Over the last five years or so I have had the pleasure and honour of meeting some of Hong Kong’s biggest and greatest stars. My greatest achievement and honour is that I have become friends with the one and only Jackie Chan and you certainly can’t get any bigger than Jackie as far as Hong Kong Cinema goes.

Now although I am in my element meeting, interviewing, talking to, and laughing with these incredible people - I never go over the top! I mean I try and be myself and not come across as some enthusiastic kid or fan - however on seeing and meeting Sammo Hung for the first time on location for EMG’s new movie, “Highbinders� I couldn’t help it! I must have acted like the biggest fan ever!

Sammo has been there from the start… before Bruce Lee and before Hong Kong cinema really was Hong Kong cinema! He’s an expert in many of the Chinese Kung-Fu systems, he’s one if not the best action director working in Hong Kong movies today, he’s super-famous and a very well respected actor, director and producer and in his younger days was among Hong Kong’s elite stuntmen.

I sat down with Sammo to question him about his incredible life for “Jade Screen�. I was incredibly flattered to hear that he was excited about the interview and I was almost lost for words when he told me he had already heard about me from people in Hong Kong (fame at last! Ha!) and was pleased to meet me.

The interview was conducted mid-morning on Tuesday the 14th of August, 2001, in an empty classroom of a vetinary college! A bizarre location to say the least but then again we were restricted because much of the college site was already taken up with filming - But hey, it didn’t bother me! I would have agreed to conduct the interview up a tree as along as we got the interview.

In person, Sammo is bigger and better than you could possibly imagine and very much like his younger Kung-Fu Brother, Mr. Jackie Chan - Sammo is also one of the world’s Mr. Nice Guys!

Anyway, here’s what Sammo and I talked about:

Jade Screen: Looking back then when you first started out as a stuntman. At that time everyone wanted to be a stuntman working in Hong Kong cinema. But did you ever think that one day you would be so famous in Asia?

Sammo Hung: No! You know, you never think about that kind of thing. With that generation and ages of us you just think about working! I just wanted to work. The most important thing to me at that time still like today was whatever the stunt or film - I just loved the film business so much. I just loved it being my job so I worked very hard at it to be good.

In the studio I was so excited. I saw everything. You know, the camera crew, the lighting. Just like Jackie and Biao - we never learn’t about the film business that much when we were in the Peking Opera School. We did shows for the audience many times.. you know, traditional Peking Opera, we did this to earn money for the School and we sometimes were asked to be extras in the background on a movie - but we never learn’t about the film business as kids - only when we leave the School and get on the set as a stuntman can you really learn about everything.

So when I was sixteen and for that generation how can you think. “Oh! One day I will be a director and a movie star!�.. No! Never think about it. After three years I have more experience and so I have the chance to be an “Action Director/Choreography� as well as a stuntman. Something like that.. then slowly after two or three years later I just try and be director. But this was back in 1968 or something like that so you never think about the future. The most important thing was getting a job.

JS: Bruce Lee suddenly exploded onto the screens in 1971 with Golden Harvest’s “The Big Boss�. Bruce was the most famous person in Hong Kong at the time. When you were a stuntman did you think, “One day I will be as famous as Bruce Lee or bigger!�?

SH: No, no, no… never thinking. I just looked in the mirror and thought, “I’m fat! How can I be a Kung-Fu superstar!â€? (laughing). With one of my earlier movies I was looking for someone to be the main star - of course he would have to know the martial arts very well. I looked around for a while but just didn’t like anyone! Then some day I walk by the mirror again and said, “Actually, that fat boy is not too bad!â€? (laughing). So I try to be an actor!

JS:(Laughing) Well it worked!

SH: (Laughing) Yes it worked!

JS: You are so famous in Hong Kong and Asia and have a huge amount of fans in the West too. Since the success of your “Martial Law� TV show for CBS you are more well known and have more power these days in the West. One day can all your fans expect to see a “Sammo Hung Traditional Kung-Fu Hollywood Movie� just like “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon�?

SH:(Laughing) Yes! I really hope I can do something like that. One day! Don’t let me wait too long ok? (laughing).

by Richard Cooper.

For the rest of the interview please see JADE SCREEN VOL. 1, ISSUE 2 or BUY THE MAGAZINE HERE.