Bruce Lee received a back injury in 1970 that nearly put an end to his acting career. Here's the story behind it and how he recovered.
A back injury Bruce Lee sustained in 1970 nearly ended his acting career before it could ever really take off. For the actor, it was one of several major obstacles that stood in the way of him becoming a martial arts superstar. Furthermore, it was one that he wasn’t expected to overcome.
For Lee, reaching stardom was an incredibly difficult journey. Due in large part to producers and studio executives’ hesitancy toward casting Asians as their leads, Lee struggled mightily to get parts in TV shows and movies. Even after getting his big break as Kato in ABC’s The Green Hornet show, Lee’s career still stalled and didn’t start moving in a positive direction until much later. The series was canceled after just one season, forcing Lee to look for other roles, but the ones he found were mostly just guest appearances in TV shows. He made efforts to write his own material, but they didn’t pan out during Lee's time in Hollywood.
A very different kind of problem entered Lee’s life in 1970 when he was performing good mornings, a popular weight training exercise with barbells commonly used by athletes and bodybuilders. During the exercise, Lee felt something snap in his back. Multiple medical examinations culminated in Lee learning that he had done permanent damage to the fourth sacral nerve in his lower back. According to Bruce Lee: A Life by Matthew Polly, the actor was told by his physicians that since it couldn’t be undone, he would never be able to practice kung fu again. He was subsequently confined to a bed for three months and was unable to work in any capacity.
Lee struggled with his new situation because he understood that any future he had in movies and TV depended on his ability to perform martial arts. Not only that, but his plan at the time was to star in a movie called The Silent Flute, where his skills would have played an instrumental role. In a sense, kung fu was the foundation of his career. Knowing that losing kung fu meant that he would never become a star, Lee endeavored to recover from his condition. With the help of acupuncture, Cortisone injections, and Chinese medicine, Lee rehabilitated himself and slowly worked his way up to a point where he could practice martial arts again. Polly wrote in his book that Lee’s efforts proved the doctors wrong. Lee’s days of using kung fu weren’t over after all.
Unfortunately, Lee’s recovery didn’t mean that his back injury became a non-issue. It’s no secret that as a result of what happened, he suffered from severe back pain for the remainder of his life. Bruce Lee recovered well enough to deliver thrilling and well-choreographed martial arts performances in a handful of kung fu movies, but his chronic back problems troubled the actor until his death in 1973.
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