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mahatmakanejeeves

(57,439 posts) Mon Jul 3, 2017, 08:23 PM Jul 2017

Stuntman Who Drove Car for Steve McQueen in Bullitt Dies at 85

I love obituaries. They're the best section in the newspaper.

There's a documentary out now about obits. I linked to it last month.

Obit. Life on Deadline

Loren Janes, renowned Hollywood stunt performer, dies at 85

By Steve Marble July 2 at 5:05 PM

In film after film, Loren Janes leapt from speeding trains, jumped from towering cliffs and roared through city streets in gravity-defying car chases. ... That’s him flying headlong into a saguaro cactus in “How the West Was Won.” That’s him tumbling down a staircase alongside a drunken John Wayne in “McLintock.” And that’s him — not Steve McQueen — fishtailing down Tyler Street in San Francisco at 90 mph in “Bullitt.”

In a career that spanned decades and with a résumé that included westerns, thrillers, comedies, dramas and science fiction, Mr. Janes was the person the studio could count on when the script called for someone to be thrown from a window, dropped into the ocean or shot dead outside a saloon. ... Mr. Janes died June 24 at 85. He had Alzheimer’s disease, according to his family.
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When a script called for Esther Williams to leap from an 80-foot cliff in “Jupiter’s Darling,” Mr. Janes pulled on a wig, the appropriate swimming attire and jumped into the ocean. He did the same for McQueen, a temperamental actor who liked to do his own stunt work and seemed put out when the director told him that he wanted Mr. Janes to do the dirty work in a particularly tricky escape scene in “Wanted: Dead or Alive.”
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Loren Janes was born Oct. 1, 1931, in Sierra Madre, Calif., and attended Pasadena City College and then California State University at San Luis Obispo before joining the Marines during the Korean War. He taught math and science at a private high school and competed in the five-event sport called the modern pentathlon. ... He was still teaching when he heard that MGM was looking for a stuntman to fill in for Williams during the cliff-jumping scene in “Jupiter’s Darling” (1955). As an experienced swimmer and diver, Mr. Janes thought it seemed like easy work. Within six months, he had done stunt work on seven movies.
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— Los Angeles Times

The Secret Of Steve McQueen's Bullitt Chase Scene
Marc Myers, Jazzwax.Com
1/27/11 11:00am

For all the attention Steve McQueen has received for the famous chase in "Bullitt," he only drove 10% of the scene. Marc Myers got to drive the route with the stuntman who deserves credit for the scene. -Ed.

As a kid growing up in New York in the late '60s, I had a thing for the movie Bullitt starring Steve McQueen. While I didn't necessarily understand the plot, I was mesmerized by the car chase. At the local candy store, all of my friends talked obsessively about it, probably because watching the sequence felt like being on one of the amusement park rides we loved so much. The you-are-there sensation owed much to the use of cameras in the car. You felt every bump and jolt.

On Sunday, I had the opportunity to gain teenage closure. On assignment for the Wall Street Journal, I was in San Francisco to drive the original Bullitt chase scene in a new, 2011 Ford Mustang V6. In the passenger seat was Loren Janes, the fabled Hollywood stuntman and McQueen double who had driven the movie's most exciting scenes. Loren had graciously flown up from Burbank for the day to take the ride. What's more, I had a CD of the Bullitt soundtrack to set the mood. The result is in Wednesday's Wall Street Journal.

Loren is a very level-headed guy who spent years doing crazy things for a living. Really crazy things. He pulled off hair-raising stunts in more than 500 movies-nearly all of them household names. He also has added excitement to more than 2,100 TV episodes. You realize that without guys like Loren, movies over the past 50 years would be rather static. When I asked Loren if anything scares him, Loren said matter-of-factly: "Not really. I'm asked that often. I'm not really afraid of anything, and I've never broken a bone. I've been a gymnast, a Marine, a diver and Olympic athlete, which was great preparation for stunt work. I was always comfortable in the air."
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  "It took the crew four weeks to shoot that 10-minute car chase. It didn't unfold the way it does in the film. The scenes were shot street by street, and in a different order from the film. Then the scenes were arranged into a deck of cards in the editing room so there was continuity. So for the stunt driver, it wasn't a car chase as much as a series of block by block enterprises all over town.
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This story originally appeared on Jazzwax.com on Jan. 26, 2011, and was republished with permission. Copyright 2011 (c) Marc Myers/JazzWax.com. All rights reserved.

And, how could I leave this out?