10 Things You Didn’t Know About The Last Dragon

The Last Dragon is a great example of a movie that was a minor box office success during its theatrical release but as time has passed the popularity of the film has grown as more people felt the glow of Bruce Leroy’s feel good story.

I recently picked up a copy of the 30th Anniversary Blu-ray of The Last Dragon that featured an informative and well put together documentary on the 1985 classic, plus a commentary track with Director Michael Schultz. The love and pride that Schultz has for The Last Dragon was evident as he waxed nostalgic on this one of a kind film.

Schultz had plenty of behind the scenes stories to share about the movie and now I’ll share some of those stories with you as I present, 10 Things You Didn’t Know About The Last Dragon…

1. Despite being the star of the movie, Taimak was actually the last person to be cast. Taimak brought a great deal of martial arts skills to the table for the role of Leroy Green, but he had zero acting experience. Transforming Taimak into an actor was said to be one of the toughest challenges of the film. Taimak had multiple acting coaches working with him during the production, one of which was the Executive Producer, Berry Gordy.

2. The flip side to the Taimak situation was Julius Carry, who played Sho’Nuff aka The Shogun of Harlem. Carry came to the movie with acting experience but was not trained in the martial arts. Ron Van Clief, who made several martial arts films during the Bruceploitation era, was the fight choreographer that primarily worked with Carry to get Sho’Nuff up to snuff.

3. The little kid that Sho’Nuff picks up by his jacket in the movie theater was played by Director Michael Schultz’s son, Brandon.

4. Just before shooting was scheduled to begin, the edict came down that they needed to cut the budget by two million dollars or the film was not going to be made. Michael Schultz got with writer Louis Venosta and the two rewrote the film, eliminating some of the more complex action sequences that were planned. There would be no rewrites once the movie went into production.

5. The Last Dragon was shot in just 44 days.  

6. A big chunk of The Last Dragon’s budget was spent (reportedly one million dollars) on video equipment for the 7th Heaven set that featured huge video walls. 7th Heaven was the music video show hosted by Laura Charles, damsel in distress and love interest to Taimak’s Leroy Green. Vanity was the only actress considered for the role of Laura Charles.

7. The aforementioned Ron Van Clief played one of the masked bad guys in the big 7th Heaven fight scene.

8. You will not find any deleted scenes on the 30th Anniversary Edition Blu-ray of Berry Gordy’s The Last Dragon because there were not any. Everything that was shot for the film was used.

9. Taimak was able to do some of his own stunts in the movie, a benefit of being an experienced martial artist. However, stuntman and martial artist Jeff Ward doubled as Taimak for the stunts Taimak was unable to do.

10. One of the biggest and most expensive hurdles The Last Dragon faced was securing the rights to the Bruce Lee footage that was used in the movie. It was fortunate that they were able to get the rights because there was no contingency plan in place.