{"id":356979,"date":"2026-03-21T00:44:09","date_gmt":"2026-03-21T00:44:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/356979\/"},"modified":"2026-03-21T00:44:09","modified_gmt":"2026-03-21T00:44:09","slug":"chuck-norris-was-unique-among-movie-stars-for-being-tough-as-characters-he-played-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/356979\/","title":{"rendered":"Chuck Norris was unique among movie stars for being tough as characters he played \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cChuck Norris<\/a> actually died 20 years ago, but Death hasn\u2019t built up the courage to tell him yet.\u201d<\/p>\n

So runs one of the \u201cChuck Norris facts\u201d \u2013 playing on the action star\u2019s toughness, manliness and dedication to the American<\/a> ideal \u2013 that have proved a popular diversion on social media over the last 20 years. Sadly, with the news that Norris has died in Hawaii<\/a> at the age of 86, that particular quip will have to be retired.<\/p>\n

He was unique among movie-star rivals in being every bit as hard as the characters he portrayed. A black belt in Karate, judo, Taekwondo, Tang Soo Do, and Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, he first gained visibility outside the martial arts game as antagonist to Bruce Lee in The Way of the Dragon from 1972. Multiple roles followed (many of them for exploitation specialists Cannon Films) in such abrasive actioners as Invasion USA, The Delta Force and Code of Silence. An unapologetic showman, Norris embraced his hard-man image offstage, becoming a proselytiser for the revivified right during the 1980s. \u201cI am a conservative, a real flag waver, a big Ronald Reagan fan,\u201d he said at the time. Yet he retained broad appeal for the robustness of his performances and for his self-deprecating humour.<\/p>\n

Carlos Ray Norris was born in Ryan, Oklahoma \u2013 out on the plains \u2013 to working-class parents. His mother was of Irish descent. Dad, a car mechanic and truck driver, claimed distant Cherokee roots. It doesn\u2019t sound like an easy upbringing. \u201cIt wasn\u2019t until my dad came home from World War II that he really started to drink,\u201d he told People magazine in 1988. He went on to note his father would go missing for months and then come home to cause mayhem. Norris remembered turning within himself throughout childhood.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Actor Chuck Norris dies aged 86Opens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

\"BruceBruce Lee and Chuck Norris during the filming of The Way of the Dragon. Photograph: AFP\/AFP\/Getty Images <\/p>\n

In 1958, he joined the United States air force \u2013 something else few of his action-movie competitors could later claim \u2013 and served as an air policeman in South Korea. On discharge, he immersed himself in a martial arts scene that, in the US, was not nearly so mainstream as it later became. In 1969, Black Belt magazine named him fighter of the year. While juggling a day job at an aircraft manufacturer, he opened a string of karate schools and, according to his website, found himself teaching the likes of Priscilla Presley and Donny and Marie Osmond. Teaching helped him overcome adolescent introversion. \u201cIt was the first time I forced myself to crack that egg of insecurity I\u2019d carried all through my life,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd from then on, I kept forcing myself to go a little further, until I had completely overcome it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Norris made his acting debut opposite Dean Martin as a pseudo-Bond in the 1968 spy spoof The Wrecking Crew. Then came his role opposite Bruce Lee, already a near-legend, in Way of the Dragon. Steve McQueen, another of his students, had seen potential and had suggested he take a few acting classes. Many noisy movies followed and, by the 1980s, he was a new kind of celebrity \u2013 among the first stars to profit from the rise of home video. In those years, no evening of VHS action was complete without a Norris title. The Delta Force, from 1986, feels like the definitive example: our hero joins up with the likes of Lee Marvin and Robert Vaughn to rescue a party of hijacked travellers from broadly drawn terrorists. Reviews were mostly awful, but Roger Ebert recognised \u201ca well-made action film that tantalizes us with its parallels to real life\u201d.<\/p>\n

\"DebbieDebbie Reynolds joking around with US actor and martial artist Chuck Norris at the Stardust in Las Vegas, 1967. Photograph: EPA <\/p>\n

Norris maintained his singular celebrity through middle-age and right up to his death. Walker, Texas Ranger, a hit TV show, ran, over 203 episodes, from 1993 until 2001. He continued to enjoy parodying his own image in films such as DodgeBall: A True Underdog Story from 2004. He later published novels and a political screed titled Black Belt Patriotism: How to Reawaken America. He had five children and 13 grandchildren. He endorsed Republicans such as Newt Gingrich and Mike Huckabee. But even the most liberal of action fans kept a space in their heart for the man from Oklahoma.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen Chuck Norris does push-ups,\u201d a top Chuck Norris Fact claimed, \u201che doesn\u2019t push himself up, he pushes the Earth down.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Earth can take a breather. <\/p>\n

[\u00a0How Enter The Dragon became a martial arts phenomenonOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cChuck Norris actually died 20 years ago, but Death hasn\u2019t built up the courage to tell him yet.\u201d…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":356980,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[93,7137,42455,61,60,115],"class_list":["post-356979","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-entertainment","tag-hawaii","tag-hollywood-la","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-united-states"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/356979","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=356979"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/356979\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/356980"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=356979"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=356979"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=356979"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}