretching, everything, you know, suppose, you know, I mean, you, you just keep it moving.

Pierre Berton: It sounds like a ballet dancer there...

Bruce Lee: Yeah, it is, I mean to them the idea is "Running water never grows stale." So you've got to just "keep on flowing."

Pierre Berton: Of, of all your students, famous, James Garner, Steve McQueen, Lee Marvin, James Coburn, Roman Polanski, which was the best? Who, who adapted best to this oriental form of exercise and defense?

Bruce Lee: well, um, depending, ok? Now, as a fighter, Steve, Steve McQueen, now, he is good in that department because, that son of a gun has got the toughness in him....

Pierre Berton: Yeah, I see it on the screen....

Bruce Lee: I mean, he would say, "all right baby, here I am, man," you know, and he'll do it, (yeah) now James Coburn is a peace-loving man....

Pierre Berton: I've met him.

Bruce Lee: Right? I mean, (yeah) you've met him....

Pierre Berton: Yeah.

Bruce Lee: I mean he's really, really nice, I mean super mellow, or, and all that...

Pierre Berton: Yeah, he is!

Bruce Lee: You know what I mean? Now he appreciate(d) the philosophical part of it. Therefore, he's understanding of it, is deeper than Steve. So it's really hard to say, you see what I'm saying now?

Pierre Berton: I see....

Bruce Lee: I mean it's, I mean it's different, that's, depending on what you see in it...

Pierre Berton: Interesting, that, we don't, in our world, and haven't since the days of the Greeks who did, combined philosophy and arts with sport. But quite clearly the oriental attitude is that the three, are facets of the same things.

Bruce Lee: Man, listen, you see, really, to me, ok, to me, ultimately, martial art means honestly expressing yourself. Now it is very difficult to do. I mean it is, it is easy for me to put on the show and be cocky (yeah) and be flooded with a cocky feeling and then feel, like pretty cool and all that. Or I can make all kinds of phony thing, you see what I mean? Blinded by it. Or I can show you some, really fancy movement, but, to express oneself honestly, not lying to oneself, and to express myself honestly now, that, my friend is, very hard to do. And you have to train. You have to keep your reflexes so that when you want it, it's there! When you want to move, you are moving and when you move you are determined to move, not taking one inch, not anything less than that, if I want to punch, I'm gonna do it man, and I'm gonna do it. You see, so I mean, so that is the type of thing you have to train yourself into it, to become one with the…, you think.

Pierre Berton: Yeah, this is very un, western, this attitude. I want to ask you about your movie and TV career, but first uh, we take a break, and we will be back with Bruce Lee.

Pierre Berton: I've been taking to Bruce Lee, mainly about the Chinese martial arts which include things like Chinese boxing, karate and judo, which is what he taught when he was in Hollywood after he left the University of Washington, where he studied, of all things, philosophy, if you can believe that. But he did, but that, perhaps you understand why the two go together from the first half of this program. And you can perhaps understand how he got into films, he knew a lot of actors but I'm told that you got the job on the green hornet, where you played Kato, the chauffeur mainly because you were the only Chinese-looking guy who could pronounce the name of the leading character, Brich Reid!

Bruce Lee: I meant that as a joke of course, haha. And it's a heck of name, man, I mean every time I said it, at that time I was super-conscious, I mean, really now, that's another interesting thing, huh? Let's say if you learn to speak Chinese...

Pierre Berton: yeah?

Bruce Lee: And it's very, I mean it's not difficult to learn and speak the words. The hard thing, the difficult thing, it's behind what is the meaning, what brought on the expression and feelings behind those words, like when I first arrived in the United States and I looked at a Caucasian, and I really would not know whether he was putting me on (yeah) or is he really angry? Because, because we have different way of reacting to it, (of course) those are the difficult things, you see?

Pierre Berton: It's almost as if you came upon a strange race or a smile didn't mean what it does to us. In fact, a smile doesn't always mean the same, does it?

Bruce Lee: of course, not.

Pierre Berton: Yeah, and it's a problem of that. Tell me about the big break when you played in long street...

Bruce Lee: Ahh, that's it.

Pierre Berton: I must tell our audience that Bruce lee had a bit part, or a supporting role in, in the long street series and this had an enormous effect on the audience. What was it?

Bruce Lee: well,…

Well, you see, uh, the title of that, that particular episode of Longstreet is called "the way of the intercepting fist". Now I think the successful ingredient in it was because I was being Bruce lee.

Pierre Berton: Yourself.

Bruce Lee: myself, right. And did that part, just expressed myself, like I say, "honestly expressed myself, at that time. and I, because of that, I brought, you know, favorable mentioning in, like, New York Time, uh which says, like, a chinaman who, incidentally, came off the quite convincingly enough to earn himself a television series and so on and so on and so forth."

Pierre Berton: can you remember the lines by Stirling Silliphant? To the key lines?

Bruce Lee: He's one of my students, you know that?

Pierre Berton: was he too?

Bruce Lee: yes...

Pierre Berton: Everybody's your student! But you read, there are some lines there /// expressed your philosophy. I don't know if you remember them or not....

Bruce Lee: oh I remember them, I said....

Pierre Berton: That's here...

Bruce Lee: this is what it is, ok?

Pierre Berton: you're talking to Longstreet played by James Franciscus...

Bruce Lee: I said, "empty your mind, be formless, shapeless, like water. Now you put water into a cup, it becomes the cup. You put water into a bottle, it becomes the bottle. You put it in a teapot, it becomes the teapot. Now water can flow, or it can crash, be water, my friend, like that, you see?

Pierre Berton: yeah, I see, I got the idea. I got the power behind it...

Bruce Lee: uh-huh....

Pierre Berton: so, now, two things have happened: first there's a pretty good chance that you'll get a TV series in the States called "The Warriors", in which you'll use what, the martial arts in a western setting?

Bruce Lee: Well, uh, that was the original idea. Now Paramount, you know I did Longstreet for Paramount, and Paramount wants me to be in a television series. On the other hand, Warner Brother wants me to be in another one. But both of them, I think, they want me to be in a modernized type of a thing and they think that western idea is out! Whereas I want....

Pierre Berton: But you would use......You want to do the westerner, right?

Bruce Lee: I want to do / because, you see, I mean, how else can you justify all these punching and kicking and violence except in that period of the west? I mean, in nowaday, I mean you don't go around on the street, kicking people or punching people.... because if you do.... (yeah)That's it. I mean, I don't care how "good" you are, I mean, you know.

Pierre Berton: yeah, a gun, but this is true also of the Chinese dramas, which are mainly costume dramas. They're all full of blood and gore over here.

Bruce Lee: oh you mean here?

Pierre Berton: yeah.

Bruce Lee: well, unfortunately,... you see, uh, uh, I hope that the picture I am in would either explain why the violence was done, whether right or wrong, or what not, but, unfortunately, pictures, most of them here, are done mainly just for the sake of violence. You know / I mean, like, you know, fighting for 30 minutes /, get stabbed 50 times.

Pierre Berton: but I'm fascinated, here; let me give you your microphone back...

Bruce Lee: I am a martial artist....

Pierre Berton: I'm fascinated, I'm fascinated that you came back to Hong Kong when you were on the verge of success in Hollywood, and full of it, and suddenly, on the strength of one picture, you become a superstar. Everybody knows you. You have to take, you have to change your phone number. You get mobbed in the streets. Now what are you gonna do? Are you gonna be able to live in both worlds? Are you gonna be a superstar here or one in the States, or both?

Bruce Lee: Well, let me say this. First of all, uh, uh, the words superstar really turn me off, and I'll tell you why. Because the word "star" man, it's an illusion. It's something what the public call you. You should look upon oneself as an actor, man. I mean you would be very pleased if somebody said "Hey, man, you are a super actor!" it is much better than, you know, superstar. Therefore, I...

Pierre Berton: yes, but you've got to admit that you are a superstar. You're not ///....if you're gonna give me the truth!

Bruce Lee: I am now....I am honestly saying this, okay? Yes, I have been very successful, okay?

Pierre Berton: yeah....

Bruce Lee: but I mean, I think the word "star" is....I mean I do not look upon myself as a star. I really don't. I mean believe me, man, when I say it. I mean I'm not saying it because....

Pierre Berton: what are you gonna do? Let's get back to the question.

Bruce Lee: ok.

Pierre Berton: Are you going to stay in Hong Kong and be famous, or are you gonna go to the United States and be famous, or are you going to try to eat your cake and have it too?

Bruce Lee: I am going to do both because, you see, I have already made up my mind, that in the United States, I think something about the oriental, I mean the true oriental, should be shown.

Pierre Berton: Hollywood sure has packed, hasn't it?

Bruce Lee: you better believe it man. I mean it's always that pigtail, bouncing around, "chopchop," you know? With the eyes slanted and all that. And I think that's very, very out of date.

Pierre Berton: is it true that the first job you had was being cast as Charlie Chan's "number one son?"

Bruce Lee: yeah, "number one son."

Pierre Berton: they never made the movie?

Bruce Lee: no, no, no they were gonna make it into like a new Chinese James Bond type of a thing. Now that, you know, "the old man Chan is dead, Charlie is dead, I mean, and his son is carrying on."

Pierre Berton: oh I see. But they didn't do that.

Bruce Lee: no, bad man came along you see. Because and then everything was started to be going into that, you know, that kind of a thing.

Pierre Berton: like the green hornet?

Bruce Lee: yeah.

Pierre Berton: which you were in...but, is it....

Bruce Lee: By the way, I did a really terrible job in that, I have to say.

Pierre Berton: really? You didn't like yourself in that?

Bruce Lee: oh, no.

Pierre Berton: I didn't see it.

Pierre Berton: Let me ask you, however, about the problems that you face as a Chinese hero in an American series. Have people come up in the industry and said, "Well we don't know how the audiences are going to take a non-American?"

Bruce Lee: Well, such a question has been raised. In fact, it is, it is, it is being discussed and that is why the Warrior is probably, it's not going to be on.

Pierre Berton: I see.

Bruce Lee: you see? Because, um unfortunately, such thing does exist in this world, you see. Like, I don't know certain part of the country, right? Where like, they think that, business while, it's a risk. And I don't blame them, I don't blame them. I mean, in the same way, it's like in Hong Kong, if a foreigner came and became a star, if I were uh, the man with the money, I probably would have my own worry of whether or not the acceptance would be there. But that's all right because, if you honestly express yourself, it doesn't matter, you see? Because you're going to do it!

Pierre Berton: Are you, uh, how were the other side of the coin? Is it possible that you are, I mean you're fairly hip, and fairly Americanized, are you too western for our oriental audiences do you think?

Bruce Lee: I, oh man! like how..., I have been, I have been criticized for that!

Pierre Berton: you have, eh?

Bruce Lee: oh, definitely. Well, let me say this, when I do the Chinese film I'll try my best not to be as.....American as I, you know, I have been adjusted to for the last 12 years in the states. And but when I go back to the states, it seems to be the other way around, you know what I mean?

Pierre Berton: you're too exotic, eh?

Bruce Lee: yeah, man. I mean they're trying to get me to do too many things that are really for the sake of being exotic. You do understand what I'm trying to say?

Pierre Berton: oh sure.

Bruce Lee: so, it's really, I mean....it's...

Pierre Berton: when you live in both worlds, it brings its problems as well as its advantages, and you've got them both. Time to go to a commercial, be back in the moment with Bruce Lee

Pierre Berton: Let me ask you whether the change in attitude on the part of the Nixon administration towards China has helped your chances of starring in an American TV series?

Bruce Lee: Well, first of all, this happened before that. But I do think that things of Chinese will be quite interesting for the next few years--I mean not that I'm politically you know, inclining toward anything, you know, but...

Pierre Berton: I understand that, but I was just wondering....

Bruce Lee: but I mean once the opening of China /happens/, you know, I mean that it will bring more understanding, more things that are, hey, like different, you know? and maybe in the contrast of comparison some new thing might grow. So, therefore, I mean it's a very rich period to be in. I mean like, if I were born, let's say uh, 40 years ago /and/ if I thought in my mind and said, "boy, I'm going to star in a movie, or /going to/ star in a television series in America," well...that might be a vague dream. But I think, right now, it may be, man.

Pierre Berton: do you still think of yourself as Chinese or do you ever think of yourself as a North American?

Bruce Lee: you know what I want to think of myself? As a human being. Because, I mean I don't want to sound like ask Confucius, hey, but under the sky, under the heaven, man, there is but one family. It just so happen, man, that people are different.

Pierre Berton: ok, we've gotta go...thank you Bruce lee for coming here, and thank you for watching...

Bruce Lee: thank you, Pierre Berton, thank you.
You've been watching Bruce Lee on the Pierre Berton show, a half of hour of programme of conversation, opinion and debate.

This is Bernard Gowan speaking.