Writer’s Fractured Fairy Tale Laid Path to ‘Forbidden Kingdom’

By Forrest Hartman

Martial arts legends Jackie Chan and Jet Li talked about shooting a film together for more than a decade, but it took a children’s bedtime story to make it happen.

Screenwriter John Fusco says the first incarnation of “Forbidden Kingdom,” the Chan-Li team-up that hit theaters on Friday, was born as a multi-part story he would tell his young son before bed.

“It started to grow night after night,” Fusco says. “I had no intentions of doing it as a movie, but as I got deeper into it, I realized that what I really was doing was creating a kind of love letter to the martial-arts heroes of my childhood.”

When Fusco mentioned the story in casual conversation and producer Casey Silver expressed an interest, the writer decided there might be more to his fable than originally imagined.

“I felt that it could be the kind of a movie that a mother and father could take their young kids to … and bring the older cousin — the kind of jaded martial-arts fan — and the grandparents,” he says. “And they would all get something out of it.”

So, Fusco created “The Forbidden Kingdom,” which is centered on the journey of Jason Tripitikas (Michael Angarano), an American teen obsessed with martial-arts culture. After he discovers an ancient Chinese staff, he is transported to an alternate dimension where he learns that he must return the staff to its rightful owner, the long- imprisoned Monkey King. That leads to a fanciful and dangerous adventure where he is aided by two martial-arts masters portrayed by Chan and Li.

Fusco says making the film was a dream, because he has studied martial arts since childhood, and he was able to spend time with Chan, Li and famed action choreographer Yuen Woo-ping.

“It was a very deep experience,” he says. “One-hundred-and-one days of kung fu immersion.”

Director Rob Minkoff, whose previous efforts include “The Lion King” and “Stuart Little,” says he treasured the filming experience, as well. In fact, he relates his work on the film to the journey that Jason undertakes on screen.

“I had a personal connection to China, in that my wife is American-born Chinese,” he says. “My family on my wife’s side, most everyone is actually from China. … For me to go make a movie in China with these martial-arts movie masters was almost exactly the same story.”

Minkoff also saw parallels between Jason’s mission and his own.

“Jason goes to free the Monkey King,” he says. “Metaphorically, in a way, that’s my job as a director.”

Minkoff says the Monkey King is one of the most famous and widely known characters in all of Asia, but he’s relatively unknown in the United States.

“This film almost represents, metaphorically, that journey of freeing the Monkey King,” Minkoff says. “The idea is that we’re bringing this character and exposing him to an American audience.”

All that courtesy of a simple bedtime story.

(c) 2008 Tribune-Review/Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.