Took me a long, long time to write that script. 8. It's not something that I'm interested in, but good luck." But Mark had permission to use his name and to basically say that this was a real story. The Corsican Brothers. In honor of How Did This Get Made?'s #Bloodsport episode, we made this #supercut of Jean-Claude Van Damme's super #butt! They each got three chances to punch (and block) one another. It was done on the exact same day that Masaaki Hatsumi, Stephen Hayes and Shoto Tanemurathese are guys who think no one in the world is a ninja but them and everyone else is a fake.Blake Harris: What about some of the specific claims that the piece makes? This regular featureis written byBlake J. Harris, who you might know as the writer ofthe bookConsole Wars, soon to be a motion pictureproduced bySeth RogenandEvan Goldberg. I don't know if they ever approached Michael Dudikoff, but basically the producers were in a quandary as to who to cast. They'll cover Frank Dux being a real man, Van Damme's soft baby buns, blindfolded tea training, the not so secret illegal Kumite martial-arts tournament, Ray Jackson, and much more. He saw the script. Is that true?Sheldon Lettich: We were working on a sequel, but I just don't think it's going to go anywhere, unfortunately. And it became real clear and finallyI said show me the proof that I represented myself as a war hero, as a Medal of Honor hero? He used Mike's own movements against him and dropped him. In downtown L.A. And I go: Well, just do me a favor. And the CIA and everyone is obligated to tell you? Mr. Dux and I met in Tegucigalpal, Honduras, in the summer of 1985, where I was being briefed by Dux and other intelligence operatives on military targets within Nicaragua. And then he was inspired to write a script. KUMITE! It was just a way to release it. DuBois' Bloodsport first appeared in Superman Vol 2 #4 by John Byrne back in 1987. Roger Moore co-starred along side Van Damme in The Quest (1996) ironically playing a James Bond actor which Frank Dux had said inspired him to learn martial arts in the first place. And so he told Menahem, "Sell it to me and I'll release it theatrically." Okay, try him out. And on it he writes: To the Man Who Beat Me. "Blake Harris: So what eventually changed Menahem's mind? Despite mixed reviews from critics, it was a considerable box office success, grossing $50 million on a budget of $1.5-2.3 million. And I said, "Okay, after dailies, I'll meet you up there." So he still didn't' have a lot of faith in Jean-Claude's acting abilities and decided not to make it. I really screwed up. It worked great. And I could see he was really contemplating it. Well, about the only thing they showed was a trophy receipt.Blake Harris: Which they claimed was evidence that the trophy you won was "at least partially made in the San Fernando Valley? And at one of these construction sites, there was a guy doing martial arts. I said, "But I can see your view from here and how the world could look bleak." As far as, like, the choreography for how fights go and stuff. In Enter the Ninja, I didn't use my real name. You know, Jean-Claude was totally overwhelmed when he got to work with Stallone on Expendables 2. How involved were you with that reshaping?Frank Dux: Every day, when Sheldon was writing the script, I would be in the office with him and Mark DiSalle, the producer. We probably fought for a good 5-10 minutes before getting split up. And Stallone felt the same way. The film finds the Suicide Squad going on a mission to the fictional country of Corto Maltese to carry out a mission to destroy a secret installation housing a secret weapon known as Project Starfish. KUMITE! "There is not Mr. Tanaka in Japanese history" of the Ninja families, Tanemura said. I was there at every meeting and, of course, they were getting all the ideas out of me. So I said, "As long as you're going to have martial arts, why not get Frank?" I think Jean-Claude and I have done just fine without 'riding his coattails,' haven't we?". So when I finally connected with Lettich, I worried that there might be some not-so-flattering words headed my way. Because this is what happened next Sheldon Lettich: So they sent me to Paris and Corsica to do research and I re-wrote The Corsican Brothers, which I was going to direct. They were flabbergasted. What was he like?Frank Dux: He was wonderful. He did everything to basically poison the well with Jean-Claude and everybody I worked with. It was very time-consuming and it was not easy to match things up with the optical printer, but I thought we did a pretty good job of that. A lot of those shots came from the camera angles I had been directing. Not what's typically expected, which was: Jean-Claude's going to find these motherf***ers and beat the s*** out of them. But then Menahem decided he didn't want to make the movie.Blake Harris: Why?Sheldon Lettich: In his words, I'm quoting, "Jean-Claude can't even play one character, how do you expect him to play two?" Go to https://NordVPN.com/variant to get a 2-year plan at a huge discount plus 4 months free. Commander Alexander Martin available for review. I had them cut down so it would fit him because I'm a bigger guy. The Jean-Claude I knew was a person who you wanted to see win. I never said that. So the play was groundbreaking in some ways. His point was that they just wanted to show it was a kid in trouble who could have gone down a different path, but martial arts puts him on the right path. That is not to say that the Tanaka name has no meaning. The concept of gladiatorial games has its roots in the Etruscans, the predecessors of the Romans. But here's a photo from the screening, so I guess at least one person wanted to have their photo taken with me. If they'd actually served. I don't think Stallone has ever been given his due by movie critics. And then he said, "What the hell are we doing out here?" And I gotta give him credit there. When. They didn't back me up and they never said anything about seeing my fight footage.Blake Harris: I'm really sorry to hear that.Frank Dux: And one of the things that people don't realize is that after the Times article came out, people were so willing to convict me, just because it was the Times.Blake Harris: I just have one last question for you: since this whole thing grew, in a way, out of your friendship with Sheldon, I was wondering when was the last time that you spoke with him?Frank Dux: I saw Sheldon, believe it or not, about four weeks ago. During the tournament, Dux battles an array of international fighters from various schools of martial arts. 2. level 2. He said, "Movies often come in cycles and there hasn't been a martial arts film in a while; I think that cycle is going to come back soon." The 20 episodes of How Did This Get Made listed below offer a taste of the world that the hosts have built. But I'm curious, getting back to what you were saying earlierand what to ultimately led to that story you describedat what point was the producer Mark DiSalle convinced that Jean-Claude would work? Are you guys still friendly?Sheldon Lettich: Oh yeah. And if Jean-Claude had found out that I really was theat that time, the real force, if you wouldthat was giving him all these elements, Sheldon's usefulness would have been short-lived. But, I mean, he couldn't do a forward roll when I first got him. Another thing was that had I co-directed The Quest with Jean-Claude, it might have contributed to a mistaken notion that Jean-Claude co-directed Lionheart and Double Impact with me. He was good at boxing. With Bloodsport and Deadshot picking up each other weapons in battle. And there'd be a bunch of people there with phones to record it, so we don't want this to happen.Blake Harris: Speaking of that screening, Frank had mentioned that you were crushed. And I was right: He came with [Bloodsport actor] Michel Qissi and two other guys. All of this was prior to Bloodsport. How did that happen? It was ridiculous what they had. Viking Samurai 104K subscribers Subscribe 546 16K views 1 year ago How did the Bloodsport Redux trailer go viral and Why this movie needs to get made! This is the kind of bond we had. On this episode of Matinee Monday, Paul Scheer looks back at the "How Did This Get Made?" episode with Nicole Byer on the 1988 cult f. For the first time in about 14 years. They didn't know what to do, but they thought they'd give me a call. The red one, the blue one, the black one. Both of them wanted to be the cop.Blake Harris: That's so funny (though it makes sense).Sheldon Lettich: It just couldn't be worked out so the project fell by the wayside until they got Stallone and Wesley Snipes to be in it. But they still run it. How much of the character's personality is true to the individual who lived those events? Two, actually. I think it was Jean-Claude finally convinced them to allow him to do it. Menahem says, "Oh, Corsican Brothers, that's perfect for Jean-Claude! It was called Firebase and was basically Zulu in Vietnam; about a small disparate group forced together on a Firebase that gets attacked by an overwhelming number of North Vietnamese. We were calling it "Delayed Stress." It was "Dukes." Ed Boon and John Tobias, the creators of legendary video game Mortal Kombat, were inspired in part by Bloodsport. Dux believes this article was part of a smear campaign orchestrated by business competitors. And he just laughed and said, "Come on, let me show you this house. A secret martial arts contest? So when he heard that there was another movie with Van Dammeand this time Van Damme was starring in itSammy was totally enthusiastic. Discovered by Player FM and our community copyright is owned by the publisher, not Player FM, and audio is streamed directly from their servers. Was Sheldon the first person you shared it with?Frank Dux: Well, it was supposed to be a series. Stallone's original idea was that [Colonel Sam] Trautman comes to Rambo and says something like: hey, I got a mission for you in Afghanistan. It was a horrible film. There's an authenticity to it.Blake Harris: Speaking of authenticity, I was wondering how much of the movie is accurate to your own life experiences?Frank Dux: Well the fighting scenes were very accurate. So we had a number of people come to my apartment; John would test them out for their acting abilities and we would also try to determine if they were for real.Blake Harris: In what sense?Sheldon Lettich: Oh, I just meant we'd try to determine if they were really Vietnam veterans. In 1980, Frank Dux first came into the public eye via an article in the November issue of Black Belt magazine. There were a number of people who really liked it. So I have all these memories of falling down stairs and crawling on my knees. He wants to find a more peaceful path. And then Moore took me and Grant and started showing us some stuff. We may receive a commission on purchases made from links. That was really my very first entry into the Writer's Guild.Blake Harris: Moving up the ranksSheldon Lettich: Yeah, and around this time I wrote a Vietnam screenplay that got me my first agent. This got the people at Cannon re-thinking Bloodsport and they decided to do a test run on the west coast. I thought: Oh shit, I'm going to get my ass handed to me. And he knows it. Because I think he's got a Walter Mitty syndrome. So my agent sent him Firebase and he responded very enthusiastically. And we ended up settling. And so yeah. And we loved each other at that point.Blake Harris: So you guys were really closeFrank Dux: Yeah, this'll show you how close we were and tie back to what I was saying right before. It was definitely a therapeutic experience for everyone involved with the play. Leon hired me to write a script, which Menahem ended up liking. Bloodsport (1988) Starring Jean-Claude Van Damme and Forest Whitaker based on experiences in the life of martial artist Frank W. Dux My involvement in that tournament was part of a plan, launched in 1975, to infiltrate the criminal organizations that organized the fights. Bloodsport is a 1988 American martial arts film directed by Newt Arnold, and starring Jean-Claude Van Damme, Donald Gibb, Leah Ayres, and Bolo Yeung. And so we had a great time. I said, "Real Kumite fighters, we fight here. It's incredible." After directing Jean-Claude in Double Impact [1991] and Lionheart [1990] before that, was there any reason you didn't want to be involved with writing or directing?Sheldon Lettich: That was right after another movie I did called Only the Strong [1993] and I seemed to have a lot of other things going on. By this time we knew that Frank was full of baloney with a lot of the stuff that he was saying about his life. And he did. Then Jean-Claude came in and worked with Michael on the fight scenes, re-working those. And it was just surreal to her. You gotta admire the fact that he wanted to get a real Vietnam vet working on the script with him. It's the amazing tale of Frank Dux, a Caucasian martial artist who fought in (and won) a ruthless secret tournament that's held only once every five years. You spent almost four years in the U.S. Marine Corps, is that correct?Sheldon Lettich: Yeah, I served as a radio operator in South Vietnam and then later with 1st Force Reconnaissance Company based at Camp Pendleton, California.Blake Harris: So how did you go about making that enormous transition from wartime soldier to Hollywood writer?Sheldon Lettich: Well, surprisingly enough, my first success came in the theater. And then Hollywood got to him and he started showing signs of manic depression, you know?Blake Harris: In what way?Frank Dux: I'll never forget. Please note as always our subject'sopinions, recollections and claims are his own, and do not reflect the views of the author or this publication. I think what happened in reality was more interesting, but you have a limited amount of time to tell a story and it has to resonate with the audience, you know? I remember him saying, "Michael Dudikoff is a movie star! Do you still believe I that?" In fact we did the casting at my apartment. And Leon was going to star in the movie, which we called The White House All Stars with the "White House" being a frat house at this college where all the football players lived. It's a sprawling ecosystem. I didn't see it coming. If it's Stallone: no problem, he can kill me on screen at the end.Blake Harris: The ultimate complimentSheldon Lettich: Ha, yes.Blake Harris: Speaking of Jean-Claude, I imagine that you first met him around this time. So he met me on the roof of the Victoria hotel. Then all of the sudden I got hit in the face with a Black Dragon shirt, and that's how I became the youngest Black Dragon in the history of the Black Dragons.Blake Harris: That's unbelievable. Although there is no convenient way to verify each and every detail connected with this story, the editors have verified enough of the basic facts to feel confident in publishing it. Fun bit of trivia: Bloodsport is essentially a hoax perpetrated by Frank Dux, who made outrageous claims about this Kumite tournament that were never substantiated and are physically impossible. He said, "To be the best, you've gotta fight the best, kid." Qissi followed Van Damme to Los Angeles and found himself in a bit part in Bloodsport and eventually played the villain, Tong Po, in Kickboxer. Jean-Claude was a big Stallone fan?Sheldon Lettich: Still is. Frank and I did write a couple of scripts together, and he received credit on both of them. A simultaneously misleading and fitting title was certainly bestowed upon Bloodsport 4: The Dark Kumite, by far the worst installment of the franchise by a longshot. I'm not talking our toes are over the edge. And then there's another story where he met Menahem and did it another way in Monaco. LIVE from Largo in Los Angeles, Nicole Byer of Party Over Here joins Paul and Jason to discuss the cult 1988 Jean-Claude Van Damme martial-arts film Bloodsport. KUMITE! And it was no-holds-barred, it'd very brutal and bloody, so it was called "Bloodsport." I should also back up and say that I was really poor growing up. That's water off my back. Why don't you go check it out?" In fact, Midway Games attempted to license Van Damme's image for the game. Blake Harris: You had mentioned earlier on that Bloodsport sat on the shelf for two yearsFrank Dux: Yeah, for two years it sat on the shelf. Now, Frank did contribute a number of ideas to the Bloodsport script, but he claimed these were "life events" that actually happened to him, not fiction. And he was friendly to me. They were both pregnant at the same time. So I climbed up on the ledge with him. They were going to do a movie called Night of the Leopard but there were some problems with getting the script so now they needed a new one. The Robert DuBois version of Bloodsport made his live-action debut in the television series Supergirl, played by David St. Louis. This thing, it had legs, and started traveling around the world (London, Australia, etc. "But I will say this," Lettich continued. I was too close to it. Plus the guy was just an idol of mine. That's bullshit, that's total bullshit.Blake Harris: What about those claims regarding your covert military background? And what really grabbed Sheldon's attention was the fights.Blake Harris: So what happened with the script? When I heard that name, it was like bells started ringing. And he agreed to that. Jean-Claude is poison!! So cool, in fact, that now we have a professional basketball team called The Raptors and no one raised an eyebrow about why a team from Tornoto, Canada would be named that. So I watched that happen and then I watched Victor Moore fight Chuck Norris.Blake Harris: Moore fought Bruce Lee and then Chuck Norris? Bloodsport wasn't an Oscar-worthy film in any manner (the original cut was deemed unwatchable and a re-edit was completed before release), but Van Damme's stoic charisma and the memorable. A college football comedy, of all things, that took place at a black college in Texas during the 60s.Blake Harris: I think that also earns "left field" status.Sheldon Lettich: [laughing] Maybe. This was all very, very low budget. Using tech he got from Lex Luthor, Bloodsport teleported a rifle that fired Kryptonite needles into his hands and shot Superman with it. How did that come about?Sheldon Lettich: Well, it's interesting. U.S. soldier Frank Dux (Jean-Claude Van Damme) has come to Hong Kong to be accepted into the Kumite, a highly secret and extremely violent martial-arts competition. It was going to be a surprise appearance. I wasn't a bitter person. In fact, we all went out to celebrate. I met Gladys, the woman of my dreams, I had a baby, and I'm miserable. That's what really happened. That movie's terrible; I'm putting it straight to video. Well you know how that ended up. So he goes there on his own to rescue Troutman, and that pretty much became the movie.Blake Harris: That's a good point. The ninja school if you want to call it that. I never accused the military of doing it. Wow.Frank Dux: And he knocked Chuck Norris to the ground several times. And that piece, filled with accusations and allegations, continues even to this day cast doubt upon the reputation of Frank Dux. And Rambo says [putting on a thick Stallone impression]: let me just go get my gear. Plus, we hear LL Cool J's hip-hop prayer and the best . "This guy's never gonna make it," Menahem said. Bloodsport: Directed by Newt Arnold. And we made money on that film. Jean-Claude had a three picture deal with Menahem at Cannon and Leon was very impressed with Jean-Claude; we all thought this was a match made in heaven. But they called me from Hong KongFrank and Jean-Claudelamenting the fact that "Mark DiSalle was messing up the script." Dux said the military ordered his record sabotaged to discredit him. That's kind of how it appealed to me. He went in and redid it. And Menahem was dead set against it.Blake Harris: Why?Sheldon Lettich: [Laughing at the memory] His word for Jean-Claude was "poison." But to my pleasant surprise, Lettich was a complete gentleman. And I just want to end it right now." Everywhere else in my life I'm like a duck out of water, but put me in that arena and I just swim. Like M was Admiral Menzies. Oh man, he f***ing hated that movie. But back then it sounded really cool.Blake Harris: Well you started that clich!Sheldon Lettich: [laughter] Back then, to say "based on a true story" was something that intrigued, and I think it particularly intrigued Menahem Golan. In exchange for dropping the suit, they offered me the rights to The Corsican Brothers, which I readily agreed to because, by then, Jean-Claude was trying to get a project set up with Moshe Diamant. I went into the offices of the L.A. Times with my attorney with the actual fight film footage. What really made Bloodsport special, though, was the work of Jean-Claude Van Damme. That was the real Sheldon Lettich. Later on, Lee took Grant and showed him that one of his legs was shorter than the other. I didn't understand. We're 60 stories in the air, I'm not kidding you. So I started doing a Howard Cosell imitation and that's where I came up with the term Bloodsport. "We have no recollection of such a tournament," said Kenneth Wilson, a spokesman for the Ministry of Sports in the Bahamas. I felt bad for him.Blake Harris: Actually, if you don't mind, I have one more question for you.Frank Dux: Sure.Blake Harris: We've spent all of this time talking about your life as a fighter and portrayals of your life as a fighter. One of the key sequences in the film finds Task Force X sent to free Rick Flag from an enemy camp. These targets included the planned mining of a Nicaraguan port and the planned sabotage of certain Nicaraguan installations including power stations and weapons depots, codenamed OPERATION CORDOBA HARBOR. "Tagline:The True Story of an American Ninja, "All I request," Lettich started off by saying, "is that we try to keep discussion about Frank Dux to a minimum. Not looking to find myself embroiled in the middle of a he-said, she-said war of words, I happily agreed to this request. Because for years he would turn down roles if his character had to be defeated at the end. In 1993, Dux got beaten up by a guy in the first tournament, a guy by the name of "Nasty" Zane Frazier, who is known for knocking himself out when he and his opponent rolled out of the ring and hit the floor. They were supposed to present the supposed evidence that said things didn't exist. Jean-Claude?Frank Dux: When we started? People would just assume that this is how it worked on those other two movies.Blake Harris: That makes sense.Sheldon Lettich: So I actually suggested to Jean-Claude that he use Frank Dux to write the script. It was awarded the Drama-Logue Critics' Award for Direction and the Los Angeles Drama Critics' Award for Ensemble Performance.

Tarkov Player Count Per Map, Sam Fox Harbour Group Net Worth, Cat Mud Flaps 24x36, Articles H