Danny Kim
Taekwondo Master, Stuntman, and Drone Pilot
‘June 1st, 2019; 10:16pm. I know the exact date my life got better.’
Danny Kim is a lot of things; a stuntman, a drone operator, a Taekwondo world champion; he dabbled in professional gambling, he sold time shares, and he can whiten the hell out of your teeth, but when asked who he is, how he identifies himself, or what he does for a living, he didn’t mention any of that. He said,
“a friend of mine once told me, ‘Danny, what’s different about you, is you are a master of whatever you do.”
Danny has been successful in all his endeavors, working for 20 years as a professional stuntman for TV Series ‘Lost’ and ‘Hawaii 5-0’, opening a Martial Arts gym geared towards women, training them with his high energy ‘Tony Robbins-like’ persona, focusing on internal power, mental strength, and embracing beauty, making a fortune in professional gambling, and the list of achievements goes on.
‘I was wicked… I was insane… Do you know the definition of insanity?’
Danny mentioned to us that he was in pursuit of the wrong thing. He was constantly searching for money. Always looking for the next way to get rich, to get popular, to have more, more, more. With each endeavor, things seemed to work out, but didn’t give him happiness and didn’t give him peace, so he would move on to the next one.
‘Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results’
Waimea Bay
In the late nineties, after eight years of competitive Taekwondo, Danny had traveled and fought in nine different countries, all major cities, won two US National Taekwondo Champion Titles, and gained the title of MVP at the 1996 Japan Open Championship. Once back home on Oahu, Danny began his venture into the business world, opening up a gym to teach Martial Arts, focusing on Taekwondo for children and Kickboxing for women. Within three months, Danny had amassed one hundred and forty female students, over three times the amount of Taekwondo students he brought in over a six month period. For the first time, Danny started to make money.
It wasn’t until Danny signed up as an extra on the 2002 film, Wind Talkers, that he was introduced into the world of stunts. A friend of his told him that Simon Rhee, Martial Artist grandmaster and Stuntman requested to meet with Danny. He only got a few words in with Simon but clearly made an impact. After work, Simon, along with the entire stunt team, visited Danny’s gym to train. This sparked an instant friendship with many of the top stuntmen that would change Danny’s life for the next 20 years.
Danny split his time between managing his Martial Arts studio in Hawaii and traveling to Los Angeles to train with his new stuntmen cohort, always awaiting his next opportunity but as time passed, that goal seemed to be getting further and further away.
‘I was put on ice. I waited for three years before I got my first shot. And what I did for those three years was train my ass off.’
But that break did eventually come, ironically on a TV film called The Break in 2003. It wasn’t much in terms of a stunt job but through that opportunity, he met Brian Keaulana, one of the most influential Hawaiian stuntmen at the time. His foot was in the door, and now he just needed someone to finally open it, which came shortly after.
‘I got a call that I got a role… as a crackhead getting hit by a car in Waikiki.’
Because of that job, Danny was Taft Hartley’d into the stunt business by stunt coordinator Lance Gilbert. He was given his SAG card and it was finally official. Danny Kim was a stunt man.
Front: Hana Hou Magazine Cover featuring Danny Kim
I asked Danny about his transition from the gym he had built, one that gave him stability and a steady income into a freelance stuntman and he said this,
‘Well, a lot of mistakes, a lot of pain, a lot of depression, bankruptcy… I went through the whole gamut. At this point in my life… it doesn’t matter what hits me, I can handle it.’
I have to admit, I wasn’t prepared for such an honest and raw response, but I think Danny opened up about something that everyone can relate to, and if not, at least something that I can relate to.
In my mind, there are two schools of thought about life, one that follows the steps, completes each task, and safely travels an outlined path. It has an end, a highly attainable goal. Then there’s the other, the one that twists, and winds, and walks through a dark forest, one that has no certainty, that can fall apart and crumble underneath you at any time, a path that forces you to make big, bold steps as to not slip between those ever-expanding cracks.
Danny took that second path. He pursued every avenue that was presented to him, sometimes leaving him on top, others toppling him down lower than before. And my question to him, to all artists, is,
‘Why?’
Danny pointing out his house in Palolo Valley. Video from his drone footage.
Now that Danny was officially in the stunt industry, a coordinator approached him about a new series coming to Hawaii that, if Danny was a part of, would be his biggest and most lucrative stunt job to date.
‘A stunt coordinator approached me, mentioning a new TV series with Chuck Norris that he would be coordinating. He told me that, ‘If I ask you to hit the ground, you say ‘How Hard?’, you don’t ask questions… you just follow and you’ll get paid really really well.’
Danny took a small pause here. And he asked us.
‘What would you do if you got that news as a young man?’
I told him I would be thrilled, I would drop everything, and take that opportunity.
‘Yeah…’
Danny’s favorite spot.
The TV series was set for a one hundred episode contract, years of work for Danny, and hundreds of thousands of dollars. So Danny made a huge life decision. He sold the gym. One that he had put blood, sweat, tears, money, love, and care into. One that he built from the ground up, where he built a community of like-minded people and helped them better their lives. He grew fond of his students, and cared for their well-being and their education. A gym that mattered to him. He sold it all for 20,000 dollars.
…and the job fell through. Another stunt guy was offered the position instead of him and he was left with nothing, introducing Danny to how ever-changing the film industry can be. His ‘friend’ who bought the gym refused to sell it and ran it into the ground, and just like that, it was gone.
‘I was lost; very, very lost…’
Stuck in a hard spot, Danny was forced to do what many of us have had to do at one point or another in life; he had to follow the money. Danny used his talent for perfection, his obsessive tendencies that made him into the Taekwondo World Champion, to pursue all sorts of different money-making endeavors.
‘I took up professional poker. Instead of Taekwondo, I practiced ‘Take-your-dough’
The pursuit of money can be an ugly thing, twisting people’s perception of what is valuable in life. Danny used the analogy of the poker table as an example of his life circling the drain, his values slipping away and being traded for plastic.
‘If you were to watch a poker table from a drone view, and you didn’t know anything about poker, you would see a bunch of humans on a table with plastic moving around in a circle, moving bits of paper, and getting emotional based on those colored bits of chips and paper. People can stay there for days in that swirl. That swirl…It’s your life draining away.’
Danny spent nearly a decade professionally gambling, selling time shares, doing stunts, whitening teeth, seeking any endeavor that may be the next get rich scheme. Sometimes he was in the positive, others he was in the negative. But it wasn’t until he was at his lowest, that his life changed forever.
‘I was considered a Vegas High Roller. And I lived the life of a Vegas whale. Consuming. Selfish. I was at one of the highest echelons in gambling. People wanted to be my friend; they wanted the high roller experience. The casinos gave me a driver who would pick me up and take me anywhere in a Rolls Royce Ghost. I used to show off and have the driver pick up friends from the airport. It was disgusting. Very disgusting.’
Humpback Whale in Waimea Bay. Drone Footage by Danny Kim.
June 1st, 2019; 10:16pm
‘I was in a fire. In my house. I got everybody out of the house, I used all six fire extinguishers, three gallons of water… and that fire didn’t go out. So I got on my knees and I prayed to God to save me and vowed to serve him until my last breath. At that point, I had lost all of my money gambling, I had been to the bankruptcy office twice, I had two homes; one that wasn’t finished yet, and one that was currently on fire. I got on my knees and prayed, and that fire went out before my eyes.’
‘There are very few people that will think of your best interests’
The next morning, Danny was unexpectedly greeted by his neighbor. A man who had lived next door to him for fourteen years, but hadn’t had much contact, approached him and asked him if he was alright. They spoke for a while and the neighbor offered to teach Danny about Jehovah and the promise of peace with everlasting life.'
For the last three years, Danny has studied and practiced the teachings of the bible and has found peace through connecting to God and giving to others.
It is more blessed to give than to receive
(Acts 20:35)
Danny currently lives in his house in Waimea Bay, Oahu, where he works as an actor and stuntman for TV and Film and manages three other business from home, where he produces Christian media. When asked if he is happier emotionally, financially, and spiritually, than he was ten years ago, he simply said,
‘Yes. To all the above.’
We were strangers to Danny when we first visited him in Waimea, but from an outsiders perspective, we would have seemed like old friends. The warmth with which he welcomed us into his home was palpable. He gave us a tour, shared his work, and told stories of all his guests he’s had over the years, so obviously happy to spend time with others and share his knowledge.
‘Connecting with nature and knowing the land with friends and family is true happiness. That is God’s original purpose for us.’
Still from Danny’s Drone Footage; ‘Dole’
Danny’s story was not only a huge inspiration to Reed and I, but it felt like a relief to hear someone be so vulnerable about their struggles to find happiness. Finding happiness isn’t something thats taught. The few classes about finding happiness are dwarfed by the thousands of seminars put on about getting rich. I think what Danny unknowingly taught us was that it’s okay to be lost at times. It’s never too late to find yourself or find your purpose. Growth comes from experience and it’s safe to say, Danny has a lot.
Happiness can come in so many forms, and even though life can seem to put you down time and time again, and it can seem sad in so many ways, I find it sadder to live a life of mediocre happiness, one where life puts you down and keeps you there, forcing you to bury your potential, so afraid of the risks, that they are never taken, so afraid of slipping and falling through one of those cracks, or making a wrong turn and being lost forever down an endless path, but as an artist, the only thing I can hope for is that:
The risk is worth the reward.
Danny Kim Taekwondo Highlight Reel