When I'm making an American film, it's more safe because there are so many people on the set to watch me. Whatever I do, they say, 'What are you doing!? Tell me first!' There are so many restrictions.
An actress should never, ever, be asked to run beside a van in red disco boots for more than about half a block, and then only if her child is being kidnapped.
I do have a stunt double because there are certain things that they won't let me do. Like they won't set fire to me. They won't like let me jump off a 20 story building. There are certain big stunts that it's just impossible to get insurance to let me do, but for the most part I'd say I do probably 75% of my stuff.
The safest genre is the horror film. But the most unsafe - the most dangerous - is comedy. Because even if your horror film isn't very good, you'll get a few screams and you're okay. With a comedy, if they don't laugh, you're dead.
I don't feel that fear is a good incentive on a film set.
You do your own stunts as an actor, and you end up getting hurt. It's not your job. You've got stunt guys. Stunt guys make a lot of money.
When I'm filming, it's in the contract - 'No kiteboarding' - ha ha.
We take safety very, very seriously on every film I make, and that's why I've never had a serious accident or anybody killed when I make a picture.
It's a very, very rare moment when another actor hurts you. That's not normal. If anything, it's the actor accidentally punching the stunt double, which happens quite a bit.
I did put on weight for the last half of the film, but the Ferris wheel scene was shot with a harness on me so that if I fell I wouldn't fall all the way.
I have made 70 or so films. In all my films not a single actor, a single extra, was hurt. Not one. So statistics are on my side when I say I'm clinically sane.
It's so important for me to do my own stunts. The sense of achievement is so immense. But the studios don't want to take the risk.
The thing is, when we do fight scenes, when we kill people in the movies, they bring in experts to choreograph it bit by bit, because you can't really kill someone, and you don't want to really hurt them.
Whenever actors tout off about doing their own stunts, it's always ... they're so protective of you that I always know these stunt guys are so good [and] they're never going to put you in danger. But it's fun to do something kind of exciting, even something as simple as driving 70 through a tunnel with five motorcycles ... it sounds simple, but it's actually really nerve-wracking.
I like telling stories, I like movies, and I want to work on films. I think I would feel safer behind the camera.
Kamal Haasan makes sure that his co-artists wear the safety gear when they perform stunts.
Jen Murray, my stunt person, is totally comfortable getting thrown into a cabinet and onto the ground or getting hit by a car. I, on the other hand, am not. Nor would it look great on film, so she does it.
For 'Death Car' I had three vehicles for the leading lady, because you never know when something is going to go wrong. You can blow a tire or start spinning around and hit a lamppost.
I'm very impressed and the next movie I do I'm definitely going to use a lot of drones in it, because they're very light and flexible and fast, and there are things that you can do with them that you can't possibly do with a helicopter for safety reasons.
I used to do fight sequences, and I started to get self-conscious about fight sequences, because invariably the other person would get hurt, and you never want anyone to be hurt on a film, let alone you being responsible. The great thing about working with guys who have spent their life choreographing fights for wrestling is that that's what they do. That's their specialty. Their specialty is selling taking hits. Their specialty is selling explosive hits without making a contact or doing too much damage.
Any show that includes guns or machinery or stuff like that, you need to trust who's around you because blanks are flying.
What the studio didn't understand is that surfing is about a billion times more dangerous than skydiving. They would not allow the boys to skydive, but they allowed us to surf in pipeline in Hawaii. Nine-hundred foot waves. So we're out there in the middle where the greatest surfers in the world surf. They have these long lenses on from the beach, so they can't see anything. They are just shooting our faces in the Point Break.
I remember when we were shooting 'Boogie Nights,' all of my stand-ins were wiping out all the time. I'd practice before I got to the set, but they'd just show up and put on the roller-skates, and they'd be skating over these wires and cables, so they would all fall over. It was totally dangerous.
If I'm going to fly for more than twenty feet it's generally a good idea to get a stunt guy.
An actor would be foolish to do something that might hold up the picture, or more importantly incapacitate him. If an actor does do a stunt he needs to make sure a stunt man stands by to see that it's done correctly.
