Notes » July 2008

Bruce Lee Museum

First, he was going to sell it to raise funds for Chinese earthquake victims.

And then he pulled it off the market after fans clamoured for it to be kept as a museum.

Now he wants permission to bend zoning laws to turn it into a 25,000 square foot complex.

What is it?

The Crane's Nest, Bruce Lee's former home at 41 Cumberland Road in Kowloon Tong. Used in recent years as a seedy "love hotel", the 5,699 square foot two-storey house is all that remains to connect Bruce Lee with Hong Kong (the statue at the Avenue of Stars notwithstanding).

Arguments in favour of creating a museum have received a lot of press lately:

"Chinese people were called the 'sick men of East Asia' ... until Bruce Lee came along. His contribution to Chinese culture was a lot more than just being a movie star. We need cultural heritage and it's unreasonable not to preserve it."

"Bruce Lee was the actor who cut through the old-style Hollywood handling of Asian characters by raising them up from the coolies or servants who just kowtowed and said 'yes sir'."

"It's humiliating. The government has been promoting Hong Kong using Bruce Lee's image but have they ever done anything for him?"

The current owner, a billionaire philanthropist, has proposed to convert the house into a museum along with the addition of "a cinema, a library and a martial arts centre".

The idea has a good head of steam and now it remains to be seen whether the government will finally get off their asses to honour Hong Kong's No.1 son. After all, it's been 35 years.

Bruce Lee died on July 20, 1973.

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