The
Fall Guys
The
classic Western movies were given
that extra dimension of greatness
by the efforts of the great cowboy
stuntmen.
By
Dan Gagliasso
Cowboy
and stuntman—the words
just seem to go together as naturally as a good
bit and a soft pair of reins. Since the earliest
days
of the film industry—an era when horse falls
and wagon wrecks were a staple of the genre—the
cowboy has been an important part of the sometimes-dangerous
nuts and bolts of moviemaking. The last time I
looked, the word Cowboy was still prominently displayed
in the masthead of this magazine and I am, as my
kindly editor likes to remind, “Our man in
Hollywood.” So I think we’re long overdue
for this look at some of the best genuine hands
to ever kick up the celluloid dust as stuntmen.
Few
of the real cowboy stuntmen did the flashy, easily
recognizable “gags”—as stuntmen
of all kinds call their dangerous individual stunts—though
several indeed performed work now recognized as some
of the most spectacular film stunts in history. But
it was horse falls, barroom “brawls,” and
speeding horseback chases that were the staples that
put the chow on the family table. In the end it was
their experience, athleticism, and good old cowboy
try that helped them achieve their success. Despite
the scarcity of new Western films, modern cowboy
stuntmen such as Walter Scott, R.L. Tolbert, Jack
Lilley, Mike Watson, Walter Wyatt, Dave Cass, Bobby
McLaughlin, Cliff Happy, and many others have taken
the trail that legends like Yakima Canutt, Ben Johnson,
and Richard Farnsworth blazed before them....
Find
the rest of this exciting article and more by subscribing
to American
Cowboy magazine...
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"Few
of the real cowboy stuntmen did the flashy, easily
recognizable "gags" ..."
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