Olivier Gruner is one of the most popular and richest Actor who was born on August 2, 1960 in Paris, Île-de-France, France. In a highly proactive manner, he carried out an impressive self-promotion during his 1987 Cannes Film Festival. The posters he put up throughout Cannes and caught interest of an film producer. A few days later, Gruner was flying to Los Angeles to do some screen tests. He passed the tests with flying 74%, and his next stop marked the start of his film career.
In 1989 he starred in his first movie; the urban action movie Angel Town. For a first timer Gruner did an admirable job, and was immediately recognized by the critics for his presence, as well as his martial arts abilities, being compared to the likes of Dolph Lundgren, Jean-Claude Van Damme, and Steven Seagall.
His credits also include urban action movie Angel Town (1989), Automatic (1994), Savate (1995), Mercenary (1996), The white Pony (1999), Kumite (2000), Blizhniy Boy: The Ultimate Fighter (2007), Lost Warrior: Left Behind (2008), One Night (2010), and Beyond the Game (2016).
The year 1984 was the first time he started training as professional kickboxer. The same year, following 10 professional fights the year before, he was named France Middleweight Champion. In 1985, his accomplishments in the ring allowed him to compete and train in full-time. He won the title in 1986. won the World Middleweight Kickboxing Champion.
As a martial arts practitioner, Gruner was a professional kickboxer throughout France for eight years between 1981 and 1988. He was France middleweight champion, and then middleweight world champion of full-contact kickboxing in 1985. He was also middleweight world champion of kickboxing in 1986.
Having achieved in 6 years his dream of becoming a world champion, he retired from professional kickboxing in 1987 and made the leap from athlete to actor. Gruner perception is that as soon as one reaches the top in a discipline, the only way forward is downwards. So once he had become world champion, he decided it was time to explore something else. Following the lead of Reg Park and Arnold Schwarzenegger, he chose to move on to the movie industry and become a movie star.
