From hearing loss to spinal injuries to painful stunts gone wrong , some actors have suffered lasting consequences for the sake of making their art.
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00:00From hearing loss to spinal injuries to painful stunts gone wrong, some actors have suffered
00:05lasting consequences for the sake of making their art.
00:09In 2016, production on the final chapter in the Maze Runner series was suspended indefinitely
00:14due to a horrific on-set accident involving Dylan O'Brien.
00:18The franchise's young star sustained severe brain trauma when a stunt involving a motorcycle
00:23went very wrong.
00:24O'Brien effectively needed to have his face put back together by a skilled reconstructive
00:28surgeon.
00:29The actor told the Salt Lake Tribune,
00:31"...I have four plates that will be a part of me forever.
00:33I feel really lucky to have come away from it, in terms of coming away from it at all
00:37on the day, and really how my face has healed.
00:40I was really lucky with a really brilliant doctor, and he salvaged a lot of what I used
00:44to look like.
00:45I think it's really astonishing how well everything healed and how my doctors fixed me up."
00:50After a bit of a break to heal up, O'Brien got back to work in Hollywood, but his traumatic
00:54experience left him with some lasting worries.
00:57In 2020, he told Variety,
00:59"...Even to this day, if I'm on set and I'm doing a stunt, if I'm in a rig, if there's
01:03some action going on, I am slightly irritable.
01:06There is a degree of anxiety in me that I don't think there's ever not going to be."
01:10Natalie Portman
01:11Natalie Portman put herself on a strict diet and lost 20 pounds to play the part of fragile
01:15ballerina Nina Sayers in Darren Aronofsky's dark drama Black Swan.
01:19She wasn't the only one to take a method approach to her character, though.
01:22Her co-star Mila Kunis followed suit, but didn't get nearly as much attention for her
01:27transformation.
01:28She told radio host Howard Stern,
01:29"...I used to be a smoker, and so I smoked a lot of cigarettes.
01:32And I ate a limited amount of calories, 1,200 calories, and I smoked.
01:37I don't advocate this at all.
01:38It was awful."
01:39Kunis later revealed that her body has never returned to the state it was in before preparations
01:44for Black Swan began.
01:45She told Harper's Bazaar,
01:46"...My shape is different.
01:47When I got down to 95 pounds, I was muscle, like a little brick house, but skin and bones.
01:52When I gained it back, it went to completely different areas."
01:55"...I will never dance again.
01:57I promise you, I will never put on that pointe shoe ever again."
02:01Uma Thurman
02:02In a candid 2018 interview with The New York Times, Uma Thurman shared some revelations
02:07about director Quentin Tarantino.
02:09During the production of Kill Bill, Tarantino reportedly forced Thurman to perform a dangerous
02:14driving scene that left her with lasting damage.
02:16She told the Times,
02:17"...I was scared.
02:18He said, I promise you, this car is fine.
02:21It's a straight piece of road.
02:22Hit 40 miles per hour or your hair won't blow the right way and I'll make you do it again.
02:26But that was a death box that I was in.
02:28The seat wasn't screwed down properly.
02:30It was a sand road and it was not a straight road."
02:33Thurman lost control of the car on gear, and it veered off the road, crashing into a tree
02:37and leaving her in so much pain that she feared that she'd lost her ability to walk for good.
02:42While it wasn't as bad as she initially feared, the accident left her with lasting injury
02:46to her neck and knees.
02:47The accident is part of the reason that Thurman, who'd also starred in Tarantino's Pulp Fiction,
02:52hasn't worked with the director since Kill Bill Vol. 2.
02:55Wolverine
02:56Wolverine, the adamantium-claw-wielding member of the super-heroically mutated X-Men, is
03:00one of the most pronounced and famous grumps in all of popular culture.
03:04Every iteration of the character in print, on the small screen, and in a series of feature
03:08films spanning two decades has been depicted as a scowling, grumbling tough guy who ultimately
03:13mutters dialogue in a raspy mutter or angry shout.
03:16No one has played Wolverine more often than Hugh Jackman, who has strapped the claws and
03:20taken on that distinctive voice in nine X-Men Universe movies between 2000 and 2016.
03:27Seven years after last playing the role, Jackman revealed that his voice and vocal cords still
03:31suffer from the consequences of that iconic voice.
03:34He told BBC Radio 4's Front Row in 2023,
03:37"...my teacher at drama school would have been horrified by some of the things I did
03:40in Wolverine.
03:41I've done some damage to my voice through playing Wolverine."
03:44Specifically, Jackman has said that when he performs in musicals, he finds that he can't
03:48reach the high notes the way he once did.
03:50He continued,
03:51"...I put that down directly to some of the growling and yelling I did."
03:58The fishiest star of the DC Universe may look like an unbeatable, impossible-to-hurt superhero,
04:03but Jason Momoa is only human.
04:05After the first Aquaman movie became a global box office sensation in 2018, Warner Bros.
04:10quickly ordered a sequel, Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom.
04:14Throughout the filming of the physically demanding and stunt-heavy action movie, Momoa suffered
04:18for his art.
04:19He was soaking up his vulnerability to his advancing age.
04:21The actor told Ellen DeGeneres,
04:23"...I'm getting old.
04:24I messed up my eyes.
04:25I just got something in it that kinda cut it up.
04:28And then I've gotta get surgery, I have a hernia, I've got ribs out.
04:31I'm just getting beat up."
04:33In addition to what he confirmed was a scratched cornea and hernia, Momoa revealed to Yahoo!
04:38that he wound up with a facial scar after a fight scene in the 2018 movie Braven went
04:42sideways.
04:43He recalled,
04:44"...I got knocked out.
04:45A stunt guy hit me.
04:46He blindsided me.
04:47We didn't make eye contact and he hit me before I could grab for him, and everything went
04:51black."
04:52Momoa required hospitalization for the incident, and shooting on Braven was put on hold for
04:56a day.
04:58After breaking into stardom with her role as Van on FX's award-winning dramedy Atlanta,
05:02Zazie Beetz was suddenly being offered work in movies much bigger than the shorts and
05:06indies in which she was used to performing.
05:09In 2018, she co-starred in the big-budget superhero comedy Deadpool 2 as Domino, a member
05:14of the titular hero's X-Force of powerful rogues.
05:18Despite having no special power, she's extremely lucky.
05:20"...Luck isn't a superpower."
05:21"...Yes, it is."
05:22"...No, it isn't."
05:23"...Yes, it is."
05:24"...No, ma'am."
05:25"...Mm-hmm."
05:26"...Mario Nopez."
05:27"...Yeah."
05:28Life did not imitate art on the set of Deadpool 2, unfortunately.
05:30According to USA Today, the film was a physically grueling experience for the actors, with Beetz
05:34training for four hours a day for months before filming began.
05:37That was far from the worst part, though, as things would continue to go wrong for her
05:41once rehearsal ended.
05:43Filming one action sequence that involved a high-speed truck chase beats lost consciousness,
05:47and drawing an elaborate fight scene, a stray casing from a freshly fired shell landed on
05:51her chest, burning her skin and leaving a permanent scar.
05:55Alfre Woodard agreed to take on the role of 21st Century Spacecraft builder Lily Sloane
06:00in the 1996 film Star Trek First Contact because she was friendly with several members of the
06:04cast, including Brent Spiner, LeVar Burton, and especially director Jonathan Frakes.
06:10A pivotal scene called for a massive explosion when the enemy Borg sends a ship into the
06:14past, which slams into Earth and sends many of the good guys flying.
06:18Woodard recalls practicing the sequence for many hours, in which she and a number of stunt
06:21performers were to jump as if they'd been knocked into the air, spin around, and land
06:25so the cameras could capture their reactions.
06:28Woodard told Collider,
06:29"...The explosion was so intense it just knocked us off our butts.
06:31We just fell any way we could."
06:33At that point, Woodard realized she'd torn up her costume and her arms were covered in
06:37blood.
06:38She got her shot, but Woodard still bares scars on both of her arms from the stunt.
06:42A lot can go wrong on a movie set, even on a relatively low-tech comedy.
06:46Case in point, in 1986, Steve Martin, along with Martin Short and Chevy Chase, starred
06:51in the action-tinged comedy Three Amigos.
06:53In this goofy romp, three silent-era Western film stars get stuck in a terrorized Mexican
06:58village and have to save its residents who think they are the brave heroes who play in
07:01the movies, and not the spoiled and cowardly actors they really are.
07:05Martin's character, Lucky Day, deals with a number of uncomfortable situations to which
07:09he's unsuited, including several shootouts.
07:12That may have led to a case of tinnitus, a persistent, high-pitched and grating ringing
07:16of the ears.
07:17The actor and comedian has suffered from the condition ever since the production of Three
07:21Amigos, but he thinks something else could have triggered it.
07:23He told Pitchfork in 2015,
07:25"...I was shooting The Three Amigos and I got tinnitus.
07:28I blamed it on the gunfire at the time, but since then I realized it was just my destiny
07:32after listening to music too loud my whole life and playing live concerts with 28,000
07:37screaming people.
07:38It was like being in a football stadium."
07:39"...It's like living with a six-year-old."
07:42Thankfully, Martin has learned to live with the tinnitus.
07:45He continued,
07:46"...it becomes your natural background noise."
07:48While making 2013's Thor The Dark World, Jamie Alexander, who played Thor's ally Sif, suffered
07:54a painful-sounding injury.
07:56Speaking with MTV News, Alexander explained that she'd slipped and fallen from an unfortunate
08:00height, elaborating,
08:01"...I herniated a disc in my thoracic spine, dislocated my left shoulder, tore my right
08:06rhomboid, and chipped 11 vertebrae."
08:09Alexander thought the injury might not be a big deal, but the next morning it was still
08:13pretty bad and then it got worse.
08:15She continued,
08:16"...I got in a car to go to the hospital and I sat in the car and compressed my spine a
08:19little bit and went paralyzed in my right leg and my right hand."
08:23After a month of physical therapy, Alexander was back on set, swinging a sword.
08:28But spinal injuries like that don't just go away entirely.
08:31It seems like playing an Asgardian might not be all it's cracked up to be.
08:34Blake Lively's 2016 hit The Shallows proved that she had some genuine action chops, and
08:39the actor was duly rewarded with the lead role in her very own spy thriller, The Rhythm
08:44Section.
08:45Sadly, things went south for Lively in late 2017.
08:47As an on-set injury she sustained while filming an action sequence with Jude Law caused the
08:52film to halt production.
08:53Sources informed The Hollywood Reporter that Lively's hand injury wasn't thought to be
08:57all that serious at first.
08:59But the surgery she underwent after sustaining it apparently failed to fix the issue.
09:03Further surgeries followed, with both Paramount and Lively awaiting instructions from surgeons
09:08on how best to proceed.
09:09In early 2018, she was cleared to return to the set.
09:12Filming resumed later in the year, but Lively's hand never quite returned back to the way
09:16it was before.
09:17"...I severed a ligament here, so my knuckles are kinda dropped, and then I, you know, dislocated
09:22these two bones."
09:24In The Wizard of Oz, the beloved 1939 film adaptation of L. Frank Baum's fantasy novel
09:29Jack Haley played the Tin Man, the friendly metal monster on his way to see the wizard
09:33to acquire a heart.
09:34However, Haley wasn't MGM's first choice for the role, or even the first actor cast.
09:39According to Vanity Fair, Buddy Ebsen, best known for his later leading gigs on The Beverly
09:43Hillbillies and Barnaby Jones, was hired first.
09:46When rehearsing in makeup and under studio lights, the crew repeatedly covered Ebsen's
09:50face with aluminum dust to keep his white grease paint from running.
09:54One night during the rehearsal period, Ebsen awoke with painful cramps in his limbs.
09:58His face had turned blue, and he couldn't breathe.
10:00The actor spent two weeks of hospitalization in an oxygen tent.
10:04His body had to divest itself of the large amount of toxic aluminum sitting in his lungs.
10:08With his recovery taking longer than they liked, MGM fired Ebsen and installed Haley
10:13instead.
10:14Another cast member of The Wizard of Oz also experienced a severe medical reaction.
10:18Ray Bolger portrayed the brainless scarecrow, and on the final day of shooting, he took
10:22off his rubber and burlap-based prosthetic mask for the last time.
10:25When he did, he discovered that he had received burlap-like scars all over his chin and mouth.