Jackie Chan Biography

Jackie Chan was born Chan Kong-sang on April 7, 1954, to Charles and Lee-Lee Chan in British Hong Kong. His parents were refugees from the Chinese Civil War and worked for the French ambassador in Hong Kong.

In 1960, Jackie Chan’s father was sent to Canberra, Australia, to work for the American Embassy. Around this time Chan went to the Chinese Opera Research Institute in Hong Kong to be trained in music, dance, and Traditional martial arts. He joined a performance group called the Seven Little Fortunes there.

In 1962, at the age of eight, along with fellow mates from the performance group, Jackie Chan appeared in the movie called ‘Big and Little Wong Tin Bar’. This led to his appearance in another movie next year called ‘The Love Eterne’. Subsequently, he kept making small appearances in movies like ‘Come Drink with Me’ (1966) and ‘A Touch of Zen’ (1971).

He also had a brief stint as a stuntman in Bruce Lee's films ‘Fist of Fury’ and ‘Enter the Dragon’.

At the age of 19, in 1973, Jackie Chan got his first major role in the movie ‘Little Tiger of Canton’ and then he starred in a comedy movie called ‘All in the Family’ (1975). This movie had Chan’s first nude sex scene. He made the shift from action movies to comedy because his action movies have been a failure until now.

In 1976, he joined his family in Australia and started working as a construction worker there. He got the name ‘Jackie’ in Australia because a fellow construction worker called Jack took him under his watch.

In 1976, Jackie Chan got an opportunity from a film producer in Hong Kong called Willie Chan to work in his movie as a stuntman. The film was called ‘New Fist of Fury’ and it had Chan as the main lead. The movie did not do very well as Chan could not exhibit Bruce Lee’s martial arts style and the whole movie was supposed to be modeled on his style.

In 1978, Chan worked in the movie called ‘Snake in the Eagle’s Shadow’ which proved to be a major success in his film career. Chan had full freedom to stage his stunts as he liked. This film was responsible for establishing the comedic kung fu genre, which became very popular with the Hong Kong audience.

After the death of martial arts prodigy Bruce Lee, it came upon Chan to follow him. But Chan decided to come up with his own style of filmmaking. In the year 1978, he was declared to be the most popular martial arts superstar in all of Asia.

In 1980, he directed his first movie ‘The Young Master. This movie became a super hit and was considered the first innovative combination of slapstick comedy and martial arts.

In 1982, he directed and starred in another venture called ‘Dragon Lord’. In this movie, he extensively experimented with intricate stunts.

In 1983, Chan starred in the movie ‘Project A’ which included the dangerous stunt-driven style of martial arts. This movie was declared the winner of the Best Action Design Award at the 3rd annual Hong Kong Film Awards.

In 1985, Jackie Chan produced and directed as well as starred in ‘Police Story’, which was a Hollywood-influenced action-comedy. The movie bagged the Best Film award at the Hong Kong Film Awards.

Chan formulated the ‘Jackie Chan Stuntmen Association’ in the year of 1985 because many stuntmen were hurt during the filming of the movie, ‘Police Story’, and no one was ready to work with Chan again. This association was formed to keep the safety and benefits of stuntmen in mind.

In 1987, he acted and directed the movie ‘Armour of God’ which became his biggest domestic success at the box office. It was said to have grossed around 35 million Hong Kong dollars. After this, he made ‘Miracles - Mr Canton and Lady Rose’ which also did great business. Due to the success of these two movies, Chan formed a production company called the ‘Golden Way’.

From 1988-1998, a huge number of offers started coming his way all the way from Hollywood, like: ‘Rumble in the Bronx’, 'Police Story 2', 'Armour of God II: Operation Condor', 'Police Story 3: Super Cop', 'Drunken Master II' and 'Police Story 4: First Strike'. Initially, Chan was offered to play a villain in Hollywood movies but he did not want to do the typical roles or play a stereotypical character. He declined the role offered to him in the movie ‘Demolition Man’ by Sylvester Stallone. He was offered more and more roles despite his limited knowledge of the English Language.

In 1998, Chan starred in the Hollywood movie ‘Rush Hour’ which was a huge hit at the box office. He worked in the movie with the comic actor Chris Tucker. With the huge success of this movie, both the stars re-teamed again for the sequel ‘Rush Hour 2’ in 2001. Subsequently, he worked in big-budget movies like ‘The Tuxedo’, ‘Shanghai Knights’, and ‘Shanghai Noon’ (opposite Owen Wilson).

Chan voiced the character ‘Shang’ in the movie ‘Mulan’ and sang its original soundtrack. Also, from the years 2000-2005, he lent his voice to the cartoon ‘Jackie Chan Adventures’, the character based on him.

In 2003, he teamed up with the British comedian Lee Evans and Claire Forlani in the movie ‘The Medallion’. This movie did not do very well at the box office.

In 2004, he worked in the movie called ‘Around the World in 80 Days’ which was a decent success at the box office.

The year 2005 saw his releases like ‘The Huadu Chronicles: Blade of the Rose’, ‘New Police Story’, ‘The Myth,’ and ‘Robin-B-Hood’.

In 2007, ‘Rush Hour 3’ grossed over 258 million US dollars, in which Chan starred with Roman Polanski.

In 2011 ‘The Karate Kid’ was remade starring Chan and Will Smith’s son Jaden Smith in it. The movie was a big success at the box office, earning over 358 million US dollars. It was the much-talked-about film of the year, which showcased a combination of Chinese-American martial arts.

The 100th movie of his career ‘1911’ was released in 2011. This movie is his first directorial venture after ‘Who Am I?’, which was released in 1998.

He next starred in ‘CZ12,’ ‘Police Story 2013,’ ‘Dragon Blade,’ ‘Monkey King: Hero Is Back,’ ‘Kung Fu Panda 3,’ ‘Skiptrace,’ ‘Railroad Tigers,’ ‘Kung Fu Yoga,’ ‘The Nut Job 2: Nutty by Nature,’ and ‘The Lego Ninjago Movie.’

In 2017, he played the role of ‘Quan Ngoc Minh’ in the action thriller film ‘The Foreigner’ directed by Martin Campbell. The film received mostly positive reviews from critics and was a box office success, grossing over $145.4 million on a $35 million budget. That same year, he was also seen in the sci-fi film ‘Bleeding Steel.’ The film was a critical and commercial failure.

His next cinema ventures included ‘The Knight of Shadows: Between Yin and Yang,’ ‘Viy 2: Journey to China,’ ‘Vanguard,’ ‘Wish Dragon,’ ‘Ride On,’ and ‘Hidden Strike.’ He voiced ‘Splinter’ in the 2023 American computer-animated superhero film ‘Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem.’ The film was widely praised by critics and earned a 97% approval score on Rotten Tomatoes.

In the years 1980 and 1982, Chan’s first two directorial ventures were launched, ‘The Young Master’ and ‘Dragon Lord’. Both the movies did very well at the Hong Kong box office and new innovations in comedy and martial arts stunts were introduced in the movies for the first time.

‘Armour of God’ in 1987 was a huge success at the box office that grossed over 35 million Hong Kong dollars.

In 1998, ‘Rush Hour’ was a huge success at the Hollywood box office, starring Chris Tucker, it helped him to establish himself more properly in the West.

Won the Best Actor Award at the 1993 Golden Horse Film Festival for his role in the movie 'Police Story 3: Super Cop'.

Won the Best Actor Award at the 2005 Golden Rooster Awards for the movie 'New Police Story.'

Received the Buttkicker award at Nickelodeon’s Kids Choice Awards in the year 2011 for his film ‘The Karate Kid’, in which he starred with Will Smith’s kid Jaden Smith.

In 1982, Chan married the Taiwanese actress Lin Feng-jiao, also known as Joan Lin. In the same year, they had a son, Jaycee Chan who is a singer and actor.

Chan is a follower of the Buddhist religion. He can speak many languages like Cantonese, Mandarin, English, German, Korean, Japanese, Spanish, Thai, etc.

Chan has claimed that he was born in such a poor family that when he was born his parents offered to sell him to the British doctor who delivered him.

Chan had an affair outside his marriage with a woman named Elaine Ng Yi-Lei and they had a daughter in 1999 called Etta. Chan never formally acknowledged Etta as his daughter.

He is an ardent football fan and supports Hong Kong national football team, England National Football Team, and Manchester City.

While doing his own stunts Chan has injured himself a number of times, breaking his nose, ankle, fingers in the hand, cheekbones, skull, etc. It is famously known that he almost died during the filming of ‘Armour of God’. It is because of this he cannot get insured in the US.