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" When I was a kid, I loved watching kung fu movies - in San Francisco, we had 'Kung Fu Theater' on TV on Saturdays, and they'd air old Shaw Brothers movies with English dubbing, things like that. "

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" I went to Hong Kong in '97 to witness the handover after graduating university, and then I was gonna backpack around Asia and then come back here and look for a job. "

Daniel Wu

Job

Backpack

Back

" It was 'Shaolin Temple,' Jet Li's first movie. That was the movie that got me to want to learn martial arts. Then I became a huge Jet Li/Jackie Chan fan after that. "

Daniel Wu

Want

Arts

" Part of the Hong Kong style is the fact that a lot of the performers can perform the moves, and we don't over-rehearse this stuff. "

" In my 20s, I could just power through stuff and be fine, but now, in your 40s? It's kind of like Kobe Bryant. He plays basketball a little bit differently than he did when he first started out. "

Daniel Wu

Now

Kind

" It's not at all my objective to become an Asian-American star. "

" I really want to take time and be in the moment with my kid for at least the first year. I know she's not going to remember that, but it's really for the family chemistry. "

" I graduated from university with a degree in architecture and then ended up doing a series of internships with different firms. And once I was in an office environment, I realized that at school what I was doing was 98 percent creative, 2 percent makework, but in the real world, it was the other way around. "

" I think growing up in the States and Australia, we were exposed to a lot of different types of things. I used to go to Gilman to watch punk shows, and it's a complete different environment - you were inspired by so many different things, whereas in Hong Kong, there is nothing for anybody. "

Daniel Wu

You

Think

" In 'The Matrix,' you see the fight between Keanu Reeves and Lawrence Fishburne. It's an amazing fight. But I know that they've rehearsed it for months beforehand. Because in some of the moves you can see them anticipating blocks before they actually happen. "

" Because my master was this renaissance man, I wasn't just learning a fighting style, I was learning how kung fu permeates all aspects of life, from eating to healthy living to mental state. "

" We'll see what I do after 'Badlands' to show audiences that I have more in my repertoire besides martial arts. "

" There's a huge interest in the Chinese market, and Hollywood has a huge interest in the Chinese market with films like 'Transformers' making more money over there than here. "

Daniel Wu

Over

Here

" I turned 40, got married, got a kid, and my mother passed away. I experienced life and death, with the enjoyment of creating life and the loss, within one year. "

" For us as Asian-Americans, I think the bane of our existence is one stereotype - 'Sixteen Candles,' the Long Duk Dong character. "

" I ended up falling in love with the whole movie-making experience. "

" I was a hyperactive kid, and it took awhile for me to find the right teacher. My master was a Shaolin kung fu teacher, but he also taught tai chi, Chinese medicine, brush painting - he was adept at all facets of Chinese culture. "

" I've built a career in Asia for 18 years, playing roles that had nothing to do with my race because everybody's Chinese in the films. "

" I worked with Jackie Chan for a long time, and seeing how much pain he's in, I realized that that might not be a sustainable career for me. So I started to develop my career as a dramatic actor rather than as an action actor. "

Daniel Wu

Time

Pain

" Bruce Lee was the first star I idolized. Growing up as a Chinese American, there weren't many people like me on the big screen. "

" If you're down to 6% body fat, which I've done before, you burn out really quickly. Like, in a couple hours, you're pretty much done, and then you're useless. "

" I've been lucky enough to build a career outside of America, where I got 18 years and over 60 films of experience. "

" Asian Americans haven't had as many opportunities as other people to build their careers in Hollywood, just because there hasn't been that much of an interest, especially in Asian American males. "

" In my 20s, it was easy. In your 40s, it's a lot more challenging. You have to look at it like you're an actor, but you're also a professional athlete. You have to train. "

" To do eleven fights in four months is pretty crazy. In some shows that we do in Asia, there are three or four fights over a six-month period, so you have time to recover and gain your stamina. "