Chuck Johnson is an international action fillm actor based out of Tokyo, Japan. He is the first African American to make an international name for himself in Far East Asia’s action film industry and also the first American be trained extensively in the art of Katana Tate (Japanese theatrical swordplay) in Japan.
His life in martial arts began when he started Olympic Taekwondo training at the age of 15. Within 2 ½ years, he had earned his 1st black belt, and less than a week later, he became the Michigan State Junior Olympic Champion in both sparring and forms for his age and weight class.
In college in pursuit of a dream of Olympic greatness, he went to Seoul, Korea to study at Yonsei University and pursue advanced Taekwondo training. Having a love of performance and showmanship, in addition to doing competition training under former Korean national champion, and Samsung Taekwondo team member Kim Sung Hoon, he also began demonstration taekwondo training under Kyung Hee University Demo Team member, Jang Inkwon, and Korean national demo team member, Suh, Sang-Oo.
While in Seoul, he was featured in both the Chosun Ilbo Newspaper, and in the Martial Arts Textbook, Korean Traditional Martial Arts, Taekwondo Philosophy and Culture.
In 2001, Chuck completed his bachelors degree with Honors from Michigan State University while studying at the University of Science and Technology in Hong Kong. While there, he also won the Hong Kong intercollegiate championship for his weight class, when he had originally only come to the tournament to watch.
During trips back to the states, he won the KTAA National Championship for sparring and forms, and was also a Gold Medalist at the State Games of America. After returning to the states, he formed the Quiet Flame Demonstration Team which coupled comical taekwondo demonstrations with motivational speaking to encourage middle school, and high school kids to chase their dreams.
Briefly after that, he moved to Tokyo, Japan, and immediately began to get work on security details for a multitude of visiting international and domestic celebrities.
Chuck’s action career began when he was cast as a martial arts extra for the film Godzilla: Final Wars. While on set, he was introduced to action director Yuji Shimomura, and immediately began training with the stunt men of U’den Flame Works, and later with Kiyokazu Tanaka and his Pass Guard Action Team. He went on to have a multitude of other TV and film roles in Japan, appearing in such films as Death Trance , Jyuken Sentai Geki Ranger, Sukeban Hunters (Yakuza-Busting Girls), Yuji Shimomura`s short film, Yassy as well as live theatre performances such as Miki Mizuno’s Away in the Life in which he was a masked ninja (performing sword work), and a bodyguard.
In addition to holding ranks in Taekwondo, Capoeira, Seishindo Karate and Judo, and being trained in Katana Tate, Chuck also has experience in boxing, kick-boxing, tai chi, wing chun, hapkido, hanmudo, and Krav Maga.
He began his study of Strasberg Method Acting under a former acting coach of Sean Penn, Shelley Mitchell. He is also a prize-winning writer, and his work has been featured in Roda Magazine and Japan Today. He currently writes about martial arts, entertainment, and Japan for Gaijinpot, Suite101, and The Examiner.
