Jackie Chan: More Than Just Funny Business

Jackie Chan is a very inspirational man. He has the traditional ‘started out poor but worked to make his own fortune’ story. But he also has much more. He has comedy, personality, and most importantly: he knows who he is. In his autobiography entitled "I am Jackie Chan," he tells the story of how he became who he is today. He, with the help of co-author Jeff Yang, tells the story of how poor, young, mischievous Chan Kong-sang joined a school for Chinese Opera which led to his career as a stuntman and later catapulted him into stardom. His training at the school under his Master, Yu Jim-yuen, was, intense. It was also very harsh. Even though he admits several times that he is lazy, Jackie stuck with the school because he was unwilling to break the contract he made in joining the school and disappointing his parents.

Jackie fully admits that he had little formal schooling. He also admits that it was one of the things he regrets most in life. His story isn’t about how one day he was discovered by some agent who saw the potential in him, it was that he tried very hard to get noticed. He barely thought of stardom, he often wrote that he was perfectly content in staying with the stuntman business for life. But, he’s a lucky man. He admits that several times as well. Luck helped him out several times. He eventually did get noticed, but not because of the potential that someone saw in him. He was noticed because people saw how hard he worked, how well he performed stunts, how willing he was to perform, and the skill he revealed.
Jackie Chan knows who he is. When Bruce Lee died, Jackie was cast in several roles in which he attempted to portray Lee. He knew he wasn’t as skilled as Bruce Lee, but he also knew that he was different from Lee. Bruce often played dark, vengeful characters; whereas Jackie enjoyed the comedy aspect of martial arts. He pushed his manager into helping him create movies more to his style than to Bruce Lee. Eventually, after several box office fails while trying to be Bruce Lee, Jackie was traded to a small company where he was allowed to finally show his real mettle. And it was box office gold. After a few wins at the box office and a few setbacks regarding falsified contracts, Jackie was a star in Hong Kong. He was more popular than Bruce Lee!

However, eventually it was time for Jackie to come visit America. On his first trip to America he failed to win any audience because he knew little English and was unwilling to study (it was against his nature). He returned to Hong Kong and lived in despair at the thought of his failure. But eventually he realized how immature he was acting and he began expanding to the European market. He was a success there as well. Unfortunately for him, the time to come back to America was imminent. He returned and was forced into roles that he didn’t want to do. He failed again. Again he returned to Hong Kong. And again he returned to the U.S. This time; however, Jackie refused to come to America under any terms that weren’t his own. He read every script (by this point he knew passable English), and turned several down because they weren’t the kinds of movies he wanted to work on. But eventually the movie “Rumble in the Bronx” caught his eyes and when it hit the theaters it earned over 9 million its opening weekend. It went on to gross more than $30 million.

He was finally in. He had finally taken charge of his life and his career and he has been successful ever since.