By Peter Dewar
Bell-bottom jeans were all the rage around the time legendary martial artist Bruce Lee leapt, fists clenched, to global fame in the 1973 blockbuster Enter the Dragon. Lee’s popularity removed any doubt Eastern fighting forms were out from the shadows. But it was up to a new generation of fighters to bring the revolution home.
In sleepy 70’s Melbourne, security industry entrepreneur Bob Jones opened a karate school offering a unique blend of fighting styles. Called Zen Do Kai, by 1980 thousands of students had signed up to one of 300 clubs. It wasn’t long before Jones was being invited to appear as a guest on daytime television.
Richard Norton was head instructor. Barely 20 years old, Richard was lean and super fit, with abs a coin would bounce off. And despite his relative youth, this unarmed ‘gunslinger’ exuded an aura demanding respect. Sensei Richard would stand samurai-like in front of a class of wide-eyed beginners.
These were the days of push-ups on knuckles on timber floors, breaking tiles with a punch, and full-contact Fridays. High-level gradings sometimes seemed more like melees to the sound of ear-piercing ‘hi-yah’s.
Students with the necessary grit were invited to join Bob Jones’ security team and work at nightclubs such as Thumpin’ Tums. Richard spent countless hours in smoke-filled environments like this, ‘road-testing’ techniques. A contrast to his daytime, administrative job at the Immigration Department.
However, the future had other plans. Richard travelled overseas in 1979 as a bodyguard to rock stars, later appearing in Hollywood, then Asian movies, only to eventually be recognised as an elder statesman of the international martial arts community. So when in March this year the 75-year-old collapsed without warning and died at his Melbourne home, the tremor was felt worldwide.
A headline in showbiz magazine Variety read, ‘Richard Norton, Mad Max Series Actor and Hollywood Stunt Coordinator, Dies at 75’. Tributes from famous celebrities such as Terminator liquid man, Robert Patrick, screened on YouTube for days. Even Sino newspaper South Morning China Post had something to say: “Stuntman Richard Norton sparred with Jackie Chan and made Chuck Norris ‘a better person’’’, read an obituary.
And at a humble warehouse in an industrial precinct in Yarraville, students dressed in Team Norton BJJ uniforms at Fusion Martial Arts were stunned. For these jiu-jitsu hobbyists, it seemed inconceivable Richard had gone.
A few days earlier, they’d been rolling on sweaty mats, working on a technique demonstrated that night by Professor (title for a jiu-jitsu instructor) Richard — their good-humoured teacher and martial arts maestro who manoeuvred with the deftness of a grappler half his age.
Richard’s professional responsibilities were hardly a secret. ‘I’ll be in NSW for a few months with Mad Max,’ or, ‘Heading off to L.A. to do a film for a friend as a favour,’ Richard might say matter-of-factly to explain absences from the training room.
However, the full extent of their professor’s background would’ve surprised many of his students, most of whom were born decades after Richard’s first big break came working as a bodyguard to the Rolling Stones in the 70s.
This led to collecting a rarified list of household names as clientele, including: ABBA, Fleetwood Mac, David Bowie, John Belushi and Linda Ronstadt. Musician James Taylor credited Richard for helping him overcome a heroin addiction with the aid of a rigorous fitness routine.
In the USA, the movie world opened up. Richard worked alongside action film great Chuck Norris, after training with the combat champion. Richard could work to the gruelling demands of Asian directors, including famous Sammy Kam-Bo-Hung. And, after catching Jackie Chan’s attention, Richard was cast in three of Jackie’s Hong Kong movies.
Richard worked in over 80 films, though in later years he was increasingly concerned with choreographing fight scenes and preparing A-listers such as Tom Hardy, Scarlett Johansson, Margot Robbie and Will Smith for their roles in stunts.
Yet at his core, Richard was a highly decorated, devoted martial artist, proficient in a variety of disciplines, including judo, karate, jiu-jitsu, and weapon-based styles. An encounter with Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu (BJJ) founders, the Gracies, proved pivotal, setting him on a 35-year-long path learning BJJ under the tutelage of the revered Machado brothers.
As is the nature of grappling, Yarraville students literally felt the individual behind the public figure. While the Richard they knew was easy-natured, he would focus intently on the minutiae of jiu-jitsu fundamentals. He valued tradition, asking students to line up in belt order and bow in correctly at the start of a class. They would be urged to spar respectfully, and that it was being the best of themselves, not winning a round, that was most important.
The experience of being submitted by the Professor could be ‘instructive’. Occasionally, an unwitting subject in a demonstration was left feeling what happens when technical knowhow, agility and strength are combined, hobbling away with a sore elbow or neck.
The legacy of a lifetime of training was a self-defence tactician committed to living by virtues that martial arts espoused, like honour, humility, courage and perseverance: ‘It’s not the two hours on the mat that matter. It’s the 22 hours off the mat,’ Richard would say.
While he continued honing his skills, adrenaline-fuelled tussles belonged to a distant past. And, in a revealing podcast only weeks before he died, Richard spoke about the book he was writing, and of embracing a ‘scary’ new challenge — taking on a dramatic acting role that did not involve action, despite his fears. As is the essence of ‘Bushido’, the warrior way.
Richard Norton figured among a vanguard bringing the excitement of traditional fighting systems to modern-day movie audiences. As a role model, it’s hard to think of a better example of how martial arts can help people become the best versions of themselves.
In the days after his passing, club members posted messages on social media. One seasoned black belt had this to say: ‘… you (Richard) had an unbelievable way of making everyone around you feel loved, appreciated and close to you. You were by far the nicest person I ever did meet.’
