10 Actors Who Didn't Realise They Were Seconds Away From Disaster
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00:00From talented thespians dangling from objects not designed to hold a human body, to very
00:05nearly becoming a big cat's lunch on the turn of a dime, these stars of the big and
00:10small screen simply had no clue disaster was heading their way.
00:14I'm Gareth from WhatCulture.com and here are 10 actors who didn't realise they were
00:18seconds away from disaster.
00:2110.
00:22Eli Wallach – The Good, The Bad and The Ugly Nearly losing his head
00:26Eli Wallach's time shooting on Sergio Leone's legendary The Good, The Bad and The Ugly feature
00:31wasn't what you'd class as a dull affair by any stretch of the imagination.
00:35If very nearly meeting his maker on the back of almost drinking acid on set wasn't bad
00:39enough, the actor drafted into play Tuco was nearly left with a head very much separated
00:44from his body on the back of an ill-thought-out train stunt.
00:48Instead of having a stunt performer execute the risky scene involving Tuco splitting a
00:52chain connecting him to a dead man thanks to an oncoming train, Wallach was brought
00:56in to do the scene himself.
00:58Only no-one realised that said train had a pair of protruding steps attached to it, meaning
01:02that if Wallach's head had been in the wrong place, well, let's just say that trying
01:06to break free from some chains would have been the least of his problems.
01:09Thankfully, Wallach survived the nutty stunt and was also saved from an explosion during
01:13the shoot by Clint Eastwood.
01:15Someone really had it out for Wallach in this western though, eh?
01:189.
01:19Bob Denver – Gilligan's Island Almost becoming Lion Lunch
01:22While shooting on Season 2 of the hit series Gilligan's Island back in 1966, Bob Denver
01:28was tasked with getting up close and personal with one rather intimidating cat.
01:32This lion, while trained, was still, y'know, a lion.
01:35So despite rehearsals going swimmingly, you likely won't be too surprised to hear that
01:39this big cat had other ideas.
01:42Letting out a huge roar, the lion leaped at Denver, who had his back turned to the animal.
01:47Luckily, the bed moving back as the beast jumped bought the animal's trainer some
01:50time to restrain the lion in mid-air.
01:53As Denver turned around, he quickly realised just how close he'd come to becoming human
01:57catnip.
01:588.
01:59Uma Thurman – Percy Jackson and the Olympians – The Lightning Thief
02:03Pierce Brosnan to the rescue!
02:04You've likely already heard about the numerous dreadful situations Uma Thurman has found
02:09herself in on movie sets over the years, with the star suffering serious neck and back injuries
02:14whilst filming Kill Bill in 2003, and claiming there was no acting required when being buried
02:19alive for that same feature.
02:21Thankfully, when it came to her time on the set of Percy Jackson and the Olympians – The
02:24Lightning Thief – the intervention of a former 007 managed to keep the star from adding
02:29another traumatic experience to her career.
02:32After a crew member stupidly forgot to stick the brakes on their van on set, Thurman was
02:36directly in the way of the oncoming vehicle when it began to roll towards her at speed.
02:41Luckily, Pierce Brosnan, one of Thurman's co-stars on the flick, dramatically hopped
02:45in the van at the last minute and slammed on the brakes, saving the Medusa actor from
02:50being squashed in between takes.
02:527.
02:53Aaron Paul – Breaking Bad Rolling boulders ain't no joke.
02:56There's no questioning the fact that the jaw-dropping AMC crime drama Breaking Bad
03:01made household names of both Bryan Cranston and Aaron Paul.
03:04But things could have been quite different for the latter star, had he not requested
03:08to move to a different spot while shooting a scene in season one of the show.
03:13As confirmed in the show's DVD commentary, moments after Paul had repositioned himself
03:17out in the desert, a gust of wind sent a 40-pound boulder that was sat on top of the RV nearby,
03:22smashing straight into the spot he was once stood.
03:26Sure, there was talk of Jesse Pinkman being killed off during that very same season, but
03:30Vince Gilligan and the gang very nearly had that decision taken away from them in an instant.
03:35It just goes to show, if the heat doesn't get you, then rotten rogue boulders will.
03:396.
03:40Harold Lloyd – Haunted Spooks That fake bomb looks awfully real.
03:44The 1920s were a very different time in the world of moviemaking, evidenced in the fact
03:48that it somehow escaped everyone on set that what was supposed to be a fake bomb was actually
03:53very much the real deal.
03:55This incident went down during a photoshoot for the silent feature Haunted Spooks, which
03:59involved actor Harold Lloyd posing for shots in front of a photographer.
04:03In this moment, Lloyd spotted the nearby fake bomb and noted that, for a fake, it sure
04:08was emitting a lot of real-looking smoke.
04:10Seconds later, his instincts about something not being quite right were proved to be correct.
04:14The bomb legitimately exploded, sending the photographer flying and leaving Lloyd without
04:19two fingers.
04:20It's safe to say that absolutely nobody in the immediate vicinity had any clue they
04:24were stood so close to an armed explosive device.
04:275.
04:28Ed Harris – The Abyss James Cameron decides to take things up an
04:32unexpected notch.
04:33There's a reason Ed Harris often refuses to even discuss the ordeal of bringing James
04:38Cameron's The Abyss to life, and it's largely down to the fact that he didn't have what
04:41you'd call the most enjoyable shoot.
04:44It's been said that during a scene which involved Harris' character of Virgil Budd
04:47Brigman running out of oxygen underwater, instead of just allowing the actor to act
04:52out the moment, you know, like they're supposed to, Cameron decided to ensure the star's
04:56oxygen ran out for realsies to capture a more authentic performance.
05:00So what at first seemed like just another scene, quickly turned into an unexpected battle
05:04to survive for Harris, and ultimately led to him whacking the director in the face upon
05:09eventually resurfacing and hearing what had happened.
05:11All in all, it comes as little surprise to hear that Harris would spontaneously burst
05:15into tears throughout shooting.
05:17Between this and being genuinely submerged underwater whilst trapped inside of a deep
05:21suit, it's a surprise he didn't thump Cameron daily.
05:254.
05:26Eli Roth and Omar Dume – Inglourious Basterds – Too Hot to Handle
05:30Perhaps the most spectacular moment of Quentin Tarantino's alternate tale of a number of
05:34attempts to assassinate Nazi leaders comes in the form of a cinema containing said leaders
05:39being blown all the way to hell towards the end of the flick.
05:42Though this was always set to be an explosive finale, nobody on the set of Inglourious Basterds
05:47was really aware just how hot a set piece this would actually be.
05:50As Eli Roth would later note when talking to the LA Times, the fire comes up, they thought
05:55it was going to burn at 400 degrees centigrade, and it burned at 1,200.
05:59Roth would go on to explain that his co-star, Omar Dume, wound up in the hospital due to
06:03the unanticipated heat whilst filming the fiery sequence.
06:07But he also stated that those on set were informed by the fire department that if the
06:11building had kept burning for 10-15 seconds more than it already had, it would have likely
06:16collapsed on all of them.
06:173.
06:18Ellen Burstyn, The Exorcist A sudden yank changes the mood.
06:22If, like Ellen Burstyn did while shooting The Exorcist, a star confesses that they feel
06:26as though they're in danger, the correct response is to listen and do what needs to
06:30be done to ensure said moment is as safe as possible.
06:33William Friedkin, however, had a different reaction to this response.
06:37Despite supposedly telling the person yanking Burstyn back with a wire after her character
06:41is sent flying by her possessed daughter to not pull her so hard, the contrary happened.
06:47Burstyn was unexpectedly dragged back so hard that she permanently injured her spine, with
06:51this version of the scene finding itself in the finished product.
06:54The actor has gone on record to admit, I'm not sure that he didn't cancel that behind
06:58my back because the guy smashed me into the floor, when discussing Friedkin's order
07:02to his wire person, again highlighting the lack of trust shared between the two.
07:082.
07:09Buster Keaton, Sherlock Jr.
07:10No one realised a neck had been broken.
07:13It's hard to even fathom how a human being could literally break their neck and not realise
07:17anything was up.
07:18But in the case of Buster Keaton while shooting for 1924's Sherlock Jr., that's precisely
07:23what went down.
07:24Coming during the scene which saw Keaton's Sherlock Jr. getting doused with a sudden
07:28downpour of water coming out of a tower above, things didn't entirely go to plan.
07:32After setting off the spout and falling back down to the tracks below, Keaton walloped
07:36his neck on a nearby rail.
07:38He was then knocked unconscious and would go on to experience some rather severe headaches,
07:42but soldiered on regardless.
07:44It was only several years later when the actor was getting checked out by a doctor that the
07:48information became known to the star himself, highlighting the break in a number of x-rays
07:52that had been taken of his body.
07:54To go that long without realising your neck is legitimately crumbling is a testament to
07:58the acting, and Stuntman Sensation's ridiculous strength of both mind and body.
08:041.
08:05Donald Sutherland, Don't Look Now, Dangling in Danger
08:09Sometimes ignorance really can be bliss.
08:11But in the case of Donald Sutherland's time dangling from a wire while shooting 1973's
08:15Don't Look Now, that ignorance very nearly resulted in a life-threatening tumble from
08:20up high.
08:21With the stuntman on set deciding that he was not going to put himself in danger due
08:24to insurance not being in place for him should something go wrong, Sutherland was roped in
08:28to perform a sequence that would see his character dangle from a rope.
08:32The actor was attached to a Kirby wire for safety, but as it turned out, this would have
08:36done next to nothing to aid the star should the rope have suddenly snapped.
08:39The fact that the actor had been twirling around on the aforementioned rope would have
08:42led to the wire becoming damaged, meaning that if he had let go or it had snapped, the
08:47chances are he would have fallen straight out of the sky.