“Oh, no no no no no no. She seems really busy preparing for her scene I wouldn’t want to bother her.”
“Oh c’mon, she’s just sitting there bored waiting for a handsome stunt guy to talk to her!” Diana grabbed my arm and dragged me over before I could protest, “Hi Claire, this is Allen one of Jackie’s stunt guys,”
“H…h…hi, nice to meet you,” I stammered.
“Nice to meet you to!” She said elegantly in a musical British accent.
All throughout the shoot I could feel the excited tension from the Irish crew who would steal glances at Jackie almost in disbelief that they were this close to a LIVING LEGEND! The Hong Kong crew were used to working with him so this was just another gig to them, but for me and the Irish crew, this was an experience we would never forget for the rest of our lives!
The next scene they were shooting was just a wide shot of Claire and Jackie riding off on their motorcycle. As I watched the two of them from afar I noticed something was a little off. When I stepped in closer to take a look I saw that it wasn’t Jackie and Claire at all! It was two people dressed exactly like them! Ah the “stand-ins” I thought. But when it came time to shoot, Claire and Jackie’s doppelgangers were still there! I later found out that they were Claire and Jackie’s stunt doubles. I learned that for scenes that you can’t explicitly tell whether or not it’s the main actors or not it’s common to use body doubles. And since they were on a motorcycle, this was considered a “stunt”. What surprised me the most was that Claire’s stunt double was a guy! I have to admit, when I was watching the scene being shot and I only saw their backs, I might’ve been checking out the person who I thought was Claire…UGH! I shuddered when the scene was over and saw that it was an older man!
I was surprised at how much “down time” there was. Most of movie set life consisted of waiting around, of course when the time came, obviously you were expected to perform! It seemed that there wasn’t too much “stunt” work going on today. So Brad, Paul, and I spent most of the day sitting off to the side. I passed the time talking with some of the Irish crew, the Hong Kong crew, Exy, Dorothy, and Diana. And as much as I could with Brad and Paul.
Before I knew it, it was already time for lunch. We got back into the transport van and went back to base camp. We went back to the same place we had breakfast, only now they were cooking up something that smelled even better! It was like a catered buffet! There was a long table set up with plate warmers and various hot foods from sautéed vegetables, to mashed potatoes and rice, to delicious looking chicken, beef, and fish dishes! Then, it caught my eye…THE DESSERT TABLE! Mounds of mouth-watering cakes, cookies, and even ice cream! Oh yeah…and fruit.
As I stood there staring at the feast I was about to devour, Diana came up behind me and said, “So how’s your first day going so far?!?
“Great! I mean, a little easier than expected, but I’m learning a lot!”
“Yeah, today isn’t a big stunt day, but when those days come I’m sure you’ll be put to work!”
“I’ll be ready!”
“C’mon, let’s go eat!” I nodded in agreement and joined the line up. After getting our food we sat down back down with Brad, Paul, and Exy.
“We’ll be doing the reversals after lunch,” Brad said.
“Reversals?” I asked.
Diana explained, “Well many of the shots this morning were from behind so we used stunt doubles for Jackie and Claire. But now we’ll be seeing Jackie and Claire from the front so they’ll be the ones on the bike.”
“Oh…”
“Which means that we’ll have to be alert.” Brad said.
“Right…so we make sure nothing happens to Jackie and Claire?”
“The kid’s catching on,” Paul exclaimed.