Budo international Martial Arts Magazine Jul.-Aug. 2014 | Page 118

Marcial Cinema
reach out and offer his support once
again. For me, I experienced a moment
of true friendship shortly after my own
mothers passing in late 2001, I had
flown back to UK from Hong Kong for
the funeral and a few days after I
arrived there was an e-mail from JC
asking where I was, as he had been
trying to reach me. I responded that
sadly I had a loss in the family, and
wouldn't really be able to get back to
him properly until I was back from the
UK. Within minutes there was a
response from JC, with his Belgium
phone number asking me to call him. I
did, and he not only offered his
condolences but told me that he was
in Belgium and if I needed anything he
was just a phone call away. The man is
a movie star, and yet he was going that
extra mile for me as a friend, and that's
something I really appreciated and
continue to value to this day.
The editor of this magazine, Don
Warrener I think would also agree with
my thoughts on Jean-Claude, as he
recalls some of his encounters with Mr.
Van Damme.
“It has been my esteemed pleasure
to know Jean Claude Van Damme now
for about 15 years. I got real lucky to
meet him right when I moved to
Hollywood thru my friend and business
partner Isaac Florentine when they
needed a script writer and Isaac called
me in to talk to JC about a project
called “The Tower” but I was the wrong
guy for the job. So I told him to get the
original writer back and he did.
But on my way out the door he
called me back in and we began to talk
about
computers
and
cameras etc. and martial
arts. Martial arts is all I really
know. I even had the
audacity to tell him I could
improve his roundhouse kick,
how arrogant of me.
Anyway once the word got
out and I had written a few
articles on him I got

contacted by a friend in England Jon
Jepson who asked if I could arrange to
bring JC to England and JC agreed to
go and teach some seminars for him
and he did. He did a great job as well
and everyone was very excited to be
involved. But it was during this trip that
I lear nt about a Jean Claude Van
Damme that no one knows about.
He was teaching a class in
Birmingham and he stopped the class
and asked everyone to sit down and
then he said “you guys all think that I
am tough and a great fighter well I
am not but I want you to meet a
tough fighter” He then walked over to
this ten year old boy Jimmy sitting in
a wheel chair with a ventilator on
with one of those