US born Hong Kong actor Daniel Wu was born and raised in California, the son of an Engineer and a College Professor. His parents are native of Shanghai, China but migrated to the US during the communist take-over of China in 1949. He said he developed an interest in martial arts at the age of 6 after watching Jet Li in “The Shaolin Temple”, thus starting his training in Wushu at age 11. He considers Jackie Chan as his role model and they became close after working on several movies, Jackie Chan considers him as a “son”.

On becoming an actor

Daniel Wu’s entry to the world of entertainment can be considered as an accident. He was in college studying architecture at the University of Oregon and also the founder of the school’s first Wushu club, after graduation he went to Hong Kong to witness the “handover of Hong Kong” without any plan of pursuing a movie career. At his sister’s suggestion he decided to try modeling only a few months later an offer to do a movie came along.

His acting career

He struggled during the early years of his career because of his inability to speak and read Cantonese. Hi first movie was the gay themed Bishonen and this was followed-up with City of Glass for which he was nominated as best actor during the 18^th Hong Kong Film Awards.  He then played a supporting role in Young and Dangerous: The Prequel, from Andy Lau’s series of gangster films. He eventually met Jackie Chan who signed him on his JC Group.

Daniel Wu’s popularity grew fast and he began starring in big budgeted films such as Purple Storm, Naked Weapon, Enter the Phoenix, Around the World in 80 days, New Police Story, The Banquet and recently The Shinjuko Incident again with Jackie Chan.

Other Works

In 2007 he launched the website alivenotdead.com with his friend Terence Yin. In this website he maintains his blog to give is fans some update on his career and personal life.