The making of Bruce Lee’s first kung fu movie, The Big Boss, was filled with problematic experiences for multiple parties, as Lee was engaged in clashes with not one, but two different directors hired to helm the project. Despite going on to become one of the biggest kung fu movie stars in cinema history, and known throughout his acting career by the nickname 'Little Dragon', Lee's first feature venture with Golden Harvest was plagued with issues behind the scenes.
A few years after co-starring in ABC’s The Green Hornet show, Bruce Lee found that his plan to become a huge Hollywood star wasn’t going the way he had hoped. As a result, the struggling actor was lured back to his roots in Hong Kong and signed a two-picture contract that would tie Lee to kung fu studio Golden Harvest. First up for Lee was The Big Boss, which turned him into a martial arts sensation in Hong Kong. It is far from his best or most famous film, but it is regarded as the movie that launched him into stardom.
Based on details revealed in Bruce Lee: A Life by Mathew Polly, the critical and commercial success enjoyed by The Big Boss does not reflect all the challenges that were encountered during production. When Lee was hired, he was brought in to play one of the protagonists, but not the main hero himself, who was to be played by James Tien, an established Hong Kong star who already had a few big roles under his belt. Immediately after filming began, Lee butted heads with director Wu Chia-hsiang, whose ideas about how kung fu movies should work on-screen contrasted greatly with Lee’s. Wu wanted long, Chinese opera-inspired fight sequences, whereas Lee wanted battles to be brief and decisive so that they looked more realistic. When both demanded the other be removed from the picture, Golden Harvest had to pick between them, and given what they had already spent on Lee, they dropped Wu from the project and hired Lo Wei to take his place.
Bruce Lee’s relationship with Lo Wei wasn’t much better. Similar to the situation with Wu, Hollywood’s influence on him and his practical approach to kung fu led to a number of disagreements. Lee inserted himself into the creative process, which only served to worsen Lo’s frustration. It also didn’t help that Lo considered Lee to be disrespectful. Lee reportedly called him by his full name, as opposed to “Director Lo”, which was the custom.
Adding to the tensions on set was a rivalry between Bruce Lee and James Tien. Tien was supposed to be the lead, but when Lee arrived, his top billing status was no longer set in stone. Since filming started with just a three-page script, the movie was practically being written as they went, so big changes were certainly on the table. Though Lo had his issues with Lee, he became open to the idea of making him the star and sidelining Tien. With both actors vying for the role, the two did their best to impress the director with their fight scenes. Clearly, it was Lee who won this contest, since Tien’s character was killed early in the film. Production of The Big Boss amounted to a rocky few months for sure, but there’s no denying that it paid off big for Bruce Lee and Golden Harvest.
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