The Wilmington morning star., 1940-08-21
In Hollywood
BY PAUL HARRISON
E Staff Correspondent

"HOLLYWOOD-Half the stunt
men in Hollywood are working in
a picture at RKO called I'm Still
Alive and are having some of
the most terrifying experience in
their career. They're acting.
The story is about stunt m e n
and is reminiscent of the Helen
Twelvetrees, Jack Woody romance.
Anyway a stunt man (Kent Tay-
LORI marries a star Oinda Hayes,
and the picture is full of jolly
rocking cars and toasting depart
ed comrades at the Gravedigger'S
Club.
There probably are 306 self
styled stunt men in Hollywood,
most of whom are inexperienced
extra who'd risk their neck for
a S. bill. Actually there are only
% acknowledged specialists in
peril-experts entitled to a daily
minimum of $35 and on up to
$1,000. Most of the II hired for
this picture play themselves in
straight dramatic or semi-comic
roles. They dread the acting and
wish the director would hurry up
and get to the good old falls and
crashes.
OF course, when the excitement
begins, one of them will have to
double for Kent Taylor, who is ex-
clusively an actor, although in the
picture he plays a stunt man who
doubles for actors.
The studios publicity on this
flicker will assure the fans that
it's all very realistic-for example,
that the Gravediggers' Club is a
replica of one in Hollywood to
which these fellows belong. That
part is utter nonsense. Stunt men
never would be so melodramatic.
The nearest thing they have to a
club is a public bar-and-cafe called
the Spare Rib on Santa Monica
boulevard. It's just a place where
the boys drop in occasionally to
talk about forthcoming jobs and
exchange tips and prices. The first
one cslled in by a studio to discuss
a stunt names a price, and there
after no one will underbid him.
In some ways these men live
the most exciting and satisfactory
lives in moviedom. Their work is
never drudgery; each assignment
is a challenge, and the better the
stunt man, the less. likely he is to
be injured. Buddy Mason men
toned that in 20 years he has
spent only about six weeks in hos
pitals.) They make a good liv-
ing. yakima Canutt, who doubles
in westerns, earned $21, 900 last
year,
All but one of the % are mar
ried, and their romances seem to
endure a lot better than those of
other Hollywoodsmen. When age
begins to add danger to their
trade, they usually enter S m e
profitable sideline. (Floyd Girls
well, whom I saw on the set, owns
So motorcycles, a fleet of police
cars, some ambulances and patrol
wagons which he rents to the
studios.)
The stunters are we'll known,
liked and thoroughly respected by
all of Hollywood. But studios are
not anxious to publicize the stunt
men who do so much doubling for
the stars. Cliff Bergere, famed
racing driver and veteran of 10
Indianapolis events, is the best
known of the daredevil brigade.
He's in this picture.
Like actors, most stunt men are
typed. Bergere explained that he
is seldom called for anything ex.
cept an automobile job-collision.
Pomeroy, heavy-set, almost mid
dle-aged, is the man every direc-
tor thinks of first for motorcycle
work. Jimmy Fawcett, one-time
circus acrobat, ball player and
vaudeville tumbler, is the best
net-diver in town. And so on
through the list. l
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