The Happenings

-- Forbidden Kingdom --

When Jet Li heard that he could take on the role of the Monkey King, he was instantly keen, having never played this beloved legendary character ever in his career. However, the five and a half hours of makeup that will ensue almost frightened him off.

Jet Li confessed, “I became afraid and almost said no because I was not sure how I will be able to act and fight in the whole getup.” So after much discussion with director Rob Minkoff and producer Casey Silver bouncing off ideas with the art and costume department, the image of the Monkey King was re-created, much to Li’s relief. Makeup time was drastically reduced to three hours.

Tan Zong (Yuen Biao), as a grandmaster of martial arts, is the chief martial arts instructor in Shaolin Temple. As much as Wang Shi Chong (Leung Kar Yan) worries about the pugilistic fraternity forming an alliance to revolt against him and thus issues a ban on martial arts practice, he also tries to recruit top martial arts exponents to consolidate his powers. Here, he is trying to invite Tan Zong to work for him, but before that, he sets up a Wooden Bench Formation to test him.  Legend of Shaolin 2 Blog