Radames Pera

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Radames Perá (born Radames Pera 14 September 1960) is an American actor who is best known for his role as the young Kwai Chang Caine in the 1972-1975 television series Kung Fu.

He was born in New York, New York and is the son of Eugene R. Perá, a renowned painter and originator of Spin Art, and Lisa Perá, a Russian-born actress. They moved to Los Angeles in 1963 so Lisa could pursue a Hollywood acting career, but the marriage suffered and they were shortly divorced. Lisa struggled as a single mother, working nights at the famous 1960s Hollywood night club, The Fog Cutter, while Radames stayed home alone. Their situation took an unexpected turn when Radames was discovered by director Daniel Mann for the role as Anthony Quinn's and Irene Pappas' dying son in A Dream of Kings (1969). Lisa was up for the part of Quinn's mistress eventually played by the late Inger Stevens. Radames met the Director at a dinner party during pre-production on that film and was cast in the role of Stavros. Soon after that Radames got an agent and went on to play many serious roles in television and films. Radames was considered a young Character Actor and he was often cast to play the more unusual roles and ethnicities requiring a variety of looks and accents (Cuban, German-Jewish, Chinese-American, Italian, Russian) and handicaps (mute, schizophrenic, polio, plague, etc.)

Notable appearances include a recurring grole as John Jr. on the NBC series Little House on the Prairie and as the ill-fated boy in the Night Gallery episode, "Silent Snow, Secret Snow" narrated by Orson Welles. Campier roles include Alex in The Six Million Dollar Man and Don Ameche's son in "Gidget Gets Married". Between 1969 and 1985 he guest-starred in numerous feature films and television shows including, Mickey Spillane's Mike Hammer, Marcus Welby, M.D., Hawaii Five-O, and The Waltons. His last feature film role was as Sgt. Stepan Gorsky in John Milius' "Red Dawn" (1984).

In 1972, just before landing his role of "Grasshopper" in Kung Fu he began making his own Super8 films, first at the Barnsdall Junior Arts Center in Hollywood under the guidance of Hugh McKay, and then on his own. It turned out that acting was not his true calling, directing was, but what better training could an aspiring film maker have than in the thick of the industry itself? This is the sole reason he remained in the acting business as long as he did.

However, growing up in the Hollywood entertainment industry can be a mixed bag, so in 1978, at the age of 18, Radames packed two suitcases and moved to New York City to study acting and directing with renowned teacher Stella Adler. He remained at her Conservatory for the next three years. Returning to Hollywood in the fall of 1981 he was greeted with the harsh reality that Hollywood not only has a short-term memory, but no longer a "child actor" now, the business had no use for his services. Struggling to break into adult roles proved very difficult and he found to his dismay that his extensive resumee was more of a handicap than an asset at this point! It took him a few long hard years to figure out that since he was no longer the "marketable commodity" of a "child actor" the industry was essentially done with him. Not incidentally, this is the same invisible wall/glass ceiling that 99.9% of all child actors experience. Unfortunately, at the time, there was no guidebook for this kind of experience.

More recently, thanks to the devoted advocacy of peers like Paul Petersen, working for several years both within and without the Screen Actors Guild's Young Performers Committee, there are now a number of guidelines, legal protections and support-systems available to the transitioning young actor of today.

By the mid 1980s, Radames felt that continuing to pursue this line of work was unhealthy for him on several levels and he forged out on his own in the workaday world. Gaining skills in other interests he had since childhood, he began working around video and electronics and eventually formed his own company, All Systems Go! in 1988, with the sole purpose of designing and installing home theaters and residential sound systems. This quickly took off for him and he remained in this line of work for the next 18 years (as of 2006). Recently renamed, All Systems Go! is now known as A-V Environments.

Also in 2006, he was at the core of MetaCinema, attempting to launch this internet service to provide unlimited High Definition (HDTV) creative content over broadband connections. Working closely with the team that made a breakthrough in proprietary data-compression algorithms, they launched MetaCinema at the 2006 NAB (National Association of Broadcasters) Convention in Las Vegas in April of that year.