Ground & Pound Radio Recap: Cung Le

Written by Mitch Ciccarelli

(Sponsored by FightCeuticals.com)

Strikeforce middleweight champion and actor Cung Le recently made an appearance on the Ground N’ Pound Radio Program to discuss both his acting and MMA careers. Le also talked about his new line of Cung Le action figures from Round Five.

“I feel so blessed” Le told the show. “I thank God everyday that I wake up. Just to be alive and to have all of this is a blessing.”

The Cung Le action figure looks almost identical to Le except for one minor flaw—his hair. Le recently shaved his hair shooting a film in China and found it funny that his figurine has more hair than he does.

“They gave me a lot more hair than I have now,” Le said. “I just came back from China about three weeks ago shooting a Chinese film and my hair was completely shaved so it’s funny to see my figurine with so much hair.”

Le is one of few fighters who have transitioned well into Hollywood. He discussed his upcoming role in the film Pandorum, which stars Ben Foster and Dennis Quaid. Le lists former UFC champion and UFC Hall of Famer Randy Couture as another fighter that has a successful acting career.

“Randy Couture is doing it a little bit out there too and he’s still fighting and doing movies at the same time,” Le said.  

“This movie is like a 40 million dollar budget movie. I know they went over-budget because they put a lot into this movie. The set they built for this was amazing and for my early budding acting career it was awesome. To be on set with Ben Foster, Denis Quaid and all these big name actors was definitely exciting.”

With the constant growth of MMA, it comes to no surprise that Hollywood has attempted to make money off of MMA-themed movies. While movies like Never Back Down appeal to the casual observer, they do not represent what MMA is all about. They take the fights to the street and backyards instead of sanctioned events and it gives a poor representation of the sport.

Le says that despite that, it is still good to see that MMA has made its mark in Hollywood and things can only get better from this point.

“MMA is so popular right now and they use a lot of MMA moves in [Never Back Down],” Le said. “It’s good to see that MMA has made such a good impact in Hollywood now.”

When asked which he thought was harder, acting or fighting, Le made it known which profession he feels is more difficult.

“MMA hands down is much harder,” Le said. “That’s why I was able to deliver on such a high level with these films.”

Le hasn’t fought in MMA since winning the Strikeforce title from Frank Shamrock back in March of 2008. He has been spending most of his time on his acting career but the desire to fight is still within him and he talked about his plans to compete at the next CBS show for Strikeforce.

“I already talked to Scott Coker and we’re talking about [a return] at the next CBS show” Le said. “If all goes well he’s thinking the end of this year or next year he’s going to figure everything out with CBS and then he’ll come and talk to me.”

He has yet to defend his Strikeforce title and Le feels it isn’t fair to the other fighters in the division to have to wait for him.

“I told him that right now I’m finishing up with Chinese movies and it’s not fair for the other fighters to wait for me. I got to either vacate [the belt] or we’re going to do an interim.”