David Carradine

Eldest son of actor John Carradine, brothers of Keith Carradine and Robert Carradine.

David Carradine studied music at the State College of San Francisco and discovered a vocation as an actor by participating as a musician in the shows of the drama section of his university. He then joined a Shakespearean repertoire company, in which he acquired on the job the basics of his future profession.

After fulfilling his military obligations, David Carradine worked as an advertising designer in New York then returned to the theatrical scene by playing The Deputy on Broadway and giving the reply to Christopher Plummer in The Royal hunt of the sun. Building on these successes, he returned to Hollywood to appear in his first film, Taggart (1965) by RG Springsteen and appear in the Shane (1966) series before starring alongside Barbara Hershey in Martin's first studio feature film. Scorsese, Bertha Boxcar (1972).

The same year, he created the character of Kwai Chang Caine for the television series Kung fu . Originally developed by and for Bruce Lee, this soap opera was an instant hit, earning in its first season no less than seven Emmy citations . Known to the general public, David Carradine returns to cinema playing the libertarian singer-songwriter Woody Guthrie in Hal Ashby's On the Road to Glory (1976). This service earned him the price ofNational Board of Review and a Golden Globe citation .

Noticed by director Ingmar Bergman, David Carradine landed in 1977 the role of an American Jewish trapeze artist in The Serpent's Egg. Three years later, he reunited with his two brothers Keith and Robert for the filming of The James Brothers Gang (1980), a western by Walter Hill. In 1981, he tried his hand at directing with Americana, a drama he played himself and which won the Audience Award at the Directors' Fortnight at the Cannes Film Festival.

The 80s are less flourishing for the actor who connects at great speed V series B like Lone Wolf McQuade (1983) with Chuck Norris, Rio abajo (1984) alongside Victoria Abril or even Armed Response (1986), where he gives the reply to Lee Van Cleef. David Carradine temporarily returned to success by following Mel Gibson in the action comedy Like a bird on the branch (1990), but immediately returned to productions intended directly for the video department. In 2002, Quentin Tarantino offered him a golden role, that of criminal Bill, head of the Assassin Viper Detachment, which Uma Thurman faced in Kill Bill and its sequel, Kill Bill: Volume 2.

He died in 2010 during the filming of his latest film, Stretch, directed by Charles de Meaux.