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Richard Norton, the Australian actor and martial arts expert who demonstrated his considerable skills alongside Chuck Norris, Jackie Chan, Sammo Hung and Cynthia Rothrock in action films, has died. He was 75.
Norton’s death was announced this weekend in a Instagram post by his wife, Judy.
The charismatic Norton, proficient in judo, karate, Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and many other disciplines, spent two decades as a bodyguard working for the likes of The Rolling Stones, Linda Ronstadt and James Taylor.
He also served as a fight choreographer on the 1993-2001 CBS series Walker Texas Ranger, starring his good friend Norris, and on features including The Condemned (2007), Mad Max: Fury Road (2015), Dark Phoenix (2019) and the Suicide Squad films of 2016 and 2021.
Along the way, he trained Scarlett Johansson, Charlize Theron, Sophie Turner, Anya Taylor-Joy, Ben Affleck, Margot Robbie, Charlie Hunnam, Liam Neeson and others.
For his first acting role, Norton portrayed the masked Ninja villain Kyo and took on Norris in a sword fight in The Octagon (1980).
In Hong Kong action comedies, he fought Hung in Twinkle, Twinkle, Lucky Stars (1985) and battled Chan in City Hunter (1993) and the Hung-directed Mr. Nice Guy (1997).
Meanwhile, Norton partnered with Rothrock in films including Millionaires’ Express (1986), the Andy Lau-starring Magic Crystal (1986), Fight to Win (1987), China O’Brien (1990) and its 1991 sequel, Lady Dragon (1992) and Rage and Honor (1992) and its 1993 follow-up.
“We just had really good chemistry and got along so well,” he said in an undated interview on his website.
“Essentially, we were able to have a lot of fun with what we were doing, and that came across onscreen. I liked the comparison from one English magazine that described us as the Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers of martial arts movies!”
Richard Norton (right) battled Chuck Norris in 1980’s The Octagon.
©American Cinema Releasing/courtesy Everett Collection
Born on Jan. 6, 1950, in Croydon, Australia, a suburb of Sydney, Norton started judo when he was 11. “The only downside was that I was pretty small and skinny … so I ended up being cannon fodder for some of the older, bigger students!” he said.
After discovering karate in high school, he partnered in Melbourne with Bob Jones in schools to train bouncers and security personnel, using techniques found in boxing, judo and wrestling.
In the early ’70s, he and Jones worked security on the Sunbury Pop Festival in Australia, and that led to them serving as personal bodyguards for the Stones when they toured Down Under.
For the next 20 years, Norton did that kind of work in support of such others acts as ABBA, David Bowie, Stevie Nicks, Fleetwood Mac and John Belushi.
Norton first met Norris in 1976 when the actor came to Australia to perform demonstrations at kickboxing competitions, and after Norton moved to Los Angeles in 1979 to work full-time with Ronstadt, the two would train together just about every morning.
For the dark comedy Gymkata (1985), starring Kurt Thomas, Norton trained the former U.S. Olympic gymnast, choreographed the fight scenes and played the lead villain.
He also acted in Force Five (1981), The Sword of Bu-shido (1990), Under the Gun (1995) — which he produced as well — Under a Red Moon (2008), Rage (2021) and Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga (2024) and did stunt work for The Green Hornet (2011) and The Amazing Spider-Man (2012).
Rhett Bartlett contributed to this report.
