Mark Dacascos "Iron Cheef " Biography

Mark Dacascos Biography.Mark Dacascos/Dancing With The Stars Season 9.There will be 16 new pseudo-celebrities competing at the brand new season of Dancing With The Stars.
The new season will start September 21, 2009 on a three-night premiere. The 9th season will start off with these 16 stars but there will be 3 double-eliminations halfway through, according to executive producer Conrad Greene.
Mark Dacascos is one of 16 celeb dancers on Season 9 of “Dancing With the Stars.”
Mark Alan Dacascos (born February 26, 1964 in Honolulu, Hawaii) is an American actor and martial artist. He won numerous karate and various styles of kung fu championships between the ages of 7 and 18.

Beginning in January 2005, Dacascos has portrayed “the Chairman” on Food Network’s television series Iron Chef America. This role was previously played by Takeshi Kaga in the original Japanese Iron Chef, and Dacascos claims an in-character relationship to Kaga as his nephew.

It was announced on August 17, 2009 that he will compete in season 9 of Dancing with the Stars.
His father, Al Dacascos, is from Hawaii. He is a martial arts instructor of Filipino, Spanish, and Han Chinese ancestry. His mother, Moriko McVey is of Irish and Japanese ancestry. His stepmother is award winning martial artist Malia Bernal.

He is married to actress Julie Condra, who starred with him in Crying Freeman.

Career

Dacascos became an actor after being discovered walking down the street in San Francisco’s Chinatown by two men working for director Wayne Wang. Though Dacascos’ first scenes ended up on the cutting room floor, he has gone on to establish a film and television career mostly playing martial artists. He also performed in three video games: voice acting in Stranglehold, live acting in Wing Commander IV: The Price of Freedom and digitally recreating The Chairman in the new Iron Chef video game for Wii. He was nominated for the Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actor in 2002 for his role in Brotherhood of the Wolf, which was a box office success in the United States.

He has also appeared in the short-lived television series The Crow: Stairway to Heaven, which was a follow-up to the 1994 film The Crow.

He has been featured in many action films such as Crying Freeman and Cradle 2 the Grave.