The case that set Hollywood reeling

Press, 20 June 1984, Page 16

The case that set Hollywood reeling

IAN BRODIE,

of the “Daily Telegraph,” focuses on the

movie men increasingly under pressure.

When John Landis was arraigned in Los Angeles court last month on three charges of involuntary manslaughter, he became the first Hollywood director to be sent to trial for a crime allegedly committed during film-making.

Whatever the merits and outcame of his case, which is vigorously defended, it already has chastened an industry that many feel has been pushing beyond the limits of safety in its quest for ever-more spectacular stunts and special effects to attract audiences. Chastened, but not cured. Thrills and spills continue to be increasingly outrageous and pular in films and television.

There are still no qualifications for stuntmen other than guts. Nor is there agreement on working hours. Filming for television series often continues for 14 to 16 hours at a stretch. The Directors Guild said that when this happens on a dangerous location the inevitable fatigue is an invitation to disaster, but a guild proposal for a mandatory nine-hour day was rejected by the studios in March. In the Landis case, an actor Vic Morrow, and a boy and girl of Asian descent, aged six and seven, were killed when a helicopter carrying a camera crew crashed at 2.20 a.m. The accident was during an attack on a mock Vietnamese village on an outdoor set near Los Angeles for the Warner Bros, film “Twilight Zone.” The court saw horrifying footage of Morrow wading through a river with the children under his arms as they were struck by the main rotor bade of the plunging helicopter. Evidence established the crash was caused by debris thrown up from a special-effects explosion on the ground which tore off the tail rotor while the helicopter was hovering. Judge Brian Crahan sent Landis, the pilot and the special effects coordinator for trial after a preliminary hearing. Despite ample warnings, the judge noted. Landis placed the trio in danger to produce “effective illusion.”

In protesting his innocence, defence lawyers said Landis could not be held criminally responsible for the crash because it was caused by a technician who admitted detonating the explosions without checking the location of the helicopter.

Incidentally, Landis and Warner Bros, already have paid $5OOO in fines for breaking laws which forbid the employment of children on film sets after 6.30 p.m. Landis feels he is being picked on as a “celebrity defendant.” He has a reputation for directing hard-edged films that are commercially successful, including “The Blues Brothers,” “An American Werewolf in London,” and “Trading Places.” Since 1980, accidents have killed of mained a dozen actors, stuntmen and camera operators.

In “Sword and Sorcerer” a stuntman missed an air bag on which he was to have jumped and was killed. In the television series “Code Red” another stuntman partially missed an air bag, slammed his head into concrete and was seriously injured. For the film “Canonball Run” a movie stuntwoman was paralysed when a car swerved the wrong way.

On the “Dukes of Hazzard” television series a cameraman was crushed and killed under a camera car. Others were injured including one worker who was in a coma for momths.

A director, Boris Sagal, was killed on the third day of his television film “World War III” when he walked into a helicopter blade. A “Magnum PI” television cameraman was pitched through a helicopter windscreen into the rotor blade in Hawaii. His body was never found.

“We’re concerned that producers are pushing harder for more spectacular stunts, but while they’ve pushing they’re bringing in unqualified people to do them,” said Fred Waugh, now 52, who has spent 28 years in the business from falling off horses for John Wayne to performing all the “Spiderman” stunts.

He is president of Stunts Unlimited, a fraternal group of 46 who consider themselves the elite of Hollywood stuntmen. His body is proof of the job’s hazards: back broken twice, nose broken 11 times, ribs numerous times. His group and others are pressing for stunt performers to be qualified, serving a stunt apprenticeship in secondary jobs on film sets, just as cameramen do now. The idea has been accepted by Ed Asner, whose campaigning onscreen persona as “Lou Grant” has

spilled over into his real-life role as president of the Screen Actors’ Guild, the office once held by President Reagan. Mr Asner in turn as persuaded the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers to set up a national safety board to discuss the issue of qualifications for stuntmen. The first meeting has been held.

The Alliance, representing all the major studios, also participates in an industry-wide labour-man-agement safety committee which puts out a series of guide-lines covering most of Hollywood’s 70,000 employees in all categories. Despite the fondness of some producers for daredevil stunts, the committee can point to an accident rate just over half the average for California’s industries as a whole.

Still, neither Mr Asner’s pressure nor the pleadings of the Director’ Guild were successful in reducing the workday for television series.

The three major networks try to complete one-hour episodes of prime-time drama in seven days, forcing the cast and crew into 14-16-hour workdays. The directors wanted 12-day shooting schedules with a working day of nine hours. There were many objections, the main one being it would take a calendar year to shoot 22 episodes instead of the present 30 weeks. The exra time required would have meant far higher costs.

The final blow came when the producers’ Alliance was able to ignore the cost factor by showing that, contrary to the directors’ claims, accidents were not more likely to happen towards the end

of long days, nor on the last days of filming. There was also union opposition to shorter days because no one wanted to lose overtime.

Mr Asner is unhappy with the outcome: “Fatigue is rife because you’re piling up a lot of hours. The public rarely realises there’s an ocean of tedium that occurs in making a film. You’re waiting, waiting, waiting around. At the same time, you’re called upon to make hair-trigger decisions and synchronisations. Tedium is definitely part of the fatigue and risk.” A union organiser for the cameraman, Mr Bob Marta, put it another way: “Something needs to be done. We camera operators are the ones who stand by the camera when the cars come at us. At the end of a 14 or 16-hour day, your reactions slow down. You’re vulnerable to anything.”