Brandon Lee

:This page is about the actor and son of Bruce Lee. For the adult film actor see Brandon Lee (porn star).

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Brandon Bruce Lee (李國豪, pinyin: Lǐ Guóháo February 1, 1965–March 31, 1993) was an American actor, the son of actor Bruce Lee and his wife Linda Emery.

Related Topics:
Pinyin - February 1 - 1965 - March 31 - 1993 - American - Bruce Lee - Linda Emery

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Brandon Lee was born in Oakland, California to Martial artist and actor Bruce Lee, and his Amercian wife Linda Emery. The family moved to Los Angeles, California when Brandon was three months old. When offers for film roles became limited for his father, the family moved to his father's homeland of Hong Kong in 1971, where Bruce Lee made several films from 1971 - 1973.

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When he was 8 years old Brandon's father Bruce died from a cerebral edema. After his death his mother moved Brandon and his younger sister Shannon (born in 1969) back to the United States. They lived shortly in his mother's hometown of Seattle(where Bruce Lee was buried) and then to Los Angeles, where Brandon grew up in the affluent area of Rolling Hills.

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He attended high school at The Chadwick School, but was kicked out three months shy of graduating for insorbination. He received his GED in 1983 and then went to Emerson College in Boston, MA where he majored in theatre. After one year Lee moved to New York City where he took acting lessons at the famed Actor's Studio and was part of the Amercian New Theatre group founded by his friend John Lee Hancock. He returned to Los Angeles in 1985, where he worked for Ruddy Morgan Productions as a script reader. He was asked to read for the part in Kung Fu: The Movie in 1985 and got the part. He continued to study acting privately and appeared in local theatre productions and low budget films. In 1991 he starred in Showdown in Little Tokyo, his first studio film, and then did his first starring role in Rapid Fire. He signed a multi-picture deal with 20 Century Fox in 1991 and was slated to do two more films for them.

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In 1992 he landed the role of "Eric Draven" in 'The Crow'. The film would end up being his last after he was killed on set 8 days before filming was to end. He was 28 years old.

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Lee was engaged to marry his longtime girlfriend, story editor Eliza Hutton, on April 17, 1993 in Mexico. The Crow is dedicated to the pair.

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Lee was educated at the Lee Strasberg Academy, Emerson College.

Related Topics:
Lee Strasberg Academy - Emerson College

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At the age of 28, Brandon Lee was shot and killed while filming the movie The Crow, when an old bullet lodged in the barrel of a .44 Magnum was propelled by the firing of a blank during the scene in which Lee's character Eric Draven is shot by an armed gang. The bullet had become lodged in the gun when it was used in a previous close-up scene, in which a percussion cap was triggered and pushed the bullet free of its empty casing. The footage of Brandon Lee getting hit with the bullet was destroyed without being developed as part of the legal settlement, and the shot of the gun firing the bullet that killed him was not used in the movie, although some urban myths claim it was.

Related Topics:
The Crow - Bullet - .44 Magnum - Percussion cap

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Lee's death took place in Wilmington, North Carolina. Lee was buried next to his father in Lake View Cemetery, Capitol Hill, Seattle, Washington.

Related Topics:
Wilmington, North Carolina - Lake View Cemetery - Capitol Hill - Seattle, Washington

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The shooting was ruled an accident, though many fans suspected foul play. (Bruce Lee's own death in 1973 at age 32, apparently from a reaction to painkillers, was also considered suspicious.) Oddly, Bruce Lee's character in Game of Death is shot in a similar fashion. Bruce's character, like Brandon's in The Crow, does return ("from the dead," although the character did not actually die) to get revenge on his adversaries.

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