Caine in Kung-Fu, Bill in Kill Bill.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/h...083479.stm

Farewell "Grasshopper"
[Edited 6/4/09 7:04am]

I had just added Kung Fu killer 2 my queue list this morning.
RIP.

koko and now carradine. we're losing some cool cats this week.

Anxiety said:

rip

I had to do a quick Google when I got my e mail about it 10 minutes ago. He sounded familiar. Now I'm doubly sad. First a hometown legend passes on, and now my favorite bad guy...


My favorite scene with him is when he's talking to Beatrix about their daughter and the goldfish Emelio. But even before that, he was a stellar actor. To me anyway.

What a week.

A rope around his neck and body - WTF??

Damn.

shit, you beat me to it.....

A friend lent me a book David Carradine wrote once, I can't remember what it was called now but it was part autobiography, part eastern philospophy, very thoughtful stuff. It was about his time filming Kung-Fu, his friendship with Bruce Lee, and mentioned this unfinished project called The Quest (iirc). I think his time as Caine really shaped him in terms of fascination with Buddhism and the thinking behind Kung-Fu as a martial art.

EDIT: Just found it on Amazon

http://www.amazon.com/Spi...0804818282

TV interviews with him always struck me as dark and he could come across a little odd or eccentric but always watchable. His scenes as Kwai-Chang will stick with me forever, especially that lifting of the red-hot cauldron with his inner forearms so that he bore those scars...
[Edited 6/4/09 8:49am]

Carradine Found Dead, Apparent Suicide
June 4
Link


Actor David Carradine, star of the 1970s TV series "Kung Fu" who also had a wide-ranging career in the movies, has been found dead in the Thai capital, Bangkok.

A news report said he was found hanged in his hotel room and was believed to have committed suicide.

A spokesman for the U.S. Embassy, Michael Turner, confirmed the death of the 72-year-old actor. He said the embassy was informed by Thai authorities that Carradine died either late Wednesday or early Thursday, but he could not provide further details out of consideration for his family.

The Web site of the Thai newspaper The Nation cited unidentified police sources as saying Carradine was found Thursday hanged in his luxury hotel room.

It said Carradine was in Bangkok to shoot a movie and had been staying at the hotel since Tuesday.

The newspaper said Carradine could not be contacted after he failed to appear for a meal with the rest of the film crew on Wednesday, and that his body was found by a hotel maid at 10 a.m. Thursday morning. The name of the movie was not immediately available.

It said a preliminary police investigation found that he had hanged himself with a cord used with the room's curtains. It cited police as saying he had been dead at least 12 hours and there was no sign that he had been assaulted.

A police officer at Bangkok's Lumpini precinct station would not confirm the identity of the dead man to The Associated Press, but said the luxury Swissotel Nai Lert Park hotel had reported that a male guest killed himself there.

Carradine was a leading member of a venerable Hollywood acting family that included his father, character actor John Carradine, and brother Keith.

In all, he appeared in more than 100 feature films with such directors as Martin Scorsese, Ingmar Bergman and Hal Ashby.



But he was best known for his role as Kwai Chang Caine, a Shaolin priest traveling the 1800s American frontier West in the TV series "Kung Fu," which aired in 1972-75.

He reprised the role in a mid-1980s TV movie and played Caine's grandson in the 1990s syndicated series "Kung Fu: The Legend Continues."

He returned to the top in recent years as the title character in Quentin Tarantino's two-part saga "Kill Bill."

May he rest in peace. Strange to know that another one of my childhood heroes is gone. Most people know him from his Kung Fu series or Kill Bill but I also liked him in obscure roles such as Frankenstein in Death Race 2000 or that Chuck Norris movie ( Wolf Mc Quade ?) where he had KARATE on his car´s number plate.

Cool guy. Will surely be missed.

The pilot movie for the ABC series starring David Carradine.

OMG, I’m totally surprised by this! I loved his cameo in the horrific Crank 2 among many many other characters. Very sorry to hear this especially the suicide part.

I remember my dad used to watch Kung Fu. It's sad that he committed suicide. RIP!

When I think of DC, I always think of Bruce Lee and his idea that was stolen.

Very sad.

Graycap23 said:

Didn't David Carradine feel bad about that?
Anyway, RIP, I just watched Kill BIll again last week and thought it woulda been really cool if he had won that Oscar.

sad indeed.

myfavorite said:

Ditto.

What an awful way to end a wonderful career.

RIP

this is crazy. Wonder what the hell pushed him over the edge. Rest in peace dude.

g-bye grasshopper ...

R.I.P. "Grasshopper" @)-}-----

Damn...

So Bill Killed Bill?

"What Asian role models were there when I grew up? There was that lady who said, 'Ancient Chinese secret, huh?' And there was that show 'Kung Fu.' But they should have called it 'That Guy's Not Chinese.'" --Margaret Cho quoted in Rolling Stone, May 19, 1994.

PunkMistress said:

she called him Asian Adjacent

I saw him just last summer in SONNY BOY. It was probably one of the most interesting movies I'd seen in a long long time.