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| Birth Name(s) : Dolph Lundgren |
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Full Dolph Lundgren Biography
Dolph Lundgren (born Hans Lundgren, November 3, 1957) is a Swedish actor, director and karateka. His breakthrough came when he starred in Rocky IV in 1985. Since then, he starred in more than 30 pictures, mostly action movies. Dolph belongs to a generation of film actors who epitomise the muscular movie action hero including Sylvester Stallone, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Steven Seagal, Jean-Claude Van Damme and Chuck Norris, many of whom he has worked with throughout his career. He is well known for his tall stature and physical fitness.
A native of Stockholm, Dolph Lundgren is a graduate of the Royal Institute of Technology. He has a master's degree in chemical engineering from the University of Sydney (1982), and was awarded a Fulbright Scholarship to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1983 – but quit after two weeks to pursue acting . He speaks five languages: Swedish, English, German, French, Spanish, some Japanese, and some Italian. He has a younger brother named Johan and two sisters who reside in Sweden.
Lundgren completed his mandatory military service in his native Sweden at the Amphibious Ranger School. He left this elite marine unit (Kustjägarna) with the rank of conscript corporal.
Lundgren holds a 3rd Dan (3rd Degree Black Belt) in Kyokushin Karate and won the European championships in 1980 and 1981 as well as a heavyweight tournament in Australia in 1982 . He was also captain of the Swedish Kyokushin Karate team, and was a formidable challenger at the 1979 World Open Tournament (arranged by the Kyokushin Karate Organization) when he was only a green belt.
Lundgren was selected to serve as the Team Leader of the 1996 U.S. Olympic Modern pentathlon Team during the Atlanta Games where he coordinated planning and other details between the team and the United States Olympic Committee. He is actively involved in promoting the image of the sport. "Over the past few years, my involvement with modern pentathlon has grown from pure interest to an opportunity to raise the visibility of the sport, increase recruitment of young talent and make sure that this event, originated by the founder of the Olympics, Baron de Coubertin, will remain in the Games," Lundgren has said.
In 1985, Lundgren made his feature-film debut in the James Bond film A View to a Kill briefly as a suited KGB henchman named Venz. Then he beat 5000 other hopefuls to land the breakthrough role of Ivan Drago, Sylvester Stallone's opponent in Rocky IV (1985). As he stated himself, he was initially turned down for the role, because he was too tall. In order to improve his physique and athletic abilities for the role of Ivan Drago, he began to train intensely in bodybuilding and boxing shortly before the film was shot.
In recent years, Lundgren has appeared in low-budget direct-to-video films. In 2004 he has made his directorial debut with the film The Defender also co-starring Jerry Springer. Subsequently Lundgren directed The Mechanik (a.k.a. The Russian Specialist in the US). He then co-starred alongside Max von Sydow, F. Murray Abraham and Ornella Muti in the historical/biblical film The Inquiry, awaiting for release (by Fox Faith), and recently starred in Diamond Dogs, an action adventure set and filmed in Mongolia. Lundgren also completed Missionary Man, a modern western that he co-wrote, produced, directed and starred in.
Dolph has often been the victim of over-billing. At the time of Showdown in Little Tokyo, he was marketed to the Japanese public as a 10 feet tall bodybuilder from a country near the North Pole and the son of a bear-trapper, who grew up in the harshest northern wilderness known to mankind.
His IQ has frequently been listed at 160 and that he is fluent in five or six languages. Dolph has expressed that both are inaccurate; although he does speak this number of languages, he is not fluent in them all.
According to various interviews, Lundgren is between 6'4" and 6'5" in height and not the 6'6" he is often billed and weighs between 230 and 240 pounds. As the character 'Ivan Drago' in Rocky IV, Lundgren was billed at 261 pounds but at the time weighed about 245 pounds. |
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