Casino Royale: Running the risk...
Being that his brother, uncle and old man all worked in the stunt industry, Gary Powell was hardly about to let the family down by taking up a 9 to 5.
The pinnacle of his career so far arrived when he landed the role of stunt coordinator for the latest Bond flick, Casino Royale, during which he was was responsible for designing a record breaking(seven rolls) Aston Martin manoeuvre.
How did you rate the experience of working on Casino Royale?
The whole idea of going back to basics with Bond was a big risk since it had been very successful the way it was going. It was a gamble and so everyone was nervous because we wanted it to work so badly and it came out well. Bond is the ultimate franchise you'd want to work on for any stunt person, so it was even better for me as a coordinator.
Did your stunts dictate the storyline in the film?
No, but they would say something like ‘Bond enters this contruction site and there's a fantastic chase', which is when they'd turn to me and say what can we do here? Then I would throw the ideas in but the actual storylines are left to the writers and the directors really.
Is car/life insurance a problem in your line of work?
It's not too bad actually. Years ago they had visions of you driving down the road and heading off cliffs. Nowadays, they probably understand that we're safer than most people, rather than being lunatics that go flying around - we do enough of that in our day jobs.
Ever had a near-miss?
Not personally, but I've heard of someone about to fall onto an airbag on the count of three. When it got to two, a gust of wind collapsed the airbag. Another second it that would have been it, he would have died.
Yikes! So what perks are there, if any, to your trade?
Smashing up a £200,000 Aston Martin in the last Bond film was definitely a perk! Normally you've got to make do with a Ford Cortina. With the Aston Martin we got to do what they wanted.
Lucky you got that right first time then!
We had driving test cars to play around with for rehearsal and we had a couple of trial runs with different variations.
Are you a fan of Jackass?
I quite like it actually. They do some crazy stuff but how they get away with it health and safety wise I don't know but it's a funny show. You see them pushing themselves, but how they haven't killed themselves I don't know. It's always interesting to watch cos you never know, you might get an idea...
You must have balls of steel for your job but do you have any irrational fears?
Yes, I'm claustrophobic. It hasn't intruded in my work yet, but you won't find me pot holing on the weekend.
