Stunts and Stuntmen

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      Zazie Beetz and Regina King on Their Big Battle in ‘The Harder They Fall’

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      In the Netflix western, the two actresses, playing members of rival cowboy gangs, engage in an epic fight. Here, they break down the scene.“Trudy’s mine,” hisses Stagecoach Mary Fields (played by Zazie Beetz), her eyes blazing.Trudy Smith (Regina King) ducks into a dye barn, its rafters hung with swatches of color.Their eyes lock, Mary empties her shotgun onto the floor. Trudy tosses her pistol to the side.“Let’s go,” Mary spits out. A wild fight scene ensues between the two members of rival cowboy gangs: bodies hit windows, teeth crunch into hands and horseshoes hurl toward heads.Toward the end of the new Netflix western “The Harder They Fall” — a reminder that Black cowboys should be as much a part of the genre as anyone else — Mary and Trudy duke it out in an epic fight that nearly ends in death.Although the director, Jeymes Samuel, is a singer-songwriter known as the Bullitts, he has dabbled in filmmaking, and “The Harder They Fall” is his first feature. In a video interview, he clarified that he wasn’t reimagining the western — he was “replacing” it.“What I was doing with that fight, I’ve done it the whole film,” he said. “The whole film is reverse psychology on what we know as the western and puts up a mirror.”Historians estimate that one in four cowboys were Black, a fact that was hardly reflected in the conventional westerns popular in the 20th century, which were largely devoid of people of color.In creating the film, his aim was to counter two tropes of traditional westerns: people of color shown as less than human; and women appearing subservient and less than men. “Westerns have never given light to women and their power in that period,” he said. That’s why Samuel, who wrote the screenplay with Boaz Yakin, inverted gender roles in the Mary-Trudy battle.“All the men in the film, when they have conflict, they pick up guns,” Samuel said, adding, “It takes the two women to literally throw away their guns and duke it out.”Regina King as Trudy Smith. She, Beetz and their stunt doubles practiced the fight in their off hours.David Lee/NetflixAlthough the actresses, part of a star-studded cast, worked closely with their stunt doubles, Nikkilette Wright and Sadiqua Bynum, most of the final cut features the actresses themselves — because the stunt doubles were simply too good at their jobs. The stand-ins’ work “was too clean,” Samuel said. “In that particular scene, it was perfect and neat, whereas I needed the urgency. When you put Zazie and Regina together, neat went out the window.”Beetz, King, Wright and Bynum practiced the fight on their own time in a hotel conference room in Santa Fe, N.M., where much of the movie was shot. As rough and tumble as the scene may look onscreen, Beetz said in a phone interview that it was all very carefully choreographed.“We also wanted the fight to look scrappy, because we wanted it to look real and intense and how people really would potentially fight,” she said. “I think it’s just a testament in general to the shift in film and the shift in how we see women and their physical abilities.”As part of her preparation, the actress read about Stagecoach Mary Fields, the first African American woman in the United States to be a mail carrier on star routes — routes handled by contractors who were not employed by the Postal Service. (Many of the main characters are based on real historical figures, but Samuel fictionalized the vast majority of the plot.) Fields was enslaved until she was around 30 years old, when the Emancipation Proclamation was issued. Then she went on to live a whole new life.“There was a lot of formerly enslaved people who moved to the West, and the culture of the United States wasn’t as established in the West,” Beetz said. “So there was more mobility for Black people. And there really were towns that were all Black, and they were self-sustaining, and it was an interesting place where Black people could thrive.”Five Movies to Watch This WinterCard 1 of 51. “The Power of the Dog”: More

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      ‘Stuntman’ Review: A Big Leap

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      This documentary follows the stunt performer Eddie Braun as he attempts to jump Idaho’s Snake River Canyon in a rocket.“I’m the face you never see,” Eddie Braun says, even though he’s racked up more than 250 film and TV credits. Braun’s hot rod greaser hairdo and battered jumpsuits signify that he’s either a “Stuntman,” hence the title of Kurt Mattila’s simplistic documentary, or an aging astronaut pressed into service for one last mission, which also turns out to be close to the truth. Now in his 50s, Braun is bored of barrel-rolling exploding cars, as are his wife and four kids whose ho-hum response to his latest fireball implies they think of their pops as indestructible.Yet, Braun seeks his own immortality — the chance to nail a stunt that eluded his idol Evel Knievel — and commits to jumping Idaho’s Snake River Canyon in a steam-powered rocket. And Mattila, a car commercial director itchy to shift gears in his own career, tracks the nearly four year process of getting Braun across a leviathan gorge with a boost from the son of the original rocket’s engineer who wants to prove that his dad’s design would have worked, if not for a pesky parachute malfunction.This is a documentary for kids, a point made in the introduction where Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson tells tykes not to try this at home. (“This” meaning fusing a steam whistle to a lawn dart and vaulting three and a half football fields.) Braun is in hero mode, repeatedly assuring the camera, and the guitar player Slash who’s agreed to record him an anthem, that he’ll be fine. Lacking deep emotions, the film cuts over and over to American flags. The only drama comes when the stunt’s TV sponsors back out — twice — forcing Braun to put his money where his life is. There’s something morbid about a world where a brave man is more scared of financial, than physical, risk. But that’s a leap this doc can’t take.StuntmanNot rated. Running time: 1 hour 35 minutes. Watch on Disney+. More

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      William Smith, Action Star Known for His Onscreen Brawls, Dies at 88

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      In addition to his Hollywood legacy, the Missouri native was also a bodybuilder, a champion discus thrower and a published poet.William Smith, an actor known for his portrayals of villains and his onscreen movie brawls, died on Monday in Woodland Hills, Calif. He was 88.Mr. Smith’s wife, Joanne Cervelli Smith, said he died at the Motion Picture and Television Fund’s Country House and Hospital. She did not specify the cause.While Mr. Smith was best known for his roles in action movies like “Any Which Way You Can” (1980), and television shows including “Laredo,” “Rich Man, Poor Man” and “Hawaii Five-O,” the real action came from his offscreen life.He was a polyglot, a bodybuilder, a champion discus thrower and an Air Force pilot during the Korean War, according to his website.Mr. Smith had more than 300 acting credits listed on IMDb from 1954 to 2020. He did many of his own stunts, and sometimes those scenes got heated. He was throwing punches with Rod Taylor for the 1970 film “Darker Than Amber” when the two began fighting each other for real. Both walked away with broken bones.“Now that was a good fight,” Mr. Smith recalled in a 2010 interview with BZ Film.The Columbia, Mo., native solidified his Hollywood status after tussling onscreen with actors like Clint Eastwood, Nick Nolte and Yul Brynner. In the 1980s, the 6-foot-2 actor earned roles in Francis Ford Coppola’s “The Outsiders,” (1983) and in “Conan the Barbarian” (1982), for which he was cast as the father of Conan, who was played by Arnold Schwarzenegger.His last role was in “Irresistible,” a 2020 film directed by Jon Stewart.In “Rich Man, Poor Man,” he played the dangerous and eccentric character Anthony Falconetti, which he would later reprise in a follow-up to the series, “Rich Man, Poor Man Book II.”Mr. Smith, who was born on March 24, 1933, grew up on a cattle ranch in Missouri owned by his parents, William Emmett Smith and Emily Richards Smith. At the ranch, he would develop a love and admiration for horses and the classic Western lifestyle, according to his website.His family later moved to Southern California, and Mr. Smith immediately began to seek work in films, finding jobs as a child performer and later as a studio extra.Ms. Smith said in a phone interview on Sunday that besides the tough guy roles that made her husband a star onscreen, he had a compassionate side as well. “He’s definitely tough as nails but he had the heart of a poet,” she said.In 2009, Mr. Smith published a book of poetry, “The Poetic Works of William Smith.”The place to find Mr. Smith, even as an older man, was the gym, Ms. Smith said. Young actors often would talk to him between workout sets, and he would share advice, sometimes inviting them to his home to discuss upcoming auditions.In addition to his wife, Mr. Smith is survived by his son, William E. Smith III, and his daughter, Sherri Anne Cervelli.Alyssa Lukpat contributed reporting. More

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      Felix Silla, Cousin Itt on ‘The Addams Family’ Dies at 84

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      He made a strong impression in his best-known role, even though his face wasn’t seen and his voice wasn’t heard.Felix Silla, the actor best known for playing the hairy Cousin Itt on the sitcom “The Addams Family,” died on Friday. He was 84.The cause was cancer, Mr. Silla’s representative, Bonnie Vent, said in a statement. She did not say where he died.Mr. Silla, who stood less than four feet tall, appeared as Cousin Itt in 17 episodes of “The Addams Family,” although his face was not seen and his voice was not heard. Sporting a floor-length hairpiece, sunglasses and a bowler hat, Cousin Itt spoke in a high-pitched mumble (his voice was provided by someone else in postproduction), which was understood only by the other members of the family.“The Addams Family,” seen on ABC from 1964 to 1966, was based on Charles Addams’s New Yorker cartoons about a family that was (in the words of its theme song) “mysterious and spooky.” Cousin Itt, who became a fan favorite, was created specifically for the show.Mr. Silla in 1965 as the hairy Cousin Itt in “The Addams Family.” With him, from left, were John Astin (as Gomez Addams), Carolyn Jones (Morticia Addams) and Ted Cassidy (the butler Lurch).Walt Disney Television, via Getty ImagesMr. Silla’s face also went unseen in other roles, including the robot Twiki on the 1979-81 NBC science fiction series “Buck Rogers in the 25th Century.” He was unheard there as well; Twiki’s voice was provided for most of the show’s run by Mel Blanc.He played an Ewok who rode a hang glider in the “Star Wars” film “Return of the Jedi” (1983). Four years later he was in Mel Brooks’s “Star Wars” parody, “Spaceballs.”“Felix knew a lot about making characters come to life with no dialogue,” Ms. Vent said.Viewers had a chance to see Mr. Silla’s face in the 1975 film “The Black Bird,” a comedic sequel to “The Maltese Falcon,” in which he played a villain named Litvak who menaces Sam Spade Jr. (George Segal).Mr. Silla did stunt work in “E.T.” “Poltergeist,” “The Golden Child” and other films. His many TV appearances, in addition to “The Addams Family” and “Buck Rogers,” included roles on “Bewitched,” “Bonanza” and “H.R. Pufnstuf.”His final big-screen role was in “Characterz,” a 2016 film about costumed mascots.Felix Silla was born on Jan. 11, 1937, in Abruzzo, Italy, and came to the United States in 1955. He toured with the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus as a bareback rider, trapeze artist and tumbler. He began working in Hollywood as a stuntman in 1962.He is survived by his wife, Sue, and his daughter, Bonnie. His son, Michael, died last year.The New York Times contributed reporting. More

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      Richard Rush, Who Directed ‘The Stunt Man,’ Dies as 91

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      He was nominated for an Oscar for the movie, about filmmaking stunts, perception and reality. His earlier films were aimed at the teenage market.Richard Rush, who made rebellious-youth films in the 1960s that featured emerging stars like Jack Nicholson but who had his biggest success in 1980 with “The Stunt Man,” a quirky, expectation-defying thriller that gained cult status, died on April 8 at his home in Los Angeles. He was 91.His wife, Claude Rush, said the cause was an accumulation of health issues that included heart and kidney failure. He had a heart transplant 18 years ago.Mr. Rush didn’t make a lot of movies; the last of his dozen feature films, the erotic thriller “Color of Night,” was released in 1994. But he made his mark with the actors he cast and with a certain fearlessness in his filmmaking choices.In “The Stunt Man,” Steve Railsback plays a fugitive who accidentally finds himself on a film set and ends up as a stunt man while striking up a romance with one of the stars (played by Barbara Hershey). Mr. Rush was nominated for an Oscar for directing and for the script, which he and Lawrence B. Marcus adapted from a Paul Brodeur novel. Peter O’Toole received an Oscar nomination for his bravura performance as the director who may or may not be trying to kill his new stunt man.The movie is full of wild stunts and misdirection, keeping the audience guessing about what is real and what is movie-within-the-movie magic.“We couldn’t wait to get to the set every day because we knew something exciting and creative was going to happen,” Mr. Railsback said in a phone interview.Mr. Rush, in a 2017 interview with the blog We Are Cult, described what he was going for in the movie.“I had the audacity to think that I could make a picture that would explore illusion and reality,” he said, “and I wanted to use the film as a mirror for the paranoid mind-set that we all live through at one point or another.”If “The Stunt Man” and some of his other films were hard to classify, switching quickly from comedy to drama to romance, that was because reality was like that, he said.“Living life is like falling down through a pinball machine, with balls bouncing off of each other, causing action and reaction in an unexpected way,” he told We Are Cult. “And that’s how I view storytelling: having that great balance of all the various elements. Something is allowed to be funny and serious sometimes within the same moment or scene.”Richard Walter Rush was born on April 15, 1929, in New York. His widow said that his parents were Ray and Nina Rush, Russian immigrants, and that his father had owned bookstores in New York and Los Angeles, where the family settled when Richard was a boy.During the Korean War Mr. Rush was part of a filmmaking unit in the Air Force, stationed in San Bernardino, Calif. After his military service he enrolled in a new film school at the University of California, Los Angeles.His early films were generally low-budget affairs made quickly and aimed at the teenage market.One of Mr. Nicholson’s earliest roles was in Mr. Rush’s first film, “Too Soon to Love” (1960), a drama about a teenage couple dealing with a pregnancy, a somewhat scandalous subject for the time. Mr. Nicholson was back in Mr. Rush’s biker picture, “Hell’s Angels on Wheels,” in 1967, two years before the better-known “Easy Rider” worked a biker theme with a cast that featured Mr. Nicholson, Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper (who directed that film).In 1974 Mr. Rush directed the action comedy “Freebie and the Bean,” with James Caan and Alan Arkin starring in an early example of the modern-day buddy-cop genre soon to spawn hits like “48 Hrs” and “Lethal Weapon.”On “Hell’s Angels on Wheels” and several other movies, he worked with the cinematographer Laszlo Kovacs, who went on to a long and acclaimed career with credits like “Easy Rider” and “Five Easy Pieces” (1970).Among Mr. Rush’s other movies were “Psych-Out” (1968), about a deaf runaway (Susan Strasberg) in the hippie heart of San Francisco, where Mr. Nicholson and Bruce Dern are among the populace; and “Getting Straight” (1970), with Elliott Gould and Candice Bergen, a film that Vincent Canby of The New York Times dismissed as “the worst of the campus-revolution movies.”Mr. Rush on the set for “Color of Night” (1994), an erotic thriller that drew considerable attention.Cinergi Pictures Entertainment“Color of Night,” which starred Jane March and Bruce Willis, drew considerable attention both for its racy sex scenes and the dispute Mr. Rush got into with the studio over the editing. During arbitration with the studio, Cinergi Productions, Mr. Rush had a heart attack.He also had an unpleasant experience with “Air America,” an action comedy for which he wrote a script that became part of a long development tussle. When the movie finally came out in 1990, it was directed by Roger Spottiswoode; Mr. Rush shared a screenwriting credit.He married Claude Cuvereaux in 1995 after many years together. He is also survived by a son, Anthony, and a grandson.Mr. Rush had definite ideas about the scripts he agreed to direct and how to shoot them. Mr. Railsback recalled that on “The Stunt Man,” the cinematographer, Mario Tosi, was taken aback by Mr. Rush’s hands-on style.“Early on Richard would say, ‘Put your camera here, do this and do this,’” he said, “and Mario was getting upset because Richard was telling him where to put the camera and all this other stuff.”But when the day’s footage (known as dailies) came back, Mr. Railsback said, Mr. Rush’s instincts proved to be spot on.“Mario looked at the dailies,” he said, “and he walked over to Richard and said, ‘You just tell me where to put that camera.’” More

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      SAG Awards Go to ‘The Trial of the Chicago 7,’ Chadwick Boseman and Viola Davis

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      Daniel Kaluuya and Yuh-Jung Youn took supporting actor honors. On the TV side, “The Crown” and “Schitt’s Creek” won top honors.Aaron Sorkin’s courtroom drama “The Trial of the Chicago 7” finally notched a significant award-season victory Sunday night, winning the Screen Actors Guild Award for best cast in a motion picture.Over the last decade, five of the films that won SAG’s top prize went on to take the best-picture Oscar, including last year, when a big win for “Parasite” gave it a gust of momentum going into the Academy Awards. After “The Trial of the Chicago 7” lost the Golden Globe for best drama to “Nomadland” and the Writers Guild Award for original screenplay to “Promising Young Woman,” the film’s triumph at the SAG Awards could give it a similar jolt.Two men who’ve been sweeping the season continued to steamroll at SAG: The late Chadwick Boseman won the best-actor award for his work in “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom,” while “Judas and the Black Messiah” star Daniel Kaluuya won the supporting-actor trophy.The actress and supporting-actress races have been more suspenseful this season, and SAG delivered two notable victories in the form of best-actress winner Viola Davis for “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom” and “Minari” scene-stealer Yuh-Jung Youn, who won the supporting-actress award.Last year, all four SAG acting winners went on to repeat at the Oscars. If that happens this year, it will be the first time that all the acting Oscars were won by people of color. “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom” would also become the first film since “As Good as It Gets” (1997) to win both the best-actor and best-actress Oscars — though unlike that film, “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom” missed out on a best-picture nomination. (“As Good as It Gets” lost that prize to “Titanic.”)In the television categories, “Schitt’s Creek” and “The Crown” continued their award-season dominance, winning the comedy and drama categories, respectively.Here is a complete list of winners:FilmOutstanding Cast: “The Trial of the Chicago 7”Actor in a Leading Role: Chadwick Boseman, “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom”Actress in a Leading Role: Viola Davis, “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom”Actress in a Supporting Role: Yuh-Jung Youn, “Minari”Actor in a Supporting Role: Daniel Kaluuya, “Judas and the Black Messiah”Stunt Ensemble in a Movie: “Wonder Woman 1984”TelevisionEnsemble in a Drama Series: “The Crown”Actor in a Drama Series: Jason Bateman, “Ozark”Actress in a Drama Series: Gillian Anderson, “The Crown”Ensemble in a Comedy Series: “Schitt’s Creek”Actor in a Comedy Series: Jason Sudeikis, “Ted Lasso”Actress in a Comedy Series: Catherine O’Hara, “Schitt’s Creek”Actor in a TV movie or limited series: Mark Ruffalo, “I Know This Much Is True”Actress in a TV movie or limited series: Anya Taylor-Joy, “The Queen’s Gambit”Stunt Ensemble in a TV Series: “The Mandalorian” More