Lillian the Bitch Fell Down the Stairs Again
Buster Keaton was no stranger to landing on his backside, but even he found the Steamboat Bill Jr (1928) shoot gruelling. "I took a pretty adept beating," he said, which is quite an admission from a man almost addicted to high-risk stunts. The film, which is rereleased in UK cinemas this month, is more than violent than most. Information technology sees Keaton jumping between paddle steamers, and being tossed in the air by a tempest created by gallons of water and six high-powered wind machines.
Moving picture-making was always a bruising business for Keaton. He had cleaved his ankle larking around on a moving staircase for The Electrical Firm, been knocked unconscious by cannon burn down on the prepare of The General and even broken his neck during the shoot for Sherlock Jr – not that he knew it until several years later.
Undeterred, Keaton claimed that he never refused a stunt, however dangerous; in fact, he frequently doubled for other actors when they needed to have a fall. That's considering he was a pro, who had learned to land soft and withstand a few knocks from his babyhood in vaudeville, playing The Little Male child Who Can't Be Damaged in a family act. For Keaton, it was almost 2nd nature to "country like a cat", using the art he called "body control".
Some stunts require agility, others an inner forcefulness. The crowning glory of Steamboat Nib Jr, possibly Keaton's greatest gag of all time, was a stunt as beautiful as it was potentially lethal but it required him just to stand still. And he didn't get a scratch on him. The celebrated moment in Steamboat Bill Jr when the facade of a firm drops to the ground with a two-tonne thwack, leaving Keaton serene amid the debris, relied on precise mathematics and nerves of steel. Keaton's position on the basis had to line up exactly with an open window in the top of the house; thankfully for him, it did. More importantly, he had to be sturdy enough to trust the sums, and not flinch.
Far beyond the awe-inspiring evidence of his films, urban legends grow on the subject of Keaton's ability to make a skilful landing. For instance, in that location is the oftentimes-spun yarn that he earned his nickname as an infant when Harry Houdini, no less, saw him autumn down stairs and exclaimed: "That was a real buster!" More than outlandishly, Keaton and his parents claimed that anile just twenty months former, he was sucked out of his bedroom window by a tornado, spun and deposited, unharmed, in a nearby field. Not bad publicity for the human activity, of course– and, by coincidence, for Steamboat Nib Jr 30-odd years afterward.
Whether Keaton really did possess heroic powers of invincibility or not, he was tougher than nearly of his Hollywood peers. In fact, he was a bit of a throwback. In the early on days of cinema, stars could inappreciably afford to be fragile flowers. But past the fourth dimension that Keaton made Steamboat Bill Jr in 1928, stunt doubles and safety regulations were making life easier for the big-name talent.
In the pioneer days of the 1900s and 1910s, actors had been expected to muck in, from the rough-and-tumble of slapstick comedy, right up to the indicate of danger. Rather than hiring a stunt performer as well every bit a star, studios would rather save the cash and hire an actor with the guts to accept the plunge. Fifty-fifty a star as glamorous as Gloria Swanson recalled being pressured into feats that modern actors might wince at. For The Danger Girl (1916) she was asked to swoop into deep water in her underwear; she was terrified, partly considering she couldn't swim.
Almost anybody had a state of war story. The waiflike Lillian Gish famously suffered frostbite in her fingers when she lay down on an water ice floe at the climax of Fashion Downward East (1920), for instance. More seriously, Grace McHugh was thrown from her equus caballus and into a river while shooting Across the Border (1914). Owen Carter, a cameraman, jumped in to save her, simply they both drowned. In 1 notorious case, matinee idol Wallace Reid was then badly injured in a train crash while filming The Valley of the Giants (1919) that he started taking morphine to cope with the pain. He became fond to the drug and died iv years subsequently during an attempt at rehab, anile 32.
At that place were workarounds of course. Stunt performers had showtime been employed in the movies in the 1900s, but they remained something of a merchandise clandestine. Audiences were expected to believe that series heroines could jump out of rising hot air balloons, and screen cowboys could race their horses along cliff edges. But accidents will happen, and it was impossible to maintain the pretence at all times.
Look at early films, and you may well see the joins for yourself, but sometimes the truth hitting the headlines. Pearl White, star of the Perils of Pauline and The Exploits of Elaine serials, was promoted as the "peerless fearless daughter" who bravely executed all her own stunts. But and then, in 1922, a performer called John Stevenson died after fracturing his skull while doubling for her. If annihilation, incidents similar that only boosted the hype machine, with stars and studios making ever grander claims about their bravery and agility.
Then here are four truly tough silent motion-picture show stars who can stand alongside Keaton in the stunt stakes:
1. Tom Mix
John Wayne is regarded every bit the archetype of the macho cowboy, only he modelled his moves on Tom Mix, a silent-era megastar who was rarely seen on screen without his white 10-gallon lid. A very physical thespian, Mix was a sometime cattle wrangler who had learned to perform every bit part of touring wild west shows. Forth with his horse Tony, he incorporated stunts into all his westerns, with high-speed chases and lasso tricks a speciality. In example anyone was in doubt that he did his own stunts, Mix took role in rodeos between films. At one, in 1915, he was caught in a smash-up between two wagons, breaking his jaw and his leg as well every bit crushing his chest. When he made a full recovery, headlines such as "Tom Mix Emerges from Hospital later being Declared Dead" but enhanced the legend of his indestructibility.
2. Helen Gibson
A stuntwoman and actor, Helen Gibson was another graduate of the wild west show circuit, who combined work as an actress in cowboy films with play a trick on riding in rodeos. In 1915, she was employed every bit the stunt double for the serial heroine Helen Holmes in The Hazards of Helen, proving her mettle when she had to jump from a roof to the summit of a moving train. Presently she had the chance to play the lead in two instalments, earlier being given her own serial to star in, The Girl of Daring. Disease and defalcation dented her career in the 1920s, only she connected to piece of work; her last role was equally an actress in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962).
three. Douglas Fairbanks Sr
Able-bodied, active and adventurous, Douglas Fairbanks Sr would have done all his own stunts if the producers had allowed it. As information technology was, he did enough: jumping to incredible heights in Robin Hood and The Thief of Baghdad, thanks to hidden trampolines on set, skimming downwards a sail in The Black Pirate on the point of his dagger, and completing parkour-style rooftop chases in The Marking of Zorro. Fairbanks's performances are always so physically exuberant, he makes these dangerous feats expect similar sheer fun.
4. Harold Lloyd
The nerdy "boy-next-door" with the spectacles and the straw chapeau might not look like an action hero, merely Harold Lloyd's best comedies characteristic thrilling stunts, from the high-speed trolley chase at the climax of Girl Shy, to the clock tower climb of Rubber Last! The famous image of Lloyd dangling from the clock face in the latter film was both more, and less, dangerous than it appears. The belfry ready was built on acme of a Los Angeles edifice, so the traffic in the groundwork appears to be far below Lloyd, only in reality he didn't have far to fall. Then again, years previously an accident with a play a joke on flop, which turned out not to exist a trick bomb, left Lloyd with only 3 fingers on his right paw, and then this stunt, similar so many he performed, was accomplished almost unmarried-handedly.
Source: https://www.theguardian.com/film/filmblog/2015/sep/07/silent-era-film-stars-risked-their-lives-doing-film-stunts
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