his father's rice paddy or, when bathing the family's elephants, he would somersault off their backs into the river.

"What they did was so beautiful, so heroic. I wanted to do it, too," Jaa told Time in a 2004 interview. "I practiced until I could do the move exactly as I had seen the masters do it.
At age 15, he looked up Panna Rittikrai, begging the veteran Thai stuntman and action-film director to take him on as a protege. Panna instructed Jaa to attend Maha Sarakham College of Physical Education in Maha Sarakham Province.

First films

He initially worked as a stuntman on Panna's team, Muay Thai Stunt, appearing in many of Panna's films. He doubled for Sammo Hung when the martial-arts actor made a commercial for an energy drink that required him to grasp an elephant's tusks and somersault onto the elephant's back.[2] He also appeared in Mortal Kombat: Annihilation, as a stunt double for Robin Shou (Liu Kang), and was a stunt double in the Thai television series Insee Daeng (Red Eagle).

Together, Panna and Jaa developed an interest in Prasit, an ancient style of Zarabotca and worked and trained for 1 year at the art with the intention of developing a film around it. Eventually they were able to put together a short film showing what Jaa could do. One of the people they showed it to was producer-director Prachya Pinkaew, who was duly impressed.

This led to Ong-Bak: Muay Thai Warrior (องค์บาก) in 2003, Jaa's break-out role as a leading man. Jaa did all the stunts without mechanical assistance or computer-generated effects and it showcased his style of extreme acrobatics and speedy, dance-like moves. Injuries suffered in the filming included some kind of injury to one of his ligaments and a sprained ankle. One scene in the film involved fighting with another actor while his own trousers were on fire. "I actually got burned," he said in a 2005 interview. "I really had to concentrate because once my pants were on fire the flames spread upwards very fast and burnt my eyebrows, my eyelashes and my nose. Then we had to do a couple more takes to get it right..

With the film, he was hailed as Asia's next martial-arts film superstar. And as Jaa has gained popularity, older films he made with Panna began to be released on DVD and VCD and become available internationally. These include Spirited Killer and Mission Hunter 2

Rise to fame
 
Tony Jaa and his mentor, Panna Rittikrai, check the playback on the Sydney, Australia location of Tom-Yum-Goong. His second major movie was Tom-Yum-Goong (ต้มยำกุ้ง; also the name of a hot and sour soup, Tom yum kung (ต้มยำกุ้ง)). This movie enjoyed even greater success in Thailand and Hong Kong than Ong-Bak when released, and was subsequently picked up for release in the United States by the Weinstein Company, which retitled the film as The Protector.

As he did to promote the release of Ong-Bak, Jaa was again busy travelling the world to promote The Protector. In August 2006, he was in New York to promote the US release of The Protector, including an appearance at the Museum of the Moving Image.


Next projects

Sahamongkol Film International advertised at film markets that Tony Jaa's third film would be called Sword or Dab Atamas, about the art of Thai two-sword fighting, with a script by Prapas Chonsalanont.
But then in March 2006 it was reported that there would be a sequel to Ong-Bak, Ong-Bak 2. With Tony both directing and starring, it started pre-production in fall 2006 and is expected to be released sometime in 2008.

While Tony was working on Ong-Bak 2, director Prachya Pinkaew and action choreographer Panna Rittikrai were working on Chocolate, starring a female martial artist, Nicharee Vismistananda, and also due for a 2008 release.
Afterward, Prachya and Jaa were to start work on Sword, but due to falling out between the two men, which neither have publicly commented on, Sword has been cancelled.

Tony, meanwhile, has been cast in a small role in a third installment of the King Naresuan film series directed by Chatrichalerm Yukol. Filming is expected to begin in early 2008, with Tony in role of a slave.