Donnie Yen is a Hong Kong, Chinese actor, martial artist, film director and producer, action choreographer, and world wushu tournament medalist; gained international recognition for appearing in many films together with other prominent and internationally-known actors such as Jackie Chan, Jet Li and Michelle Yeoh. Yen is widely credited for bringing mixed martial arts (MMA) into the mainstream of Chinese culture.
Education
When he was two years old, his family moved to Hong Kong, and then to Boston, Massachusetts, United States, when he was eleven. At the age of four, Donnie started taking up martial arts from his mother who taught him tai chi and wushu until they moved to Boston. From there, Donnie continued with tai chi and wushu but soon also began experimenting with various others martial art styles, such as taekwondo, kickboxing and boxing, after developing a huge interest in martial arts. From a young age, he was also taught by his parents to play musical instruments, including the piano. He also knows hip-hop dancing and breakdancing.
When he was sixteen, his parents sent him to Beijing Wushu Academy so he could train Chinese MA under Master Wu Bin, well known as the coach of Jet Li. He underwent intensive training for three years. After those years passed by, he was about to leave back to the States, but made a side trip to Hong Kong, and there he was accidentally introduced to famous Hong Kong action director Woo-ping Yuen, who was responsible for bringing Jackie Chan to super stardom and was looking for someone new to star in his movies.
Career
Yen was a stuntman in his earliest films, "Shaolin Drunkard" (1983) and "Taoism Drunkard" (1984). At the age of 20, he got his first acting role in the 1984 film "Drunken Tai Chi". After that he continued his early film career playing roles in numerous films, which are: "Dak Ging to Lung" (1988), "Wong Gaa Si Ze IV - Zik Gik Zing Jan" (1989) and "Sai Hak Chin" (1990). He played in "Wong Fei Hung II - Nam Yi Dong Ji Keung" (1992) and was nominated for the "Best Supporting Actor" award at the 1992 Hong Kong Film Awards. Yen had a starring role in the film "Iron Monkey" (1993). Yen and Li appeared together in the 2002 film "Hero" and this film was nominated for the :Best Foreign Language Film Oscar" at the 2003 Academy Awards. In 1997, Yen started the production company Bullet Films, and made his directorial debut in "Legend of the Wolf" (1997) and "Ballistic Kiss" (1998), in which he played the lead character. In 2003, Yen played the antagonist against Jackie Chan in "Shanghai Knights". He continued to work on few movies, including "Gin Chap Hak Mooi Gwai (2004) as director and action director, and "Chin Kei Bin 2 - Fa Tou Tai Kam" (2004) as actor, had a leading role in "Qi Jian" (2005). In recent years, Donnie had a leading role in the battle epic "Jiang Shan Mei Ren" (2008), and continued further with the supernatural romance movie "Hua Pi" (2008). In 2008, Yen starred in "Ip Man", a semi-biographical account of Yip Man, the Wing Chun master of Bruce Lee. Yen was the fight choreographer for the 2010 film "Legend of the Fist: The Return of Chen Zhen". Due to his success in action choreography, he is invited to choreograph his upcoming films such as "The Lost Bladesman", "Wu Xia" and "The Monkey King". In September 2011, Yen revealed that he took two comedy roles in a row, "All's Well, Ends Well" (2012) and "Thunder Cop".
