I got so much time to talk to Donnie Yen at the Blade II premiere that he gets his own interview. Yen, of course, starred in the legendary Iron Monkey among many Hong Kong action films. He added fight choreographer to his resume' in the late '80s and directing five years ago. Coming over to America, he choreographed and performed in Highlander: Endgame and now Blade II. He will next appear in Shanghai Knights with Jackie Chan and Hero with Jet Li.

How did you influence the choreography of Blade II? I think everything just evolved itself. Hong Kong action has taken the whole world by storm the past couple years, so I don't really have to try to convince anybody or introduce anything. Especially Wesley and the director, Guillermo, have always been fans of my previous films like Iron Monkey, so it wasn't too difficult. It was basically me walking in and sharing my experience, my creativity with them. That's pretty much it. If it were five years ago, maybe it would have been a lot more difficult.

Where did you decide to use wirework in the fights? Frankly speaking, I'm not a big fan of wires. Actually, Yuen Wu-Ping is not very big on wires. Compared to some of his other colleagues in Hong Kong, he's more settled as far as delivering wireworks. We always emphasize the martial arts. The martial art comes first, the theories behind the martial arts. Wirework only enhances that movement to exaggerate and dramatize them.

How did you keep the choreography of Blade I in mind? To me, when the first one came out, I was very excited because it had Hong Kong style written all over it. At the same time, years ago the standard wasn't as high. The audience wasn't as educated as they are now. Now the standard is a lot higher. Now it's the real highest level from Hong Kong, bring it over and not to expect them to use all of it but they do expect the highest Hong Kong action standard.

Why include WWF moves? To me, I don't call it WWF. I just call it whatever works for the film, whatever makes sense, we use it.

What have you learned from Yuen Wu-Ping? I've worked with this guy for 15 years. Of course, he's a mentor and he's a master. What I've learned from him is his attitude, how we approach choreographing action. A lot of times in Hong Kong when we work, a lot of ideas come up in each film. Our objective is not to save an idea and say, "Let's use this next time." No. We never say that. You always give it your best. That's what I learned most importantly form Yuen Wu-Ping.

What is your role in Shanghai Knights? I play the main villain.

Are you doing any choreography in that? No. That's Jackie's. When you get invited to someone's house and he's a chef, you don't try to get into the kitchen and cook. That's his game.

What kind of fighting is he having you do? I don't know. I have a lot of respect for the man. He's a big brother in Hong Kong. I've never worked with him before but of course we know each other, and he always expressed that he always wanted to work with me because of my reputation, so I don't know what he wants to do with me. Maybe he'll let me kick him a couple of times or maybe he'll beat the crap out of me. I don't know.

And you're a villain in Victorian England? I'm actually [part of] a royal family trying to overthrow the Ching dynasty and trying to reunite my forces in England. So, I play kind of a gentleman looking kind of guy. We haven't started yet. I'm going there next month.

What's your role in Hero? I'm one of the costars. The whole movie is about Jet Li trying to hunt down three assassins that tried to assassinate the emperor Chin. I'm one of the assassins and have a big fight with Jet Li.

Did you choreograph in that? It's a collaboration because working with Jet, usually Jet doesn't have a whole team with him. Jackie does. Jackie has the Jackie stuntman team so out of respect, you follow their rules. Working with Jet, Jet hires different choreographers each time and Hong Kong is a very small world. We have mutual respect so when we're on the set we basically just play with our movement, play with the martial arts and whatever works for each of us, we come up with our own moves and make it work.

How did your fight with Jet go? This is the second time I fought him. 10 years ago we fought in one of the most talked about fight scenes of the decade, [Once Upon a Time in China II]. Everybody wants to see me fight him again.