Thursday, November 18, 2021
Movie crews share horror stories of maiming, death after 'Rust'
nypost.com: Recently, in the wake of the Oct. 21 tragedy on the set of the movie “Rust” — where Alec Baldwin stands accused of accidentally shooting cinematographer Halyna Hutchins with a gun that he thought was unloaded — Gilliard’s emotional wounds have torn open again.
“This whole thing that happened with ‘Rust’ has brought on PTSD,” said the hairdresser, who spent a year in physical therapy before going back to work. “I was in a state of shock from ‘Rust.’ Then I became angry and sad and couldn’t stop crying. You don’t think you will go to work and risk losing your life.”
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8 comments:
This article terrifies me. People losing lives because a company decided to cut the corner and shoot anyway is just appalling and unjustifiable. No shot in the world, as authentic as one wants it to be, has more importance than the life of any person. Not just the performers, but anyone, from having a huge role to play to a small role to play, should not have to be concerned about the safety of their lives. Accidents happen, everyone knows that, but knowing that an accident could have been avoided, if only rules were followed or visions eased out etc, is not OKAY. I do not want to walk on a set, fearing for my life in the off chance than an accident could take place, because who knows, the company is not taking the required safety precautions or being at a place where they should not be. I feel so so bad for the victims and their families who have had to deal with something like this. THIS IS JUST NOT OKAY.
This article is genuinely chilling. The first story about the train made me sick to my stomach. The audacity the people in charge had to film on train tracks without a permit is ridiculous and dangerous, obviously. The safety of every human being should be the number one concern at all times on every single set, and it is clear that they were hoping they could save a quick buck or some time by not following proper safety precautions. These people have enough money to not care about lives. It is genuinely all about the money for them, and they have so much of it that not even the law can deter them from abusing their power and putting their cast and crew at risk. Stunt people are not rag dolls to be abused and thrown around too, regardless of what their job description is. They are there to conduct dangerous stunts as safely as humanly possible, not to be a disposable human fill-in. I hope changes are made and that a younger generation of filmmakers takes into account the safety of everyone involved.
It's so upsetting seeing articles about accidents like these because they are so heavily avoidable. It's disgusting that directors and producers are willing to risk the safety of their cast and crew just to get what they want. Cutting corners is never okay especially when you're dealing with big stunts and safety issues like train tracks and weapons. No production is worth the loss of a life or the injury of someone that was committed to creating great work. It's appalling how frequently people get away with making choices that jeopardize others. Accidents happen but careless and thoughtless accidents are unacceptable. If the people making the decisions in entertainment valued life, safety, and healthy working conditions more than their bottom line and the product of their process productions would probably be even better than they currently are. People that still love what they do and feel safe doing it make great work. People that are overworked, at risk, and treated poorly will start to not. How many incidents have to occur before real change happens?
A conversation this article reminded me of was one we had in our props mini, the idea of putting the burden of care on the workers involved and not on the people putting them in danger situations, with such excuses as “they could have payed more attention” or some other comment where technically there's a way out but they fail to see that putting someone in a dangerous situation, especially without the knowledge of the situation, such as in the movie where they put the crew on a train track without telling them they had not gotten a permit from the transit authorities, brings that risk inherently, the workers would not have to have done that if the company had not put them in that situation for the sake of monetary gain. It shows the separation of the money makers with the crew, who actually deal with the consequences of the actions.
This is a terrifying article to read and a painful reminder of how cutting corners quite literally costs lives. The article lays out multiple instances of cutting corners and how it ended up causing safety issues, but mostly everything here leads back to producers wanting to save money by cutting corners on proper procedure. If the crew was adequately staffed and union on Rust, the cinematographer would maybe still be alive. If there was a permit to film for Midnight Rider, those people would definitely not have been injured and killed. If a film can’t afford to do something according to proper procedure, than the shot should not happen or they should find a different way to do it without risking the safety of the cast or crew. This article has me extremely annoyed and disturbed by the film industry. I hope that with many articles like this coming to light in recent weeks, that more change will happen in Hollywood.
Every time I read about Rust, I keep mistaking it for Rustin, which is shooting now in Pittsburgh and for which I applied to be an intern. It sends a chill up my spine even though I know it's about Rust and not Rustin. I well and truly will never understand how people can cut corners like this, cost lives, and move on anyways. I bet I am as penny pinching as the next guy, but not if I knew my frugality was literally, directly killing and hurting people. I just do not know how to explain to executives that they should care about other people. As much as I would like to bridge both theatre and film in my career, horror stories like these always set me on edge. How can I put myself in situations like this knowing what may well happen? They shouldn't be filming or producing if they can't afford a safe workspace for everybody involved, else find a different way to achieve their goal.
This article exemplifies the fact that we as crew are not cared about by production companies. It’s just so frustrating how all of these problems could’ve been so easily avoided if the extra time had just been taken to obtain the right permits, or hire the right people. We’re seen as replaceable and unimportant, so it’s easy for big wig producers and directors to just overlook our safety to cut costs. Why spend the energy worrying about the wellbeing of people they think are so far beneath them? Crew members here are already forgotten about by directors, I can’t imagine how much worse it is on the industry level. No performance is worth losing people’s lives. The fact that these kinds of tragic events on sets continue to happen even now as our ability to do things safely has improved is sickening. No one else should have to get maimed for art. I’ve always thought about the idea of working on film sets, but it’s terrifying how little value my life has there.
This article does a really good job of laying out specific reasons that 10 out of 12’s are harmful to everyone, but especially people with family commitments. It’s also important to note (and the article did) that good theater is being produced without this long work day. I know I find personally that pushing past 16 hours makes me wildly less efficient and fun to be around and there’s a reason that unions a long time ago demanded 8 hour work weeks and five days to that week. It’s a good thing that theater is finally catching up with that. It’s also disappointing that actors with kids are having such a difficult time. It’s also interesting that here at CMU I know we spend 12 hours a day four days a week (at least for me). Getting in at 10:10am and going home at 10:30 constitutes a 12 hours day and then you’ve still got homework when you get home.
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