An inside look at Malibu’s super stunt people
By Kim Devore
They’ve been shot in the back, hurled from skyscrapers, set on fire, blown up, bashed up, banged up, smashed up and smacked down, but for Malibu’s stunt men and women, it’s all in a day’s work. From gutsy Eric Rondell to fearless Annie Ellis, these folks know how to roll with the punches and get paid.
Stuntwoman Kathy Brock skied her way to success in Sun Valley, Idaho.
“A film crew came to town and wanted skiers as extras,” she explained. “They were offering twenty-five bucks and a free sack lunch so I signed up on the spot.”
Before you could say “vertical drop,” Brock was flying high doing awesome aerials as Glenda Jackson’s stuntwoman. The adrenaline rush agreed with her and she soon found herself doing high-speed chases, dodging bullets and leaping from tall buildings in a single bound.
Trained as a police officer and a current member of the Santa Monica Police Department, she continued stunt work as a sideline. But when she decided to take a little break in the Aloha state, her career took an exciting new turn.
“I ran across the set of “Magnum P.I.” and thought it would be really fun to do stunts again,” Brock said. “I contacted the stunt coordinator and was hired.”
Brock was such a hit with Tom Selleck and the P.I. crew that her vacation swung into a full-time gig.
“It was very exciting,” she explained. “I was getting so much work, I quit my police job.”
Stunt pro Jeff Jensen also got his big break in Hawaii. When the ace racecar driver cruised by the set of “Hawaii Five-0,” his career went zooming in a new direction.
“I was watching a stuntman on set and decided I could do that too,” he said.
Jensen put the pedal to the metal and before long was performing death-defying acts, which included a six hundred fifty-foot plunge off of the Hoover Dam. During his impressive career, Jensen has appeared in four hundred television shows, one hundred fifty films and more than seventy commercials.
One needs nerves of steel to take on this kind of work, but having the right look doesn’t hurt either. At six foot five, Jensen is a favored stand-in for Sean Connery appearing in films like “The Untouchables” and “Indiana Jones.”
For some, life on the edge is a family affair. Allen Wyatt’s dad used to double for Gary Cooper. Decades later, his stunt-loving son was behind the wheel standing in for John Schneider in the long running TV show “Knight Rider.”
Eric Rondell is a third-generation stuntman following in the footsteps of his uncle, Ronnie Rondell, and his two sons, R.A. and Reed (Reed was killed in helicopter crash during a stunt). Malibu native Annie Ellis also went into the family biz. Her dad, Richard, and brother David were both pro motorcycle racers and pro surfers. Ellis got her big break in 1977 when Rondell asked her to stunt double for Cheryl Ladd in the original “Charlie’s Angles.” Although she had planned to go into veterinary medicine, one curl before the cameras and Ellis was hooked. She now has more than one thousand television shows and one hundred twenty movies to her credit, and most recently appeared in the summer blockbusters “Mr. and Mrs. Smith” and “War of the Worlds.” She’s doubled for everyone from Madonna to Pamela Anderson to Farrah Fawcett and Christina Ricci.
While they make it look all so easy, not everyone is cut out for this kind of a high-wire work.
“It’s tough on you mentally and physically,” Brock explained. “You have to be healthy and stay in shape. You also have to keep your weight down because a lot of those actresses are super thin.”
Even with nerves of steel, stunt people like Brock do occasionally get rattled.
“One time they asked me to jump out a moving car that was plunging fifty feet down a cliff,” Brock recalled. “I was terrified.”
Since they put their life on the line day in and day out, many stunt people are disappointed in the lack of recognition in their own industry. They have been trying for fifteen years to get a category in the Oscars, but get turned down time after time.
“The Academy of Arts and Sciences says that we are neither an art nor a science,” Ellis said. “We feel stunt work is an art and a science.”
Stunt people do have their own stunt awards. Ellis won for best vehicular stunt for “The Fast and the Furious” in 2003. Wyatt was nominated for his motor work in “Get Carter.”
Those fantastic feats light up the screen, but they can take their toll. After years of body abuse, Wyatt has a titanium knee as well as four plates in his back. These days, he’s doing a great deal more work behind the camera. Despite all the hard knocks, many stunt people enjoy long and illustrious careers. The key is to be prepared, stay focused and live to tell.
Said Jensen, “It is dangerous. People can and do get hurt. But we are not just a bunch of crazy daredevils. The whole point is to get up and go to work the next day.”