Hollywood Hoofbeats

by Petrine Day Mitchum

  One horse the camera surely loved was a handsome gelding named Cocaine, owned by the late stuntman and double for John Wayne “Bad Chuck” Roberson. In his autobiography, Roberson devoted an entire chapter to Cocaine, a seven-eighths Thoroughbred out of a Quarter Horse mare. “I liked him the first time I saw him,” wrote Roberson. “He was a big sorrel gelding, not that color meant anything. In his working life, he was destined to be painted thousands of times. He and I single-handedly doubled entire tribes of Comanche Indians getting shot to pieces. We’d ride out in front of the camera, get shot down, come back; I’d change my headdress, and they’d paint another spot on Cocaine, and we’d ride out and bite the dust again.”

  At 6 feet 4 inches Roberson was looking for a big horse for the upcoming production of the Ronald Reagan film The Last Outpost (1951) when he found Cocaine at the stable of trainer Frosty Royce. Although only four years old, the blaze-faced sorrel had size and presence. He was totally green, but Roberson was undaunted and leased Cocaine for the picture without even trying him. As soon as the stuntman climbed aboard the sorrel, he knew he’d picked a winner. “With a man on his back,” Roberson wrote about Cocaine, “all he wanted to do was move out, race the wind, and win. He had heart and style, and I knew I could make a falling horse out of him.” Roberson had only three weeks to prepare Cocaine for the shoot.

  Cocaine learned his lessons with amazing speed and in three weeks was ready for his debut in The Last Outpost. Jack Williams also worked the sorrel mare Coco for the first time on this movie. Although Roberson owned her, Coco, at just under 15 hands, was too small for him. She suited the trim 5-foot 10-inch Williams just fine. Coco was trick trained and could bow, sit, and lie down. Williams, who had figured she could play dead in the battle scenes, soon discovered Coco’s talent for falling. Like a ballerina, she was capable of spectacular airborne pirouettes.

  Guided by Roberson and Williams, Cocaine and Coco did a record eighty-seven horse falls in three days on The Last Outpost. “Every passing day, I became more impressed with the intelligence of this animal,” Roberson wrote about Cocaine. “More than that, he had a desire to please; he seemed to enjoy doing things right for me. A word of praise seemed to light up those big, brown eyes of his and I got as attached to him as to any horse I had ever ridden.” When the picture finished, Roberson knew he could not part with the big red horse so he purchased Cocaine from Frosty Royce.

  Jack Williams, similarly smitten by Coco and her outrageous style, bought the little mare from his buddy for $400 and a television set. The pair would go on to enliven many a movie. Williams remembered Coco fondly in 2001: “Coco, my famous mare, was unique. She seemed to understand that you’re making a movie.” When he started working with Coco in 1950, she was about five or six; they made Rio Lobo (1970), their last picture together, almost twenty years later. “She died on my ranch in 1976. She was thirty-something.” That might seem extraordinary for a horse that had performed such rough work, but as Williams explained, “You’ve got riding academy horses that are used up when they’re seven years old. They get arthritic if they’re used on hard ground a lot, so for longevity, probably the best thing a horse can possibly do for a career is to be a good falling horse.”

  Cocaine and Roberson also made movie history for two decades. Whether splashed with white to play an Indian pony in movies such as The Last Outpost, painted black to double Robert Mitchum’s mount in The Wonderful Country (1959), or jumping through a candy-glass window (which looks real on film but is perfectly safe) with Roberson aboard in Chisum (1970), Cocaine always made a strong impression. Unusually versatile, he was trained to jump and do drags, transfers, and bulldogs, in addition to falling. His great contribution to movies was acknowledged mid-career with the American Humane’s Craven Award for Best Performance by a Stunt Horse for his work in the John Wayne film Hondo (1953). He won his second award at the end of his career, in 1972, another Wayne picture, The Train Robbers.

  Cocaine was dyed black to take this fall in The Wonderful Country (1959), with his owner Chuck Roberson doubling Robert Mitchum.

  Robert Mitchum says goodbye to his felled steed in The Wonderful Country. Again, it is Cocaine, dyed black and patiently lying down for his death scene.

  A fiery gelding named Hot Rod was, according to Tap Canutt, one of the most spectacular falling horses of the 1950s and 1960s. One of the first Thoroughbreds trained in that capacity, he raced under his registered name of Salvage Goods. He left the racetrack as a four-year-old with two bowed tendons. A proud-cut gelding, he still had enough testosterone to make him a handful. Stuntman Danny Fisher purchased Salvage Goods and turned him into the top falling horse Hot Rod. It was Fisher who taught Tap Canutt how to fall a horse, and Canutt got to throw the Rod, as he was known, many times. Their first film together was a Randolph Scott vehicle, Hangman’s Knot (1952). Hot Rod was eventually sold to stuntman Red Morgan, who continued to use him for many years.

  Danny Fisher later gave Tap Canutt another Thoroughbred, a tall sorrel mare, to train as a falling horse. Canutt changed her name, L’Elegante, to Gypsy. Gypsy worked with him on many films, including The Last Command (1955), Friendly Persuasion (1956), and Spartacus (1960). When he served in the Korean War, Canutt lent the mare to a friend, stuntman Joe Yrigoyen, who later purchased her with the condition that Canutt could use her anytime she was available.

  Gypsy also had a long career but sadly had to be euthanized after suffering an injury in the line of duty. Sometimes accidents can foil even the most careful planning, and Gypsy took an unscheduled spill while performing a stirrup drag—a dangerous “gag” in which a stuntman is literally dragged behind the horse with one foot caught in a stirrup. Gypsy had been chosen for the stunt because she had a kind disposition and wouldn’t kick while dragging a stuntman at a full run. Ironically, the valiant mare who had fallen so many times without mishap fractured a leg in the accidental fall. Joe Yrigoyen was with the much-beloved Gypsy at the end.

  Chuck Roberson provided another horse to Tap Canutt when the latter was working as Lee Marvin’s double on Cat Ballou (1965). Canutt had hoped to use Cocaine for a falling sequence, but the big red horse was busy elsewhere. Roberson suggested Tap try Tadpole, whom Roberson was boarding for their mutual friend stuntman Bill Hart. Chuck promised Tap he’d love the horse. Wrangler Dick Webb hauled Tadpole to the Cat Ballou location. En route, he tore up the inside of the van and almost crippled three other horse passengers. Webb unloaded the monster and snubbed him to a tree out of harm’s way. He warily informed Tap his falling horse had arrived.

  “Skipping what I thought was a well-deserved lunch,” Tap recalled, “I carried my saddle and falling horse bridle down to where they’d tied the beast from hell. Expecting to see a red-eyed creature with flames coming out of his mouth, I was a little surprised to find what appeared to be a reasonably sound bay horse.

  “‘Don’t let him fool ya!’ I heard Dick yell as he came riding up. I smiled and kept my eyes open as I saddled and bridled him. After walking him around for a few minutes, I climbed in the saddle and rode down into a wash where there was soft white sand. A perfect spot. I galloped him through the sand a couple of times, then on the third pass, I snatched him. Lifting in the front and lunging forward and high, he twisted to the left and came down on his hip and turned completely over. Chuck was right: I fell in love with this horse before he hit the ground.”

  Tap worked with Tadpole in many films. Notably, the two appeared together in The Wild Bunch, jumping through candy glass and tumbling down a sand dune in a group fall. A fantastic performer, Tadpole was treated like a star for the rest of his career.

  These stunt horses lived pampered, and generally long, lives. Cocaine lived to be almost thirty-two. Roberson’s father put the old horse down in 1975 when blindness and arthritis compromised the quality of his life. Unable to face his partner’s demise, Bad Chuck took off for a drive to San Francisco and thought about all the good times he and Cocaine had had. “Then I hung my head,�
� Roberson wrote, “and I’ll be damned if I didn’t cry some.”

  Like Cocaine and Coco, Hot Rod and Tadpole also had long lives. Another versatile performer, the Jerry Brown Falling Horse, an expert at jumping an obstacle and then falling over, lived to be thirty-four. Acquired at the end of World War II from the cavalry post at Fort Reno, Oklahoma, the gelding was owned by the Hudkins brothers but trained by stuntman Jerry Brown (hence his name). He performed his special stunt in Northwest Outpost (1947) and the John Wayne vehicle The Fighting Kentuckian (1949). The stunt was eventually banned because of injuries to other horses that attempted it. The Jerry Brown Falling Horse, however, was a superb athlete and worked for many years. He was awarded the Humane Association’s Craven Award of Excellence in 1951.

  While Chuck Roberson donned a sombrero to double the star. Cocaine’s blaze was widened to match Dollor’s for this spectacular leap through a prop window. Chuck Roberson, ducking to avoid flying shards of candy glass, doubled John Wayne.

  Chuck Roberson, in Native American disguise, aboard Cocaine on the left, and a fellow stuntman on a painted pony synchronize falls by pulling the reins to one side so the horses land on their shoulders on prepared landing sites, in the 1956 Western Pillars of the Sky. Look closely at Roberson’s left stirrup and you can see it is made of rubber to prevent it jabbing the fallen horse or rider.

  In this scene from Forty Guns (1957), Barbara Stanwyk, as a rough ridin’ cattle maven, was outfitted with a leather back pad and dragged 40 yards by wrangler Ken Lee aboard Oakie. Notice that her right foot is in the stirrup so she could face the camera car—if she were mounted, she’d be facing Oakie’s south end.

  And the Winner Is . . .

  The Craven Award, named after American Humane’s Hollywood office head, was inaugurated in 1951 to honor stunt animals. The PATSY Award, given to the Picture Animal Top Star of the Year, was also begun by American Humane in 1951 to honor animals in starring roles. These awards were given until the mid-1980s. If such awards existed today, the most likely equine recipient of a lifetime achievement award would be a handsome sorrel American Quarter Horse named Hightower.

  Hightower was trained by his owner, Rex Peterson. A protégé of the late Glenn Randall, Rex bought Hightower as a ranch horse but quickly realized the gelding’s potential as a movie horse. Docile yet athletic, highly intelligent and eager to please, Hightower had everything it takes to be a star, including good looks. Rex began by “whip training” Hightower to work at liberty when he was just a two-year-old. Using the whips like a conductor’s baton, the trainer taught Hightower to come to him, back up, lie down, and rear, all with a different flick or position of handheld whips. The whips are never used to hurt the horse. According to Peterson, “If I was to hurt him, when I get out in ten thousand acres and there’s not a fence in sight [as sometimes happens on movie locations], he’s not going to be with me. The only thing that keeps him around is his confidence in me.” Time and time again, movie trainers stress that the single most important ingredient in training a horse for any kind of work is trust.

  Hightower made his film debut in 1988’s Winter People, in which he was required to simulate dragging a man to death, first through water and then across snow. Horses are easily spooked by dragging inanimate objects and must be slowly trained to accept pulling dead weight. Hightower learned quickly, and although he had to perform out of sight of Peterson, he followed his trainer’s direction and accomplished the complicated stirrup drag without injury to the stuntman. Peterson knew he had a keeper.

  In 1994, Hightower played the mare “Ginger” in Black Beauty. Shot to disguise his sex, he played costar to his stablemate, the black American Quarter Horse stallion Doc’s Keepin’ Time, who played “Beauty.” Director Caroline Thompson fondly recalls: “Hightower has an attitude of gratitude. He really is your perfect horse. He has kindness, and he will try, try, try, try, try. He has more heart than I have seen in any horse, and most other creatures I can think of!”

  Another fan of Hightower is actress Julia Roberts, who can be seen galloping away from her character’s jilted bridegroom on the big chestnut in the beginning of Runaway Bride (1999).

  The gelding’s most difficult role was in 1998’s The Horse Whisperer. Hightower had to play a horse who had been severely injured and traumatized after being hit by a truck. Robert Redford’s “horse whisperer” character brings the psychotic horse back to normal. The script required the horse to act vicious and charge Redford’s character. Peterson auditioned Hightower by charging him at Redford and stopping him inches in front of the star. Hightower has the amazing ability to look ferocious one second and then drop the façade and be instantly docile. Recognizing the sorrel gelding’s extraordinary talent, Robert Redford cast Hightower as the lead horse.

  Chuck Roberson (in striped shirt), receiving the American Humane Association’s Craven Award on behalf of Cocaine, then in his twenties, for his stunt work in1972’s The Train Robbers.

  No Horses Were Harmed . . .

  Hightower and stablemate Doc’s Keepin Time, nicknamed Justin, both performed in The Horse Whisperer’s harrowing truck accident scene, carefully choreographed with the American Humane’s participation. Justin was required to lie in the snow and then get up on cue as the truck approaches and drags a girl, stunt double Shelley Boyle, across the road. Because a horse will not lie on cold, hard ground for long, the road was warmed up and softened with a white rug placed over sand and only lightly covered with snow. As the truck approached and the wind machines whirled, Peterson admits he was nervous—not only was his prized stallion at risk, so was Shelley, his sister. To everyone’s great relief, Justin ignored the surrounding mayhem and, listening only to Peterson, got up on cue and dragged Shelley to safety.

  Trainer Rex Peterson demonstrates the charge behavior that won Hightower his role in 1998’s The Horse Whisperer.

  Julia Roberts so enjoyed her ride on Hightower that when it came time to shoot the final horseback sequence, she insisted on using him again. Hightower was in Los Angeles, however, working on another film, far from Runaway Bride’s Maryland location. No problem. The studio arranged for him to be flown by FedEx to New York and trucked to Maryland for Julia Roberts to ride in the closing scene.

  Animatronics

  State-of-the-art robot horses are often used in dangerous scenes. In The Horse Whisperer sequence leading to the accident, two girls ride up a snow-covered hill, and their horses slip on the icy snow. The stunt doubles worked with animatronic horses for the most dangerous shots on a specially constructed slide. One animatronic, doubling Hightower, is hit by the truck. The animatronics were so realistic that an observer on the set was fooled. He led Peterson to a black horse (Justin’s animatronic double) lying in the snow, apparently struggling to get up. The “injured” horse even raised his head to look at the panicked visitor. Nearby, the special-effects man radio operating Justin’s realistic robotic double couldn’t hold back his laughter. The entire accident sequence is so real that when the film was over, Peterson said, “I had people swear to me that we hurt horses. We never injured a horse.” He added, “That is the magic of making movies.”

  Animatronic horses were also used in 1995’s Best Picture Braveheart and 2001’s The Patriot. Braveheart director Mel Gibson wanted to depict enemy horses being impaled on wooden stakes. Gibson would never subject a horse to danger, yet he insisted on graphic realism. Animatronic horses were built for the brutal scenes with horrifying results. A similar scene of horse impalement can be seen in The Patriot. Interestingly, the horse used in this film did not come from a Hollywood special-effects shop but was built by Alabama artist Bruce Larsen. The robot horse, named Brock, was also featured in the 2002 remake of Planet of the Apes.

  Brock was one of the animatronic horses built by Alabama artist Bruce Larsen for a gruesome impalement scene in 2001’s The Patriot.

  Water Work

  For jumps or falls into water, horses are, of course, no longer obliged to take the kinds
of risks they faced in Jesse James. For the 1991 Disney movie Wild Hearts Can’t Be Broken, the true story of Sonora Carver, the first woman to ride performing diving horses in Atlantic City, New Jersey, Corky Randall was hired to train the horses. He set up a tank at his peaceful Newhall, California, ranch, where he began by getting the horses accustomed to diving into the pool from a short platform. Randall gradually increased the diving height to 10 feet, the maximum as mandated by American Humane. A beautiful white Arabian, Chad, loved diving, but he had a habit of sticking his neck out when he hit the water. If the platform had been any higher, Chad might have broken his neck. “Thank God the Humane made us stop at 10 feet,” said Randall in 2001, “otherwise we’d have stood a chance of killing a horse.” A testament to Randall’s training, Chad gallops at liberty through the fairgrounds in the film’s climactic scene and voluntarily runs up the ramp to the dive platform, where the actress playing Sonora Carver, Gabrielle Anwar, leaps on his back for a spectacular dive. In the longer diving shot, it is stuntwoman Shelley Boyle aboard Chad. Their descent into the water is enhanced through computer animation to appear longer, but the brave little horse’s willing spirit and graceful motion are breathtakingly real.

  Randall had faced another challenge involving water as the head trainer on The Black Stallion (1980). A difficult scene involving the title character, largely played by the stunning black Arabian Cass Olé, required the horse to jump from a burning ship and risk his life to rescue a young boy. The scene was shot in Rome in a large indoor tank. Cass Olé was doubled by two French Camargue horses who were natural swimmers. All Camargues are white, and so the doubles had to be dyed black. In the water, a filament cable secured the horses. Everything went smoothly until one of the animals suddenly flipped upside down. Randall was in the water like a shot. He was able to right the horse and maneuver it to a ramp so it could walk out of the pool. After comforting the frightened horse, Randall stopped production. “That’s it for tonight,” he said, “I will not put another horse in the water until I know what our problem is and why we had a horse upside down.” The producer wisely acquiesced to Randall. The next morning, Randall went in the tank himself with the filament cable attached to his leg and discovered that the deceptively thin wire created a tremendous drag in the water when pulled sideways. He devised a way to use the cable to direct the horse in the water without creating the drag that toppled him. The time spent in closing down the production and figuring out the logistics of the scene proved costly, but the alternative might have been far costlier.