Hollywood has a reputation of being luxurious through the glitz and glamour of award shows, movie premieres, fashion shows and other red-carpet events. Celebrities are admired by millions for their work, but being in the entertainment industry is not always a safe career.
Directors and producers want their work to look as authentic as possible, so they try to perform stunts in person as much as they can rather than using CGI, or computer-generated imaging, to create visual effects. This makes actors feel compelled to perform their own stunts to show that they are dedicated and to make their character more believable.
Ava Hrysikos (12) loves watching TV shows and movies, but questions the safety of many stunts she watches.
“I would not feel comfortable doing my own stunts because I know I can’t perform efficiently,” Hrysikos said.
There are five categories for stunts according to BBC.com. Fighting stunts take techniques from martial arts and boxing to create realistic fight scenes. In many cases, however, the actual fight has not proved to be dangerous, but the prop itself has. In the movie “The Crow,” actor Brandon Lee was shot by a prop gun that was meant to be loaded with blanks, but the gun had a dummy cartridge in the barrel. This failure to check the barrel ended up costing him his life. Falling stunts have also proven to be fatal, with John Bernecker, a stuntman for “The Walking Dead,” missing his safety cushion and falling headfirst into the concrete floor.
Driving or riding stunts can fail due to misjudging speed, mechanical malfunctions and human error. During the filming of “2 Fast 2 Furious,” the remote-control setup did not signal for the chase vehicle to stop in time, and the car fell off the ramp, with the driver sustaining minor injuries. Agility and strength are the broadest categories of stunts and can entail many specialties such as weightlifting, gymnastics, extreme sports, parkour and circus acrobatics. While attempting an obstacle course on “American Ninja Warrior,” Travis Rosen suffered a compound fracture to his leg after falling. Water stunts are the last category, and if executed poorly, they can lead to the possibility of drowning. This nearly happened to Isla Fisher in “Now You See Me,” when her character was performing a magic trick while being restrained in a water tank by chains. The chains got stuck, and her attempts to signal for help were interpreted by the crew as a part of her character’s act.
Finley Sloan (12) enjoys acting in plays and is familiar with working on a set.
“I would be least willing to try falling stunts because I am scared of heights, and I would break character,” Sloan said.
Accidents from stunts can cause many other negative effects, including pauses in production as well as an incredible emotional toll on actors and crew that comes from fear and guilt. Filming delays, reshoots and insurance complications can become very costly. Writers may also be forced to rewrite the script for serious injuries that the project can’t cover up. Stunt failures can scare actors into walking out of the stunt because they are not trained to handle mental blocks like professional stunt performers. There have also been cases where actors feel as though they are at fault for causing someone injury or death during a stunt, causing a buildup of guilt.
Hilaria Baldwin shared in the reality series “The Baldwins” how her husband, Alec Baldwin, was affected by Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) after a prop malfunction on his movie “Rust” killed cinematographer Halyna Hutchins.
“Everyone who is close to Alec has seen his mental health decline. He was diagnosed with PTSD, and says in his darkest moments, ‘If an accident had to happen that day, why am I still here? Why couldn’t it have been me?’” Baldwin said.
