A stern-looking martial arts wizard who studied and later taught his craft in Japan, Seagal (pronounced say-GAL) got his feet wet in motion pictures as a fight coordinator on John Frankenheimer's "The Challenge" (1982) and later set up a popular martial arts school in West Hollywood. He caught the attention of Michael Ovitz (then head of Creative Artists Agency) who arranged a martial arts demonstration for Warner Brothers president Terry Semel. Impressed by Seagal, Ovitz arranged a screen test and he was somewhat unexpectedly catapulted to action stardom. His first feature was the low-budget,
