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The Flying Wallendas got me thinking about stunts. There is this really good independent movie about Hollywood stuntwomen called, Double Dare that debuted at the 2004 Toronto Film Festival. The documentary takes a look at the lives of two stunt women, Jeannie Epper, stunt double for the Wonder Woman Show in the 1970’s and a working stunt woman, and Zoe Bell, a nineteen year old rookie and New Zealander. The documentary from Runaway Films was directed by Amanda Micheli and has interviews and some great action stunts. The film confronts the issues of agism and sexism in Hollywood, but does it in a very funny and intimate manner as it examines the lives of these two women who face some of the challenges of very ordinary women, one trying to hold on to her career as a stuntwoman and the other trying to break in to the business. The movie made the 2005 Rotten Tomatoes “Best Of” list and got scores of great reviews. A little long at 3 hours and 30 minutes, but get yourself a pillow as the film is well worth checking out. Speaking of stuntwomen, probably no one remembers Heidi Von Peltz, but she is a remminder what a very dangerous business film making can be. She was a stuntwoman in the 1980’s who was severely injured in an accident during the filming of Cannonball Run. The accident happened in Las Vegas when an Aston Martin that had been switched from left to right hand drive performed badly during a stunt. The car was supposed to veer to the left at about sixty miles per hour, but the steering column locked. The stunt driver could not get the wheel to turn and the car hit an oncoming stunt van head on. Heidi, age 25 was a passenger in the van. She was paralyzed from the neck down. After long years of rehabilitation Heidi went on to write a book, My Soul Purpose and found the Follow Your Heart Foundation for people with severe muscular disorders.

Villanova officials are defending their hiring of comedian Steve Trevino to entertain incoming freshmen, after Trevino’s act offended students:”At some point, it was just too offensive. I didn’t like what he was saying at all, especially the racial jokes,” said Jessona McDonald.

McDonald is one of many students who walked out during the barrage of bad language, including the n-word and racist and sexist humor.The university says the comic promised a clean show:”We have a contract and we say we are a Catholic university. We have standards that we want met. Even when he was here that day, we talked about having a PG-13 show. So, we really did the things that we normally do. It was very upsetting. He was very offensive,” said Kathy Byrnes, and assistant vice president of student life.Kudos to the university for at least having the judgment to Trevino offstage 15 minutes into his 90-minute show. But their claim that they were promised a clean show seems facile; why even hire a comedian known for foul-mouthed, racially charged, ”misogynistic” humor? Looking at Trevino’s Web site — which features a T-shirt depicting men waving money at a pole dancer (caption: “I SUPPORT SINGLE MOTHERS”) — one has to wonder, what were they thinking?

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P.S. When I entered New York University, the freshman-orientation comic was a pre-fame Mario Cantone. Definitely not appropriate for a Catholic university. Even so, his one-man version of “West Side Story” remains one of the funniest things I have ever seen. He pointed out the incongruity of the Jets’ being so tough and yet breaking into pirouettes.

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