Albert Pyun: King of Cult Movies

Charles F. Stahelski (born September 20, 1968) is an American stuntman and filmmaker. He is considered a highly-influential figure in the action film genre. He first achieved prominence as an stunt performer and coordinator, notably as the key stunt double for Keanu Reeves on The Matrix (1999), and as the martial arts stunt coordinator on its first two sequels. He subsequently directed the 2014 film John Wick, starring Reeves, and its three sequels.

Tracy Morrow (born February 16, 1958), better known by his stage name Ice-T, is an American musician and actor. He was born in Newark, New Jersey and moved to district Crenshaw, Los Angeles, California when he was in the 7th grade. After graduating from high school he served in the United States Army for four years. He began his career as a rapper in the 1980s and was signed to Sire Records in 1987, when he released his debut album Rhyme Pays. The next year, he founded the record label Rhyme Syndicate Records (named after his collective of fellow hip hop artists called the Rhyme Syndicate) and released another album, Power. He co-founded the thrash metal band Body Count, which he introduced in his 1991 album O.G.: Original Gangster. Body Count released its self-titled debut album in 1992. Ice-T encountered controversy over his track "Cop Killer", which was perceived to glamorize killing police officers. Ice-T asked to be released from his contract with Warner Bros. Records, and his next solo album, Home Invasion was released later in the Fall of 1993 through Priority Records. Body Count's next album was released in 1994, and Ice-T released two more albums in the late 1990s. Since 2000, he has portrayed NYPD Detective Odafin Tutuola on the NBC police drama Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.

Norbert Weisser (born July 9, 1946) is a German-born American film and theatre actor, probably most known for his many roles in Albert Pyun-directed movies (15 and counting). Weisser is a founding member of the Odyssey Theater and the Padua Hills Playwrights Festival, where he developed the role of Trickster in Murray Mednick's epic seven-hour The Coyote Cycle. He has played roles in theaters throughout Europe and the US, including Broadway, where he played Rode opposite Ed Harris in Ronald Harwood's Taking Sides at the Brooks Atkinson Theater. Most recently he played Oskar in John O'Keefe's Times Like These in San Francisco, Albany, New York and Los Angeles, where he received an Ovation Award, an LA Weekly Theater Award and an LA Drama Critics Circle nomination for his performance. Weisser has directed plays at the Magic Theater in San Francisco and at the Mark Taper Forum's New Playwrights Festival in Los Angeles. Recently he produced two Albert Pyun films, Infection and Cool Air. He is the father of fellow actor Morgan Weisser, who starred in both movies. Weisser's television credits include: Amelia Earhart: The Final Flight, Riders of the Purple Sage, My Antonia, From the Earth to the Moon, Alias, The Agency, NCIS, ER, and Ghost Whisperer.

Seth Benjamin Green (né Gesshel-Green; born February 8, 1974) is an American actor. His film debut came with a role in the comedy-drama film The Hotel New Hampshire (1984), and he went on to have supporting roles in comedy films throughout the 1980s, including Radio Days (1987) and Big Business (1988). During the 1990s and 2000s, Green began starring in comedy films such as Idle Hands (1999), Rat Race (2001), Without a Paddle (2004), and Be Cool (2005). He also became known for his portrayal of Scott Evil, Dr. Evil's son, in the Austin Powers film series (1997–2002). Green has also taken serious roles in films, including The Attic Expeditions (2001) and Party Monster (2003). He has provided the voice for Howard the Duck in a number of Marvel Cinematic Universe films and series, including Guardians of the Galaxy (2014), Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017), and Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 (2023) and in the animated series What If...? (2021–present). In 2019, he wrote, directed, and starred in the comedy-drama film Changeland. Green's first lead role on television was on the ABC sitcom Good & Evil in 1991, for which he won a Young Artist Award. Green later gained attention for his supporting roles as Oz, a teenage guitarist and the boyfriend of Willow Rosenberg, on the fantasy television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997–2000), and as the voice of Chris Griffin on the Fox adult animated comedy series Family Guy (1999–present). He also voiced Leonardo in the Nickelodeon animated series Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2014–2017) and the Joker in the Mass Effect video game series (2007–2012). Green created, directed, wrote, and produced the adult animated comedy series Robot Chicken and its spinoffs (2005–present), which have earned him three Primetime Emmy Awards and five Annie Awards. Description above from the Wikipedia article Seth Green, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.

Van Damme was born Jean-Claude Camille François van Varenberg in Berchem-Sainte-Agathe, Brussels, Belgium, to Eliana and Eugène van Varenberg, an accountant. “The Muscles from Brussels” started martial arts at the age of eleven. His father introduced him to martial arts when he saw his son was physically weak. At the age of 12, van Damme began his martial arts training at Centre National De Karate (National Center of Karate) under the guidance of Master Claude Goetz in Ixelles, Belgium. Van Damme trained for 4 years and earned a spot on the Belgium Karate Team. He won the European professional karate association's middleweight championship as a teenager, and also beat the 2nd best karate fighter in the world. His goal was to be number one but got sidetracked when he left his hometown of Brussels. In 1976 at the age of sixteen, Jean-Claude started his Martial Arts fight career. Jean-Claude retired from martial arts in 1982, following a knockout over Nedjad Gharbi in Brussels, Belgium. Jean-Claude posted a 18-1 (18 knockouts) kickboxing record, and a semi-contact record of 41-4. He came to Hong Kong at the age of 19 for the first time and felt insured to do action movies in Hong Kong. In 1981, van Damme moved to Los Angeles. He took English classes while working as carpet layer, pizza delivery man, limo driver, and thanks to Chuck Norris he got a job as a bouncer at a club. Norris gave van Damme a small role in the movie Missing in Action (1984), but it wasn't good enough to get anybody's attention. In 1984, he got his first significant role as a villain named Ivan in the low-budget movie, No Retreat, No Surrender (1986). Then one day, while walking on the streets, Jean-Claude spotted a producer for Cannon Pictures and showed some of his martial arts abilities which led to a role in Bloodsport (1988). The movie, filmed in Hong Kong, was so bad when it was completed, it was shelved for almost two years. It might have never been released if van Damme did not help them to re-cut the film and begged producers to release it. They finally released the film, first in Malaysia and France and then into the US shot on a meager 1.5 million dollar budget, it became a US box-office hit in the spring of 1988. It made about 30 million worldwide and audiences supported this film for its new sensational action star, Jean-Claude van Damme. His good looks led to starring roles in higher budgeted movies like Cyborg (1989), AWOL: Absent Without Leave (1990), Double Impact (1991) and Universal Soldier (1992). In 1994, he scored with his big breakthrough $100 million worldwide hit Timecop (1994). But in the meantime, his personal life was coming apart. A divorce, followed by a new marriage, followed by another divorce. It began to show up in his career when his projects began to tank at the box office: The Quest (1996), which he directed; Maximum Risk (1996) and Double Team (1997). The three films made less than $50 million combined. In 1999, he remarried his ex-wife, Gladys Portugues, and restarted his lost career to attain new goals. With help from his family, he faced his problems and made movies like Replicant (2001), Derailed (2002), and In Hell (2003).

Albert Pyun was an American film director best known for having made many low-budget B-movies and direct-to-video action films. He frequently blends kickboxing and hybrid martial arts with science fiction and dystopic or post-apocalyptic themes, which often include cyborgs. also well-known for directing the cult classics The Sword and the Sorcerer, Deceit, Cyborg and Nemesis.