I used to be a street performer, and performances on Venice Beach, it's like playing the Apollo: They let you know if they don't like you!

I used to be a street performer, and performances on Venice Beach, it's like playing the Apollo: They let you know if they don't like you!

Half my family was from the Imperial Japanese Navy, and the other half was U.S. Army, and I was raised on Army posts during my childhood, so I pretty much began my life with a split-brain sort of thing.

I was clear: "I don't want to play businessmen with bifocal glasses and cameras, so if you're going to give me an Asian bad guy to play, then I'm going to give you the baddest Asian bad guy you've ever seen, and you're not going to forget that I was in the film."

I'm not a method actor, I don't write my character's history or all those kinds of things. I'm more about the 90 percent of the brain that is subconscious. I like to just pick certain pieces, let it soak in, and then let it kind of emerge out.

My major intention for coming to Hollywood - besides the fact that I was just enamored with acting from a very young age - was that I was tired of seeing wimpy Asian actors.

I really believe that breath, in and of itself can become the ultimate self-healing tool.