Green Hornet

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August 2nd,1964.  While cutting television producer William Dozier's hair, Dozier mentioned that he was looking for an Oriental martial artist, Sebring replied the name Bruce Lee.  Dozier then watched Bruce's demonstration that was fortunately filmed by Ed Parker, was impressed with what he saw and contacted Bruce to come to the studio for a screentest.  That was successful and Bruce was signed to play Charlie Chan's son in a new show but it sadly never got made.  Instead - because of Dozier's very successful Batman show, it was decided that Bruce would play the role of Kato (Oriental side kick and chauffeur)  in a spin-off series based on an old radio serial, 'The Green Hornet.'  The family moved down to Los Angeles in March 1966 where Bruce underwent a month's training at the 20th Century Fox acting school.  Shooting for the series began on June 6th, 1966.  Later in an interview with Ted Thomas on Hong Kong radio in late 1971 Bruce reflected, "When i first arrived (in the U.S.) and i did the Green Hornet, as i looked around, man, at myself, i was the only robot there because i was not being myself."  Although Bruce was dissatisfied with his performance as Kato, it gave him prestige in the martial arts world.  Bruce was even asked to open a chain of Kato Self Defence Schools but declined as he didn't think it was the right thing to do.  Although the show was cancelled in the U.S. after 26 episodes it turned out to be a huge success years later throughout the Far East  The series broke television rating records in Singapore and the Philippines.  Because of the popularity of the show Bruce would return back to Hong Kong in April 1970 with his five year old son Brandon and demonstrated his art of Jeet Kune Do on a Hong Kong television show called 'Enjoy Yourself Tonight' (the Green Hornet was renamed as The Kato Show in Hong Kong).</div> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <IMG SRC="17486a10.gif" border=0 width="646" height="929" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> <bR> <div> <I><B><U>An Interview with Van Williams</U></B></I><I> who played the Green Hornet on TV and today runs a cellular phone business in Santa Monica. </I></div> <bR> <div> <I><B>THE GREEN HORNET</B></I><B> WAS SUPPOSEDLY CANCELLED WHEN THE PRODUCER DEMANDED AN HOUR TIME SLOT, WE'D LIKE TO BELIEVE IT WAS SOMETHING MORE SINISTER...</B> </div> <div> I don't know if I can help you on that, because that's what I found out. The show was costing an absolute fortune. It was costing almost as much for the half hour of the <I>The Green Hornet</I> as a one hour segment of <I>Batman</I>. The special effects, the color, the amount of production that went into it. The cost was draining William Dozier. Everything he was making off <I>Batman</I> was going into <I>The Green Hornet</I>, and it wasn't working. </div> <div> <B>THE RATINGS DIDN'T MATCH UP?</B> </div> <div> The ratings were not a factor. We were on Friday night and winning our time slot, but Friday night, at that particular time of the, you know, the '60s, was the least watched night of all television. </div> <div> <B>BECAUSE EVERYONE WAS OUT ON THE TOWN?</B> </div> <div> Yeah, Yeah. So it put our overall way down in the '30s and '40s, though we were beating our time slot. I bitched about it, everybody bitched about it. We did two or three hour-long shows to prove that we needed it to get the scope. Dozier went back and said 'We're gonna do it this way or we're not gonna do it.' ABC said 'screw you.' And that's where it was left. I don't know if that was true or not.</div> <div> <B>SO TH-</B></div> <div> Now another thing that happened that you might want to know is there's a little mystery in it. There was an audit done on the show afterwards and they found that there were double and triple charges being charged to <I>The Green Hornet</I> that were not supposed to be.</div> <div> <B>SO THE SHOW COSTING A FORTUNE MAY HAVE HAD SOMETHING TO DO WITH THESE PADDED CHARGES?</B></div> <div> See, it was a 20th Century Fox show but the production company was Dozier's Greenway, who also did <I>Batman</I>. Either they had better control on <I>Batman</I> or weren't looking at what was going on- but the cost was killing them. Because the show, if I can remember right, was budgeted for either 75 or $100,000 and the average show was costing $143,000. So every show was in a negative cash flow situation of $43,000, and that added up pretty quick when you multiply it times 26.</div> <div> <B>DID THE OVERCHARGES COME TO THAT MUCH?</B></div> <div> Maybe some but not all. I just know that they'd call me into the fricken lot at 4 a.m. and wouldn't let me go till 11:00 p.m. They were paying me overtime and double charges and all this other crap they get into. Plus our show, the stunts and stuff were a lot more sophisticated, a lot more coordinated than they were on <I>Batman</I></div> <div> <B>THE </B><I><B>HORNET</B></I><B> WAS COOLER THAN </B><I><B>BATMAN</B></I><B>.</B></div> <div> I run into all these people who go, "you were our favorite and Batman was a joke. We liked the Hornet because it was real." Batman caught on with college kids- the "Wham!" "Bam!", all those top name people doing it and a lot of humoral and folderol. But I think we had a lot more sophisticated and loyal watchers than Batman.</div> <div> <B>WERE YOU AND BRUCE FRIENDS OFF THE SET?</B></div> <div> Well as much as you could be. We were working our ass off on that show. We had to teach Bruce how to work with the camera because he really didn't know. He learned how to expose Jeet Kune Do to the two dimensional world of the camera, you know, and not work in real close and hurt people, which he did a lot.</div> <div> <B>HE DID?</B></div> <div> Well yeah but not intentionally. He was used to working with people who knew how to give way when those slaps and backhands took effect. The guys working on the <I>Hornet</I> didn't know how to protect themselves. A lot of 'em got kicked in the you know whats. We had to convince Bruce that you could do your wackety-wack over the shoulder and be three feet apart. We also had to slow him down- it was a joke! He would go into a room, and all you'd hear, because of the lighting, was all this yelling and people flying around! We'd replay the scenes later and people would laugh and that really got him upset. He did NOT want to be laughed at.</div> <div> <B>DID YOU GUYS HAVE ANY FREE TIME OFF CAMERA?</B></div> <div> Bruce was a good friend. Everybody was good friends on that show because we tried to do something we thought was right. He'd come to our house with Linda and Brandon, bring all his paraphernalia, and have Brandon do his kicks- I mean he was two years old! He'd have Linda showing off and doing her stuff. Linda was always very, very, VERY quiet. She has changed considerably since those days. But he was so wrapped up in his Jeet Kune Do that really the only other thing he was interested in was exotic Chinese food. He'd invite us all down to Chinatown, this old Chinese restaurant, go talk to the cooks and order all these like 1,000 year-old duck eggs that were absolutely unbelievable. We'd have him write us lists of what to do, and we'd go the Chinese restaurants out here on the west end and they couldn't decipher his writing- didn't know what the hell he was talking about. </div> <div> <B>IT REALLY WAS A CASE WHERE HE WAS SO FOCUSED ON THE ONE THING THAT HE DIDN'T HAVE MANY HOBBIES?</B></div> <div> He didn't care anything about acting. He didn't care about trying to get rid of his real heavy Chinese accent.</div> <div> <B>DIDN'T HE JOKE THAT HE GOT THE PART BECAUSE HE COULD SAY "BRITT REID"?</B></div> <div> Yeah he could say "Britt Reid." Otherwise he had this heavy, heavy Chinese accent that was very, very hard to understand.</div> <div> <B>BOTH BRUCE AND BRANDON DIED UNDER STRANGE OR ACCIDENTAL CIRCUMSTANCES. WHAT ARE YOUR THOUGHTS ON ALL THAT?</B></div> <div> The only time I ever got anything was three or four weeks before he died. He was over and kinda joked about how the Tong- or whatever it was, the Chinese Mafia- had tried to move in on his production company. He was just joking about it, and thought it was a bunch of bull. He said he could handle it. A friend of mine later got information out of Hong Kong that he thought the Tong was involved in his death and there was some surreptitious thing about it. So I contacted some people I know over there in government circles and got a copy of the coroner's report- </div> <div> <B>IS IT TRUE THAT THE ORIGINAL CAUSE OF DEATH WAS LISTED AS "MARIJUANA POISONING"?</B></div> <div> No. When it's an accidental death at your hand, the British explanation is "Death by Misadventure." But as far as I can gather from what people have told me including Linda's story he developed one of his migraines. Supposedly it was some pinched nerve in his neck from doing all his stuff that was giving him the headaches. He and Chow were at the actress's house, and she said, "well I've got just the thing for you." She got some kind of a Chinese herbalist pill. He took it, laid down, and after 30-45 minutes, they couldn't wake him up. By the time they got him to the hospital, his brain had ceased to function because he had edema of the brain, which was an allergic reaction supposedly to an opiate. She had gotten, which you can do over there without prescription, these pills that were basically opium.</div> <div> <B>NOW HE WAS NEVER MUCH OF A PARTIER THOUGH...</B></div> <div> He wasn't here. But I'd heard rumours, which I couldn't believe because he was very into keeping himself in shape and eating the right foods. He didn't drink alcohol, didn't smoke pot, or this that 'n' the other. But I heard rumours that he had got involved with pot smoking, for the pressures and stuff.</div> <div> <B>OH REALLY?</B></div> <div> I didn't know whether that was a fact or not. I just heard that he'd been involved with dope and that it could have been an overdose, but I pooh- poohed that. You know, rumours were flying all over when he died. But when he was here he did not smoke cigarettes. He couldn't stand to be around people who did. He never took a drink that I ever saw. He took himself, physically, very, very seriously because that was his</div> <div> <B>WHOLE THING....</B></div> <div> That was his whole deal.</div> <div> <B>CAN YOU REMEMBER ANY FUNNY STORlES ABOUT BRUCE, OR RECALL ANY OF HIS RAUNCHY JOKES?</B></div> <div> Bruce drove everybody nuts around the set doing his Jeet Kune Do. Everybody'd be standing around, and suddenly you'd feel something tick your ear like a bug hit it or something. You'd turn around and realize that Bruce had just jumped in the air, kicked out and hit the lobe of your ear. You knew it was in fun, and he did have a sense of humor, but he was ALWAYS doin' this stuff. He'd tap you on the shoulder-, you'd turn around and all of a sudden he'd kick out at your groin. And of course you'd fold up, fall down, back up into furniture- and he just thought that this was hilarious! Just puttin' everybody to a disadvantage. Then one day he did that and at the same time the guy looked over to his right. Bruce hit him and dislocated his jaw. That ended <I>that</I> party! People were impressed with it at first. But after a while it got to be, "Oh God, he's at it again...." </div> <bR> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <A HREF="id58.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Special Event"><U><B><U>Click He</U></B></U></A><A HREF="id58.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Special Event"><U><B><U>re - Index Page</U></B></U></A></div> <bR> <bR> </td> </tr></table></body>