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By: Jamie Penick, MMATorch Editor-in-Chief Cung Le has been dipping his toes further into the Hollywood pool over the last year, and with his biggest part to date coming in this weekend's new release, Pandorum, he's decided to relinquish his Strikeforce Middleweight Championship as his time continues to be taken up by obligations in the movie business. I had a chance to catch up with Le this week to discuss the movie, when he plans to return to action and what his plans are for the near future. Check it out below!
Jamie Penick: I'm joined today by a very special guest, he is now the former Strikeforce Middleweight Champ and he's got a movie out this week, Pandorum, it is Cung Le; how are you doing today, Cung?
-Cung Le: I'm doing great, how are you?
I'm doing very well. Now Cung, you've decided to relinquish your Middleweight Title for Strikeforce and now Jake Shields and Jason "Mayhem" Miller are going to have a go of it for the belt. How did that decision come about for you? Obviously you haven't been able to defend it since defeating Frank Shamrock for the belt in March of 2008, as you've got everything going on with your movies and that led into it, but that's got to be a tough thing to do to give up that Title.
-Well first of all, it was a very hard decision. I was torn, I wanted to fight you know, and I sat down with my entertainment team and went over everything, and they told me that these opportunities for someone who's just gotten into [movies] don't come around too often. So then I had a meeting with Scott Coker and I told him, you know, "I want to pursue this." Strike while the iron's hot. We definitely have a good communication and I told him exactly what's going on and I let him know ahead of time. He told me "let's just do an Interim belt." I felt that it's not right for all the middleweight contenders to have to fight for an Interim belt while I'm off doing movies. It's a great opportunity for me, but those guys don't have the same opportunities and then they'd have to fight for an Interim belt? I didn't feel right about it and Scott when we sat down and talked about it, he agreed with me, and I said, you know "I'm going to take a step back and vacate the Title so that two guys that are very active can fight for the Title. I'll bow out, finish up what I'm doing and then come back next year for a couple of super fights. If I feel I'm sharp and everything's going well when I come back then perhaps I'll make another run at the Title, but right now it's about getting back into the cage sometime next year and hopefully I'm not too rusty.
So you're looking at a mid to late 2010 return, then?
-I'm hoping earlier. I mean, I've got some things in the cooker right now, and if it greenlights I'm off filming again. I mean, when you're filming a movie and you're doing your own stunts there's really no time for training or anything. I didn't know if I could do it, though someone like me probably could find a way to manage it, but there's always the risk of injury. Shoots sometimes go between 12 and 16 hours a day, and when you're doing your own stunts you're shooting A unit and you're shooting B unit, so once you're finished with the A unit you're moving over and doing your own stunts for the B unit, so it's busy on the movie sets for me. My roles keep getting bigger, and I'm just taking advantage of it right now. I definitely miss being back in the cage. I miss training like a fighter and living like a fighter, but at the same time I'm having a fantastic time with this new career that I've dove into. I'm definitely maintaining my shape so when I do come back it's not too painful.
Now your new movie Pandorum comes out Friday [September 25th], and it's your second movie that's been released this year. The trailer has been making it's way around television, and obviously you've got actors like Dennis Quaid and Ben Foster in the movie who have done a lot of stuff before this. Tell us a little bit about the movie and your role in it.
-My first part this year was in "Fighting" with Channing Tatum and Terrence Howard, and that was a pretty big deal. Channing Tatum was the lead in G.I. Joe this summer, but with this project I'm one of the main leads. There's six main characters in the film and I'm one of them. Dennis Quaid has been around for the longest time and then Ben Foster, they call him the "scene stealer," that's what my manager called him. He's definitely intense. As far as how I got this project I didn't just get it because I'm a Champion fighter and have a big following. I got it on an audition. I met with producer Jeremy Bolt, who produces the "Resident Evil" films, he's one of the producers on this project, and after I met him he sent my manager a script, and I read it and told my manager, "do whatever it takes to get me an audition." A couple of months later I was auditioning for it, and I beat out a lot of other top Asian actors in the business. I got on set and I took it seriously. I trained like I would for a fight, I trained in the morning, I trained at night in the art and the craft of acting. I knew that most of my scenes were with Ben Foster, so I definitely want to let him steal the scenes away. I didn't realize what a big part I had when we were shooting. I felt like after the first act of the movie I'm in throughout the whole movie until the end. I'm very excited, and to get to work with actors like Dennis Quaid and Ben Foster and this amazing director Christian Alvart from Germany, it was such a great experience. I haven't had a chance to see the finished product yet. I've seen a few little scenes because I needed to do some ADR [a.k.a "dubbing"] because a few of the scenes the sound didn't pick up when filming. But I have not seen the movie yet. I'm really excited for Friday because Overture films was nice enough to rent out a whole theater in my hometown so I get to do my own little premiere.
So what is the movie about here, from what I can gather it seems like a sci-fi, horror, action film set in outer space, is that about right?
-The best way to sum it up is a "psychological, horror, action-thriller." It's about a big ship, kind of like a Noah's Ark of today, and there are 60,000 passengers in the ship. This ship is flying from this solar system to another solar system because they've found a planet that can sustain mankind. It's not like Star Trek where you can just beam from one solar system to another, it takes time to get there. So all of the 60,000 passengers get put into a sleep chamber to sustain their youth. There's an eight-rotation crew that wakes up every three years, and every three years a different shift wakes up to check and make sure all the reactors and everything else on the ship is still functioning and that the ship is in good shape. What happens here is two crew members wake up for their shift but don't have any memory of what's going on, so one character explores the ship, that's Ben Foster's character, and he finds all types of strange things going on. People are missing, people are killing each other, people are mutated. All hell breaks loose. I save him in a scene and then we team up to explore the ship together to try to get the reactors going.
Now the other movie you've got coming up here is Tekken, and you're not the only MMA fighter in that one as the UFC's Roger Huerta is also in that movie. Did you work a lot with Roger in that film, did you have a lot of scenes together at all?
-We both had small parts in the movie. I play Marshall Law, and I believe Roger got a new character, coming out in the new Tekken game, Tekken 6. I forget the character's name, but it's more of ten to fifteen minute scenes for both of us there. That's going to be another fantastic movie, but I don't know exactly when it's coming out, but it won't be this year it will be next year. Right now I'm looking forward to Pandorum because my part is a very, very big part and it was a lot of hard work that was put into this. Working with all the bigger named actors in here, we all really connected and it was a very good cast. We definitely had a really good chemistry on set and I think everything came out fantastic for the cast of this movie, Pandorum.
Now you're not the first fighter to move over to movies and you're certainly not going to bethe last, obviously with Roger Huerta and then Quinton Jackson taking a part in the A-Team movie, what was it about acting that made you decide to put the sport on the back burner for now. What was it about that vocation that drew you more to that than fighting at this point in time?
-Well, I wouldn't say I put the sport on the backburner at the beginning, because with four of my six fights I was able to film multiple small parts with a few weeks here and there and I could still fight at the same time. But as the parts got bigger, and also the pay got bigger, I realized that being on set for two and a half months in a different country without your trainer or the time to even train doesn't allow you to come back and defend a Title let alone fight a high level MMA fight for three, five-minute rounds. I just figure that I can't fight forever and I've got to make sure that I've got something for me to fall back on after I'm done with fighting. I'm not young anymore, so I wanted to make sure that I can secure something and then come back and get the rest of that fight out of my system before I do hang up the gloves. I was just thinking of my future and what I would do to secure it and that's why my decision right now is that I have to go hard and heavy right now while the iron's hot. Not everyone can go and say, I'm going to go film a big budget movie and get on a cast where I can make six figures and potentially seven figures one day. People say, "well you can always do movies," but that's not true. You've got to have a little bit of luck to get into this industry, too. So far I've been very lucky and I want to take advantage of this opportunity because I know I can't fight forever. I'm coming down closer to that time where it's a little bit harder to get rid of all the aches and pains, and injuries take a little bit longer to heal, so I'm just watching out for myself, my career and my family.
You said you're looking at a couple of super fights when you come back and then you'll judge based on those whether or not you go after the title again in Strikeforce. Are there any names out there right now that you're wanting to fight or is there anyone in particular under contract to Strikeforce right now that you'd like to fight?
-For me, I always let the promoter and the match maker do their job. I just prepare for who they want me to fight, and that's my job. I feel that I don't want to take on too much. Scott Coker, I've been with him since 1998, and I've been fighting since we were on ESPN 2, and then we moved over to K1, and then his first show in MMA I was with him. Now he got the Showtime deal this year and I haven't been able to fight, so I'm just going to let him make that decision. He knows what will be a fight that the fans want to watch and that will put butts in the seat, and also what will make for a really good matchup for an exciting fight. He really does want us to put on the best fights he can possibly put on. So I just go with the flow.
He's set up the Fedor Emelinanenko vs. Brett Rogers fight that we now know is going to take place on November 7th on CBS. Are you hoping to get on CBS when you come back, or will you just be happy to be back by the time you return to the cage?
-I'll just be happy to get back when I do return. Whether it's Showtime or CBS, hopefully I'll have a new audience coming along with me and whatever platform they decide to put me on I'll be ready to go. I feel that guys like me and Rampage and Randy [Couture] are going to bring a new set of fans over from our movies that will hopefully become MMA fans as well. I'm hoping that will be the case with what I'm doing right now.
We touched on Tekken already, but are there any other projects that you'll be working on once promotion for Pandorum is up?
-Well after Pandorum I know I've got some promotional things I need to do for "Bodyguards and Assasins" and "True Legend," which are Chinese action style movies, but it's with the biggest movie studios over in Hong Kong and in China. They want to build me as one of their new rising action stars there, so I know I'll have that coming up in December which is "Bodyguards and Assasins." Also "True Legend" is with Master Woo Ping, who did The Matrix and Kill Bill movies. I've also got a few projects in the burner right now that, until I sign on the dotted line I'll wait to announce, so there's nothing to announce there, just some more media and promotional stuff in China that I'll have to do. I've got other offers and stuff but I'm being very selective of what I'm doing right now.
Well I'd like to thank you for taking time out of your busy schedule to talk with me here, is there anything else you'd like to add before you go?
-I'd just like to say thank you for the interview, and thanks to all the fans for all their support through the years. Pandorum's out this weekend so check it out! I'll be back, and thanks again for all the support.
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Jamie Penick, editor-in-chief
(mmatorcheditor@gmail.com)
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