Scott Adkins Interview - by Anthony Dawe

Scott how did you first get involved with the martial arts and what styles have you studied to date?

My father and my elder brother both did Judo so naturally I went along when I was old enough. I started at the age of 10. The main styles that I have studied are Judo, Tae Kwon Do and Kickboxing but I’ve picked up certain things from styles like Wu Shu and Gymnastics.


What made you want to get into acting from such an early age, as you weren’t just a martial artist but also an actor?

I’ve always loved films. I was the kind of kid whose mother dreaded taking him to the video shop. I would stay in there for ages and would always leave with no less than about 3 videos or more. I worked in a video shop for a long time also. I vividly remember being 12 years old and seeing Bloodsport and then saying to my mother, “That’s what I’m going to do, I’m going to be a martial arts movie star someday!” So along with my martial arts training, as soon as I left school I enrolled in a Performing Arts class at college and didn’t look back really.

You have great gymnastics abilities that you combine with your martial arts and add them to your fights, how does this help a shoot?

Well it definitely helps as far as being spatially aware and being dexterous enough to do what ever stunt needs to be performed. I’d say that the best thing gymnastics could give a fight performer or stuntman is spatial awareness because if your being flung around on a set and you don’t know exactly where the floor is, you may well land on your head and that’s only good if you’re supposed to so. But now that you have people like Tony Jaa out there who have took martial arts and gymnastics on film to another level, I feel without the acrobatics experience you would not be able to stand out. Like anything else the level of skill has been raised so much in recent years that it’s a necessity.

You have worked on a number of projects from The Medallion with Jackie Chan to Special Forces, and many TV appearances in British shows such as Doctors, Eastenders and the Sky One comedy, drama series Mile High. Would you ever consider playing as just an actor with no martial arts if you were offered the role?

Well that’s exactly what I did with Mile High. I was hired as an actor for the whole of series 3 and of course I would do it again. Eastenders and Doctors and even Pit Fighter were no different. I consider myself an actor first and foremost. You’re either an actor or a stuntman and I decided long ago that an actor was what I wanted to be. However, I wouldn’t star in an action film and not fill it with exciting fights because I feel that the audience would be disappointed and would expect that from a Scott Adkins film. But if it was a part in a TV series with an ensemble cast or a nice cameo in a movie I wouldn’t hesitate at all, as long as I liked the script and the part. I’ve actually just started work on Holby City as a regular character for the next 5 months which is the British version of “ER”, so I like that I can do both.

Right, Isaac Florentine is a close friend of yours, and one hell of a great director, that should be doing A-movies by now. What’s his secret to shooting good movies with great action and a good story?

Isaac Florentine is a wonderful friend who I owe a lot to. There aren’t as many straight to video/DVD movies made as there used to be but if you look at Isaac’s back catalogue, as far as this genre is concerned he is certainly the best director working in the American straight to video action market. I have worked on films like The Medallion, Unleashed and The Pink Panther where the budgets are $40 million plus and it would be stupid to try and compare these movies to a made for DVD film as the budgets are enormously different. For Unleashed for example, we had 3 days rehearsal and 2 weeks to shoot the fight scene in the empty swimming pool. That’s one fight scene. Whereas with these lower budget films you’re lucky if you get 2 weeks for all the action scenes. Isaac has never brought a film in over schedule or over budget and still he has been able to deliver some of the best martial arts action to come out of America. I think people will be very surprised when they see our new film “Undisputed 2”. It’s not a tiny budget film by any means but it’s still a long way off from the budget of your average Hollywood movie, but I really believe this movie will find a large audience as everyone involved did a fantastic job from set design to the actors involved to the cinematography and both JJ Perry (action coordinator) and Isaac excelled in shooting the fights but it also delivers on a dramatic level, very well paced and conceived and if Isaac doesn’t get a shot at the big leagues after this I’ll be very disappointed and it will be a shame for the fans of this genre.

Tell us more about Undisputed 2. It stars yourself and Michael Jai White. What role you play and how did you got the role? Also, how it was working with such a cool cast?

Michael is the main star of the film; he plays the same character that Ving Rhames played in the first movie. Basically, he is in Russia, filming a commercial for Vodka and finds himself framed by the Russian mafia and locked up in a Russian prison. I play Boyka, who is the champion of an underground mixed martial arts sort of cage fight, where different fighters from different prisons compete against each other whilst the mafia makes money from putting bets on the fights. My character is the Undisputed champion and no one will bet against him, this is why George “Ice Man” Chambers has been brought in to raise the odds but of course, he doesn’t want to fight, so he must be convinced. I think it’s a great movie and I’m very proud to be a part of it.

Scott what are your views on wire work in movies? Do you think it’s a waste of time?

Personally I’m not a big fan, but wires can be used to enhance some action scenes.
I’m not a big fan either, I think why bother? Obviously, Hollywood have found this trend where they can take actors with no martial arts experience and put them on a wire and pretend that they can perform death defying feats and that’s fine if that’s what you’re into but for me it just doesn’t cut it. It’s kind of like watching action films of today where you see a stunt but you know it’s all CGI so it doesn’t really get your blood pumping. When John Rambo jumps of the cliff in First Blood, you know that the stunt man is going to land in an air bag but it’s still an incredibly impressive stunt that you know has been done for real and that’s why it works so well. It’s the same thing when you see Jackie Chan or Tony Jaa do a combination of kicks or a stunt that you know has been done for real and that’s really the appeal of martial arts films for me, and that’s what got me into them in the first place. Wire work has its place in films like The Matrix or Crouching Tiger, which is a mythology but I’m so glad that Tony Jaa has come along to show people the real deal once again and I hope I can too.

Scott do you think you can do a martial arts movie that will be better than Drive or Ong Bak? Or just as good? As that’s what missing at the moment decent, well shot, well edited, well cast action movies(?)

It’s all just a case of time and money but I hope to yes. With Ong Bak they certainly had the time, shooting in Thailand and on the “making of”, they said that the alleyway scene took 2 weeks to film and that one day Jaa had a sore muscle so he took the day off. I’m not taking anything away from Tony Jaa as I think he’s incredible but what I wouldn’t give for that luxury. As I’ve worked with Alpha Stunts who did Drive, I know that they were filming day and night to get that amount of action into the film. They were sleeping on the set, and good on them because the action is brilliant. It’s just a case of finding a way to get more time to spend on shooting the action. If you have that, then you have no excuse really.

You may be working on a new fight movie with Isaac Florentine, can you tell me more about that and if and when it will go ahead?

I really can’t say much as it’s not a done deal but we’re developing a great idea for the movie.

Alpha stunts worked with you on Special Forces, what are they like to work with?

I worked with Akihiro Noguchi from Alpha Stunts and I was very impressed with them. As you know I’ve worked with most of the Hong Kong action directors and I really believe that Alpha Stunts are right up there with them. I’m amazed that they haven’t worked on more high profile films. Drive is an incredible fight film, certainly one of the best to come out of the US along with the No Retreat films.

Would you ever consider working on any more Hong Kong movies? As you played the lead bad guy in black mask 2.

I think I’ve done all I can do in Hong Kong now. I was a little disappointed that I didn’t get to have more of a showdown with Jackie in the Medallion but what can you do. I really want to concentrate on starring roles now and I don’t think a Hong Kong production company would want to see me in a starring role in one of their films but never say never. Obviously I’d like to do something with Tony Jaa.
Jason Statham has made a big leap because of the budget for the Transporter movies, how hard is it to get a good movie sold and noticed world wide? As there are a lot of bad movies out their just destroying the martial arts movie image and making it harder for guys to get noticed by big studios.
I don’t know the ins and outs of what it takes to get a world wide distribution deal but I do know that the reason Jason Statham is where he is, is because he proved himself as an actor first. Same thing with Wesley Snipes, same thing with Stallone, same with Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson. They’ve all earned their stripes as actors. The only guy I can think of that started in the low budget martial arts arena that made it out into the big leagues was Van Damme but that’s probably because Bloodsport was a huge hit. All the guys that start in these B movies don’t normally reach the cinema. For the most part that is. I suppose Mark Dacascos is the exception. At the end of the day, to be in the theaters you need to appeal to a wider audience than just fight fans and people want an actor first and a martial artist second and that’s just the way it is. Sure they can tell the difference between Jet Li and Keanu Reeves or Tony Jaa and Jason Statham but do they really care as long as they can do it a bit? I do but maybe that’s just me.

No 17.You perform all your own stunts with no wires, that’s very impressive and can be seen in your showreel. Whats your secret Scott?

As tony jaa is dong all his stuff now with no wires, and its amazing.
There’s no secret. It’s just hard training and dedication. I’ve seen kicks in the past and thought “Wow, how did they do that!” You think you’ll never be able to pull it off but you keep training and practicing and eventually it comes. You can’t limit yourself, anything is possible. I’ve been working on a few kicks that I’ve never seen before and I’m looking forward to putting them on film.

Do you have any plans to work with Van Damme on a project? As you are linked with his new fight movie B-2, what’s going on with that?

I don’t know what’s going on with that but I’ve had a few meetings with Van Damme in the past. He was talking about putting me in a TV series of Kickboxer but that wasn’t the direction I wanted to go in anyway. I have a huge amount of respect for Jean Claude, he really was one of kind and he opened up a whole new market for a lot of action actors. He certainly made his mark and he’s a very nice guy. He treated me very well and I’m a big fan.

Scott, you are a cool dude, and I wish you all the best for the future, thanks for the interview.

No problem mate.

by Antony Dawe.