- Born
- Birth nameSteven Frederic Seagal
- Nicknames
- The Great One
- Lord Steven
- The Master of Aikido
- Height6′ 4¼″ (1.93 m)
- Steven Frederic Seagal was born in Lansing, Michigan, to Patricia Anne (Fisher), a medical technician, and Samuel Seagal, a high school math teacher. His paternal grandparents were Russian Jewish immigrants, and his mother had English, German, and distant Irish and Dutch, ancestry. The enigmatic Seagal commenced his martial arts training at the age of seven under the tutelage of well-known karate instructor and author Fumio Demura, and in the 1960s commenced his aikido training in Orange County, CA, under the instruction of Harry Ishisaka. Seagal received his first dan accreditation in 1974, after he had moved to Japan to further his martial arts training. After spending many years there honing his skills, he achieved the ranking of a 7th dan in the Japanese martial art "aikido" and was instructing wealthy clients in Los Angeles when he came to the attention of Hollywood power broker Michael Ovitz.
Ovitz saw star value in the imposing-looking Seagal. The high-octane action movie genre was in full swing in the late 1980s, and Seagal's debut movie, "Above the Law", was wildly received by action fans and actually received some complimentary critical reviews. He followed up "Above the Law" with another slam-bang thriller, Hard to Kill (1990), as a cop shot in an ambush by the mob who revives from a coma to take his revenge. The movie also starred Seagal's wife at the time, leggy Kelly LeBrock, who was married to him from 1987 to 1996 and is the mother of three of his children. His next outing was battling voodoo-using Jamaican drug "posses" in the hyper-violent Marked for Death (1990), before returning to fight psychotic mob gangster William Forsythe in the even more punishing Out for Justice (1991). Seagal was by now enormously popular, and his next movie, the big-budgeted Under Siege (1992), set aboard the battleship USS Missouri and also starring Tommy Lee Jones and Gary Busey, was arguably his best film to date, impressing both fans and critics alike.
Seagal's fighting style was rather different from that of other on-screen martial arts dynamos such as Bruce Lee, Chuck Norris and Jean-Claude Van Damme, who were predominantly fighters from striking arts background such as karate or tang soo do. However, aikido is built around using an opponent's inertia and body weight to employ various locks, chokes and holds that incapacitate him. Seagal carries himself differently, too, and often appears wearing Italian designer clothes and usually favors an all-black outfit, generally with a three-quarter-length coat with an elaborate trim. Additionally, Seagal's on-screen characters were often seemingly benign or timid individuals; however, when the going gets rough they reveal themselves to be deadly ex-CIA operatives, or retired Special Forces soldiers capable of enormous destruction!
As his box-office drawing power grew, Seagal began to infuse his film projects with his personal and spiritual beliefs, especially concerning the abuse of the environment. He appeared as an oil fire expert who turns against his corrupt CEO (played by Michael Caine) in On Deadly Ground (1994) to save the Eskimo population from an oil disaster; in Fire Down Below (1997) he plays an environmental agency troubleshooter investigating the dumping of toxic waste in Kentucky coal mines, and in the slow-moving The Patriot (1998) he plays a medical specialist trying to stop a lethal virus unleashed by an extremist group.
Action fans struggled to come to terms with social messaging being built into bone-crunching fight films; however, Seagal's box-office clout remained fairly strong, and more traditional chopsocky projects followed with the "buddy cop" film The Glimmer Man (1996), then almost a cameo role as a Navy SEAL alongside CIA analyst Kurt Russell before Seagal is sucked out of a jet at 35,000 feet in Executive Decision (1996).
In 1999 Seagal took a different turn in his film projects with the surprising genteel Prince of Central Park (2000), about a child living inside NYC's most famous park. He returned to more familiar territory with further high-voltage, guns-blazing action in Exit Wounds (2001), Half Past Dead (2002), Out for a Kill (2003) and Belly of the Beast (2003).
Unbeknownst to many, in 1997 Seagal publicly announced that one of his Buddhist teachers, His Holiness Penor Rinpoche, had accorded Seagal as a tulku, the reincarnation of a Buddhist Lama. This initial announcement was met with some disbelief until Penor Rinpoche himself gave a confirmation statement on Seagal's new title. Seagal has repeatedly discussed his involvement in Buddhism and how he devotes many hours studying and meditating this ancient Eastern religion.
While his box-office appeal has somewhat declined from his halcyon blockbusters of the mid-'90s, Seagal still has a very loyal fan base in the action movie genre and continues to remain a highly bankable star.- IMDb Mini Biography By: firehouse44@hotmail.com
- SpousesErdenetuya Batsukh(2009 - present) (1 child)Kelly LeBrock(September 5, 1987 - 1996) (divorced, 3 children)Adrienne Larussa(May 31, 1984 - September 1987) (annulled)Miyako Fujitani(December 1974 - 1987) (divorced, 2 children)
- ChildrenAnnaliza SeagalDominick SeagalKunzang SeagalSavannah Seagal
- ParentsPatricia Anne FisherSamuel Seagal
- RelativesBrenda Seagal(Sibling)
- Ponytail
- In all of his films, he is seen holding a Colt M1911A1 semi-automatic pistol. He owns several in his private collection.
- Uses Aikido in fight scenes
- Quiet, husky voice
- Corrugated eyes
- Broke Sean Connery's wrist when he was teaching him martial arts during the filming of Never Say Never Again (1983).
- Has been visiting children's hospitals for more than 25 years, and has stated that he will continue to do so until the day that he dies.
- Speaks Japanese fluently.
- Was already thirty-six when he made his acting debut in Above the Law (1988).
- For almost twenty years, Seagal has been working as a fully commissioned deputy with the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office in Louisiana.
- I am hoping that I can be known as a great writer and actor some day, rather than a sex symbol.
- [on what he thinks are the most important lessons that one should strive to live by in Aikido] Try to find the path of least resistance and use it without harming others. Live with integrity and morality, not only with people but with all beings.
- [on his feelings regarding past movies] Hollywood is a mercurial place where people are sort of . . . a victim of their environment and how the environment changes. Movies that would be timely now, ten years from now would be passé and nobody would be interested in the subjects. All the movies that I have done I have not been in control of. Sometimes there is a contractual situation where you go to the studio and they kind of tell you which ones they want you to do. Be that as it may, I have also been lucky in the sense that I have been able to make environmentally conscientious movies as well as politically conscientious movies. Above the Law (1988) was a politically conscientious movie. On Deadly Ground (1994) was environmentally conscientious, so I want to keep making movies like that which are more geared with a certain entertainment value but also bring people forward into contemplation.
- [on President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo of the Philippines] I've never met her, but my impression of her is that she's very straight, sincere, honest, really talented president, and I hope she gets re-elected.
- [on actors who become political leaders] [Ronald Reagan] was a pretty good one, but I think it really depends on the situation.
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