Not a huge fan, but given my last impression of him was praising his amazingly nuanced performance in Kill Bill Vol. 2 (a lousy movie, but worth admission for Carradine's performance alone), I thought his passing was worth mention.
Oscar-nominated actor David Carradine, best known for his leading role of Kwai Chang Caine on TV's Kung Fu in the 1970s, died Wednesday in Bangkok, where he was shooting a film, his manager confirmed Thursday. The star was 72.
According to manager Chuck Binder, the movie's producer went to Carradine's hotel room and found that he had passed away. Binder told Fox News the death is "shocking and sad. He was full of life, always wanting to work ... a great person."
Married five times and divorced four - he is survived by his widow, Annie Bierman, whom he married in 2004 - Carradine was nominated as Best Actor for his role as folksinger Woody Guthrie in 1976's Bound for Glory. Among his later screen roles was in Quentin Tarantino's Kill Bill, in which he played Bill.
Varied and Long Career
As profiled in People in 1992, Carradine was born in Hollywood to the actor John Carradine and his first wife, Ardanelle, and was just 7 when his parents divorced.
Shuttled between the two, he grew up in boarding schools on both coasts. Although he was orphaned emotionally, he did become close to the seven stepbrothers and half brothers he would accumulate during Dad's four marriages: Ardanelle's older son, Bruce; Chris, Keith and Bobby (whose mother was actress Sonia Sorel); Mike Bowen (Sonia's son from an earlier marriage); and Mike and Dale Grimshaw (John's stepsons by third wife Doris Rich).
By 1970, Carradine says, "I had a house in the Hollywood Hills that virtually every brother has lived in. It was like this safe harbor. We all took care of each other."
David's acting breakthrough - as an Inca king on Broadway in 1965's The Royal Hunt of the Sun when he was 29 - came only after lean years of studying music and ballet at San Francisco State, a brief Army hitch and a life-support gig as a prune picker.
"They can chew you up, but they gotta spit you out."
agree with GP that his master moment on film was @the end of Kill Bill 2
the Kung Fu thing was huge back in the 70s
guess I never realized the fucker was that old.
(& the older you get, the less 72 seems old ..... )
................ I exist only to amuse myself ................
I personally feel that this message board, Jacurutu, is full of hateful folks who don't know
how to fully interact with people. ~ "Spice Grandson" (Bryon Merrit) 08 June 2008
I don't know that I ever really watched an episode of Kung Fu, but I did enjoy his performances in Kill Bill 1 and 2.
The circumstances of his death are still a mystery, and probably will be for at least a few more weeks. Like other people have been saying, I hope that he is remembered for his work and not for the way he died. He had a pretty long-spanning career so hopefully people will choose to focus on that, since, in the end, that is what's more important.
GamePlayer wrote:Well, for cmsahe and SandRider, and any other casual fan like myself, here's Carradine giving one helluva performance in QT's Kill Bill Vol. 2.
I was an infant when I used to watch Kung Fu, then there was another Kung Fu series in the 90s I think (or late 80s) And of course Kill Bill. Here in my country, due to the popularity of the series in the 70s and a comic parody, everyone knows about the Kung Fu tv series and the little grasshopper.
Only the books written by Frank Herbert are canon.
Tleszer wrote:Last I read it wasn't suicide... but a sex game on wrong. He had rope tied around his neck and "other body parts."
Hopefully he won't be remembered for how he died.
not a chance in hell of that now ....
................ I exist only to amuse myself ................
I personally feel that this message board, Jacurutu, is full of hateful folks who don't know
how to fully interact with people. ~ "Spice Grandson" (Bryon Merrit) 08 June 2008
"You have profane our tradition, Round Eye Dog! Now we strangle you slow with rope around you neck and genital. And while we do, Slow Pong here gonna fluff you to death!"
"You have profane our tradition, Round Eye Dog! Now we strangle you slow with rope around you neck and genital. And while we do, Slow Pong here gonna fluff you to death!"
Knowharramean?
Yeah, that was an impromptu cover-up story if I've ever heard one.
Grasshopper, when you can untie the curtain chord from around my penis, then you will be ready.
Paul of Dune was so bad it gave me a seizure that dislocated both of my shoulders and prolapsed my anus. ~Pink Snowman
Picture of his dead body as he was found: (graphic picture)
This does not look, to me, like a masturbation gone awfully wrong, he is hung, he was murdered:
(Due to youtube I learnt the cultural diffences about the depiction of dead people, these pictures are common in mexican newspapers but it seems that inthe USA they are considered offensive, of bad taste)
