Jackie Chan

1954-present

Latest News: Jackie Chan Stars in Karate Kid: Legends

After 15 years, actor and martial artist Jackie Chan is reprising his role as Mr. Han in the upcoming Karate Kid: Legends. Chan, who starred in the 2010 remake of The Karate Kid, returns as the skilled sensei to join forces with the original Karate Kid Daniel LaRusso, played by Ralph Macchio, to help mentor a new kung fu prodigy in New York City.

In a May interview with Haute Living, Chan said the sequel is unprecedented in that it blends both karate and kung fu.

“It’s the first time, and I’m glad we had this opportunity to work together and teach this lucky kid both karate and kung fu. It’s definitely different styles, but I think with the same goal,” he said. “There definitely is some really good action, but you also see friendship and dedication.”

The 71-year-old actor, who serves as a mentor on set, confirmed he still performs his own stunts in the film, and doesn’t plan on stopping anytime soon. “That’s not changing until the day I retire, which is never!” he continued. “And to be honest, when you’ve done it for 64 years straight, there’s no physical preparation anymore. Everything is in your heart and soul; it is muscle memory.”

Karate Kid: Legends arrives in theaters May 30.

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Jackie Chan is an actor and martial artist known for such films as Rush Hour, Shanghai Noon, The Karate Kid (2010), and Kung Fu Panda. He began studying martial arts, drama, acrobatics, and singing at just 7 years old, honing his skills at an early age. Once considered a likely successor to Bruce Lee in Hong Kong cinema, Chan instead developed his own style of martial arts blended with screwball physical comedy. He became a huge star throughout Asia and was instrumental in creating hit American kung fu films.

FULL NAME: Chan Kong-sang
BORN: April 7, 1954
BIRTHPLACE: Hong Kong, China
SPOUSE: Joan Lin (1982-present)
CHILDREN: Jaycee and Etta
ASTROLOGICAL SIGN: Aries

Jackie Chan was born Chan Kong-sang on April 7, 1954, in Hong Kong, China, to Charles and Lee-lee Chan. When his parents moved to Australia to find new jobs, 7-year-old Chan was left behind to study at the Chinese Opera Research Institute, a Hong Kong boarding school. For the next 10 years, Chan studied martial arts, drama, acrobatics, and singing. He was subjected to stringent discipline, including corporal punishment, for poor performance, according to his 1998 autobiography, I Am Jackie Chan: My Life in Action.

He appeared in his first film, the 1962 Cantonese feature Big and Little Wong Tin Bar, at the age of 8, and went on to appear in a number of musical films. While Chan grew up thinking he was an only child, he later learned that he had two half-brothers, Fang Shide and Fang Shisheng, and two half-sisters, Guilan Chan and Yulan Chan, from his parents’ previous marriages.

After graduating in 1971, Chan found work as an acrobat and a movie stuntman, most notably in Fist of Fury (1972), starring Hong Kong’s resident silver screen superstar, Bruce Lee. For that film, Chan, serving as a stunt double, performed an impressive rope stunt fall, earning the respectful notice of the formidable Lee, among others. The director gave him the Chinese stage name Chen Long, but he soon became known by another name in the English-speaking world. During a brief stint as a construction worker in Australia in the early 1970s, he earned his now-popular moniker from a fellow builder named Jack. “It didn’t take much for him to realize that Kong-sang was not a name Australian construction workers would get an easy grip on,” he wrote of the worker in his 1998 autobiography. “‘Aw, hell, his name’s Jack, too.’” Chan quickly became “Little Jack” before later shortening it to “Jackie.”

After Lee’s tragic and unexpected death in 1973, Chan was singled out as a likely successor as the king of Hong Kong cinema. To that end, he starred in a string of kung fu movies with Lo Wei, a producer and director who had worked with Lee. Most were unsuccessful, and the collaboration ended in the late 1970s. By that time, Chan had decided he wanted to break out of Lee’s mold and create his own image. Blending his martial arts abilities with impressive nerve—he insisted on performing all his own stunts—and a sense of screwball physical comedy reminiscent of one of his idols, Buster Keaton, Chan found his own formula for cinematic gold.

A year after the release of his first bona fide hit, Snake in the Eagle’s Shadow (1978), Chan took the Hong Kong film world by storm with his first so-called “kung fu comedy,” the now-classic Drunken Master, that same year. Subsequent hits such as 1979’s The Fearless Hyena and the 1980 films Half a Loaf of Kung Fu and The Young Master confirmed Chan’s star status; the latter film marked his first with Golden Harvest, Lee’s old production company and the leading film studio in Hong Kong. Before long, Chan had become the highest-paid actor in Hong Kong, as well as a huge star throughout Asia. He exerted total control over most of his films, often taking charge of duties ranging from producing to directing to even performing the theme songs.

Jackie Chan with co-star Kristine DeBell in the 1980 film The Big Brawl.

In the early 1980s, Chan tried his luck in Hollywood—with little success. He starred in the Golden Harvest-produced The Big Brawl (1980), which flopped. He also had small supporting roles opposite Burt Reynolds in the 1981 ensemble comedy The Cannonball Run and its sequel, Cannonball Run II, in 1984.

Back in Hong Kong, Chan’s star continued to rise. He produced impressive action comedies such as Project A (1983), Police Story (1985), and Armor of God (1986), as well as the hit period film Mr. Canton and Lady Rose (1989), a clever remake of Frank Capra’s 1961 film A Pocketful of Miracles.

By that time, Chan was far more than a movie star—he was a one-man film industry. In 1986, he formed his own production company, Golden Way. He also founded a modeling and casting agency, Jackie’s Angels, to recruit talent for his films. Additionally, after numerous stuntmen were injured during the filming of Police Story, the actor founded the Jackie Chan Stuntmen Association, through which he personally trained and provided medical coverage for its members.

For his part, Chan, who is 5 feet 8 ½ inches tall, claims to have broken every bone in his body at least once while performing stunts. During the filming of Armor of God, he fractured his skull after falling more than 40 feet while attempting to jump from the top of a building to a tree branch below. In the early 1990s, Chan broadened his cinematic range, turning in a rare dramatic performance in the 1993 melodrama Crime Story. He also made several sequels to his hits Police Story and Drunken Master. Chan was still mostly unknown in the United States at this point, but he experienced a meteoric rise during the mid-1990s, when a series of events gained the attention of a wider American audience.

In 1995, Chan created his own comic book character, the central figure in Jackie Chan’s Spartan X, a series that hit newsstands in both Asia and the United States. That same year, newly anointed directing sensation Quentin Tarantino, fresh off the success of Pulp Fiction (1994), presented Chan with a Lifetime Achievement Award at the MTV Movie Awards.

Rumble in the Bronx

In 1996, New Line Cinema and Golden Harvest jointly released Rumble in the Bronx, Chan’s fifth English-language release but his first hit in America. The film grossed $10 million in its first weekend, shooting to No. 1 at the box office, and its success prompted the American debuts of two previous Chan films, Crime Story and Drunken Master II.

Rush Hour Franchise

Jackie Chan with Rush Hour co-star Chris Tucker in 1998.

After two less successful efforts, Jackie Chan’s First Strike (1997) and Mr. Nice Guy (1998), Chan scored another box-office hit with the 1998 American-produced action comedy Rush Hour. In the film, Chan plays Detective Inspector Lee, flown in from Hong Kong to assist a streetwise Los Angeles cop, played by the rising comedian Chris Tucker. That same year, he chronicled his life as an action star, detailing his stunt work, in his autobiography I Am Jackie Chan: My Life in Action.

Chan teamed up with Tucker again for the 2001 sequel, Rush Hour 2, earning himself a hefty $15 million plus a percentage of the record-breaking box-office haul. In 2007, Chan reprised his role as Lee in Rush Hour 3. Nearly two decades later, the actor confirmed a fourth installment was in the works. Currently, there is no official release date for the film.

Shanghai Noon

In 2000, Chan starred in Shanghai Noon, an action comedy set in the Old West and co-starred Owen Wilson and Lucy Liu. He followed with the moderately successful sequel, Shanghai Knights, in 2003. During this time, Chan also voiced himself in the animated series Jackie Chan Adventures, which ran for five seasons.

The Tuxedo

In 2002, Chan co-starred with Jennifer Love Hewitt in The Tuxedo, a comedy about a taxi driver who receives special powers when he puts on his boss’s tux. That same year, he received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and was honored with the Taurus Award for best action movie star at the World Stunt Awards.

Despite the positive reception of his previous films, The Medallion (2003) and the adaptation of Around the World in 80 Days (2004) both flopped. Seeking greater financial and artistic control over his films, he co-founded JCE Movies Limited in 2004, through which he produced the successful Hong Kong flicks New Police Story (2004), The Myth (2005), and Rob-B-Hood (2006).

Kung Fu Panda Movies

Jackie Chan at the Shanghai premiere of Kung Fu Panda 3 in 2016.

In 2008, Chan provided the voice of Master Monkey for the wildly successful animated action comedy Kung Fu Panda, which grossed $632 million at the box office worldwide. He returned for the Christmas special, Kung Fu Panda Holiday, in 2010 before starring in the 2011 sequel, Kung Fu Panda 2. Chan reprised his role as Master Monkey yet again in the third installment, Kung Fu Panda 3, in 2016.

In between work on the beloved franchise, the actor appeared in several other films. He paired with fellow Chinese action star Jet Li in the 2008 film The Forbidden Kingdom before starring in family-friendly fare The Spy Next Door and a reboot of The Karate Kid in 2010.

Shinjuku Incident and 1911

Meanwhile, Chan continued to thrive as a mainstay of Chinese cinema. He headlined the crime drama Shinjuku Incident in 2009, and wrote and starred in the action comedy Little Big Soldier in 2010. In 2011, he completed an ambitious project as co-director and star of historical drama 1911, a film about China’s Xinhai Revolution.

Dragon Blade and Skiptrace

Jackie Chan with Dragon Blade co-stars Adrien Brody (L) and John Cusack (R).

The 2012 film Chinese Zodiac put Chan back in action mode. The following year, he revisited an old franchise, staring in Police Story: Lockdown. In 2015, Chan published his memoir Never Grow Up, which covered his childhood in China to his life as a husband and father. He also enjoyed a huge box-office haul with the 2015 3D historical action film Dragon Blade, which also featured American stars John Cusack and Adrien Brody, setting the table for a slate of flicks the following year.

In 2016, Chan joined Johnny Knoxville in the buddy cop film Skiptrace before playing a World War II-era railroad worker in Railroad Tigers. That same year, he received an honorary Oscar for his lifetime career achievements at the Governors Awards.

Iron Mask and Hidden Strike

Chan starred in 2017’s Kung Fu Yoga, his highest-grossing film in China. Two years later, he teamed up with Arnold Schwarzenegger for the adventure fantasy film Iron Mask, in which he played a Chinese master who faces off against a British naval officer. In 2023, he appeared alongside John Cena as an ex-special forces soldier in Hidden Strike and voiced Splinter in the animated movie Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem.

Karate Kid: Legends

For his latest project, Chan will reprise his role as Mr. Han in Karate Kid: Legends, arriving in theaters May 30, 2025. In this continuation of the 2010 Karate Kid reboot, as well as the original movie trilogy, Mr. Han teams up with the legendary Karate Kid Daniel LaRusso (Ralph Macchio) to guide a new kung fu prodigy.

Jackie Chan with son Jaycee Chan.

In 1981, Chan married Taiwanese actress Joan Lin, who was more famous than he was at the time. The following year, Lin became pregnant with his child. At his agent’s urging, the two got married in a coffee shop in Los Angeles in December 1982. Their son Jaycee was born the very next day.

In his 2015 memoir Never Grow Up, Chan admits he hasn’t been a model father, revealing that he was strict and always working. He even confessed to hitting Jaycee “once, and was very heavy-handed” before promising not to touch him again. Following in his father’s footsteps, Jaycee is an actor and singer, but stopped short of becoming a martial artist.

Chan had an affair with actress and former Miss Asia winner Elaine Ng Yi-Lei and fathered another child. Their daughter, Etta, was born in November 1999. Although he has never explicitly acknowledged his estranged daughter, he has admitted to the affair, writing in his 2015 memoir that it resulted in a “love child.” In 2015, Etta told Express, “He never existed in my life. I will never regard him as a father.”

As of September 2024, Chan has an estimated net worth of $400 million, according to Celebrity Net Worth. In addition to acting, he is the owner of several production companies, including JC Group China, JCE Movies Limited, and Jackie and JJ Productions. Chan also owns a chain of movie theaters in China. A noted philanthropist, Chan has used his fortune to fund a variety of causes, including environmental conservation, animal welfare, and disaster relief. In 2006, he announced that he would donate half of his assets to charity when he dies.

• I never wanted to be the next Bruce Lee. I just wanted to be the first Jackie Chan.
• The ads all call me fearless, but that’s just publicity. Anyone who thinks I'm not scared out of my mind whenever I do one of my stunts is crazier than I am.
• In Hollywood, they care more about comedy, relationship, and so many things before action stunts. In Hong Kong, we go straight into stunts and action, but in America sometimes that’s too much. So, now I’m making a film half and half—take some good things from Hollywood and some good things from Asia.

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