Cagney's Black Belt

[Walt Harms]

I have read that Jimmy Cagney (movie star) had a Black Belt in
Judo. Does anyone know where he trained? He does Judo in the film
Blood on the Sun.

Walt Harms

[Charlie Kondek]

Funny enough, Walt, I asked about this some time ago. Do a search here for a thread with the same name. General consesus is that he was pretty good (I liked "Blood on the Sun"), and someone even suggested he may have been a 6-dan before he died.

[TommyK]

Greetings,

I loved Mr. Cagney's acting, in all of his movies. However, I read once that he studied Judo just for the movie mentioned and then stayed with it, up to Brown Belt. I never heard that he received a earned Black Belt, perhaps an honorary one? Can anyone comment definitively? Is Mark F out there with a answer?

Regards,
TommyK
Tom Militello

[Chuck Clark]

Cagney is one of my favorites, but his judo dan ranking was honorary. The only judo he did in "Blood On The Sun" was the very static stuff at the first of the movie. The rough and tumble stuff at the last was done by a stand-in.

Bogart did some nice judo in a movie called "Tokyo Joe" during an impromptu randori with an old friend in their night club in Tokyo in the early part of the occupation. Good movie.

Regards,

[vadrip]

I also heard he was a brown belt, Cagney also boxed and that's showcase alittle in Blood on the sun too. The movie was also showcased in a docoumentary called the martial arts: the real story. I once saw a show on Cagney where he was getting beat up in a movie, Cagney was actually a street kid with alot of real fights, so during the filming he either gets accidentally hit or didn't like that fact he was supposedly getting beat up in the movie. Well, he starts beating like two or three guys and the guys are pissed and start fighting back, but Cagney got the better of all of them. It was funny his ego was just too strong to let some hollywood types think they could portray Cagney as getting beat up.

[MarkF]

Chuck pretty much agrees with what I know. The only training other than the few (six?) weeks for Blood on the Sun, were perhaps the odd workouts from friends he had made. The brown belt story is as high a rank as I've heard he got, but even that is based more on speculation rather than fact.

I loved that movie, and until I saw the movie for the great one it is, I watched only for the judo.


Mark

[Walt Harms]

Yes, years ago I thought that Cagney had only studied for the movie, however now if you do a search for "Cagney Judo" on the web many judo sites will state he was a black belt and that TR was a brown belt. I'm just interested where those sites came up with that they almost read "cut and paste" from one source. Thanks for all input. Also,
crossing the pacific with Bogart has some nice judo shots as well, I wonder if Bogey has some judo.

Walt Harms

[Charlie Kondek]

Interesting question. I've read a couple of Bogart bios and judo was never mentioned, but biographers tend to ignore a lot of these types of details. I'll go see "Tokyo Joe," it's one of the Bogie pics I haven't seen!

I do know that Bogie was pretty tough in real life, but also very human. His favorite bar-fighting tactic was to invite a guy outside, tell the guy he'd be there in a minute, then go on drinking at the bar. When his adversary returned, fuming, he'd buy the guy a drink and laugh the whole thing off.

P.S. Saw what looked like some judo in "Gunga Din," a rip-snorting colonial adventure yarn from the 30s starring Douglas Fairbanks Jr and Cary Grant.

[Joseph Svinth]

That stuff is generally cut'n'pasted from Dennis Helm's "2,000 Years: Jujitsu and Kodokan Judo." The best known iteration of that particular text appears in Corcoran and Farkas, 1988. The sad part is that USJF paid money to have that drivel written.

After the war, Cagney's bodyguard was Jack Sergel, who was the former LAPD judo instructor, and a double and trainer on "Blood in the Sun." Meanwhile, Ken Kuniyuki's wife worked for Cagney as a maid or some such. "Rafu Shimpo" is the paper I'd start with if I were in Southern California and seriously interested in researching the topic. (It's available on microfilm at various LA-area libraries.)

I have seen no evidence that TR was ever formally graded in judo.

[Mitch Saret]

Another movie that Cagney starred in and used some judo/jujutsu is "13 Rue Madeline." He plays either an OSS or intelligence agent in France during WWII.
I never heard about him being ranked in judo, though. It wouldn't suprise me as he was quite athletic and was a consumate song and dance man.

[Jack B]

I heard that Bogart was a judo nidan. Anybody know for sure?

Jack Bieler

[TommyK]

Greetings,

I read that Mr. Bogart was the son of a wealthy Southern California Medical Doctor. He was raised in boarding schools and I doubt he really 'mixed it up' with street kids. This probably is the cause behind the much heard of story of challenging a guy to step outside and then staying inside. I don't know how he was able to portray a street-wise thug though. Anyway, does Joe Svinth or Mark F. have further scoop on this subject?

Regards,
TommyK
Tom Militello
"It is better to say I don't know, then to spread baseless rumours."

[Charlie Kondek]

Yeah, Tommy, it's funny to hear an interview with Bogie and hear his natural voice, as opposed to its edgy, "on-screen" version. Bogie was a classically trained actor and veteran of the stage, could recite huge chunks of Shakespeare, and preferred chess and boats to gats and gunsels. That said, he was probably legitimate tough. That upper lip of his was frozen by a piece of shrapnel he received in the first world war. The gravel in the voice: booze and smokes, and loooots of 'em.

I heard an interview with Cagney once in which he said he wanted to be a boxer, not an actor. His old Irish mother protested, and said, "Okay, if you wanna be a boxer, then first you have to fight me. If you can lick me, you can be a boxer. If not, you have to find another occupation." Of course, he couldn't bring himself to hit his sainted mom! So it was tap-dance and grease paint instead.

[MarkF]

I don't know how he was able to portray a street-wise thug though.

Hi, Tom,

Rumors get started because he and others were good at playing these types, a certain fight scene in in a movie, and voila, you have a black belt in judo.

Edward G. Robinson was a great thug, even at his height of perhaps five feet, but not a street thug. He used his voice, dress, and his gat to get over the lack of size.

But Cagney actually did study some judo, we agree on that, and I don't have a problem with Bogie doing the same.

How do they do it in the movies then? Probably like anyone else. Good teachers, lots of practice, tons of "temporary" jobs close to the studio sets and perhaps some judo along the way which was about all there was at that time in North America, anyway.
****

When Cagney retired, he really meant it, so any training he did have would probably have been done at his home (He did come out toward the end of his life to make two movies, the last was a made-for-TV movie).
*****

Walt,
Have you heard the one about judo being the second most popular sport behind soccer? That, apparently, came straight out of a book, was posted on the IJF web site, then made it's way to nearly every judo web site I've seen since. I recently read something estimating the number of world-wide judo players at six-million. Sometime before that, I'd read the number of American judo players was some 40,000.

As for TR, I also read his chief reason for taking up judo in the first place was that he had heard it could help take off some weight (I believe there is at least one photo of him toweling off after, or during a workout session, in judogi). I remember the photo, but I can't swear he was wearing a dogi, only that he was working out).


Mark