Yakima Canutt
Encyclopedia
Yakima Canutt also known as Yak Canutt, was an American
rodeo rider
, actor
, stuntman
and action director.
; he was one of five children of John Lemuel Canutt, a rancher, and Nettie Ellen Stevens. He grew up in eastern Washington on a ranch near Penawawa Creek, founded by his grandfather and operated by his father, who also served a term in the state legislature. His formal education was limited to elementary school in Green Lake, Washington, then a suburb of Seattle. He gained the education for his life's work on the family ranch, where he learned to hunt, trap, shoot, and ride.
He broke a wild bronco when 11. As a 6 feet (1.8 m) sixteen-year-old he started bronc riding at the Whitman County Fair in Colfax in 1912 and at 17 he won the title of World's Best Bronco Buster. Canutt started rodeo riding professionally and gained a reputation as a bronc rider, bulldogger
and all-around cowboy. It was at the 1914 Pendleton Round-Up
, Pendleton, Oregon
he got his nickname "Yakima" when a newspaper caption misidentified him. "Yakima Canutt may be the most famous person NOT from Yakima Washington" says Elizabeth Gibson, author of Yakima, Washington. Winning second place at the 1915 Pendleton Round-Up brought attention from show promoters, who invited him to compete around the country.
During the 1916 season, he became interested in divorcee Kitty Wilks
, who had won the Lady's Bronc-Riding Championship a couple of times. They married on July 20, 1917 while at a show in Kalispell, Montana; he was 21 and she 23. The couple divorced about 1922. While bulldogging in Idaho, Canutt's mouth and upper lip were torn by a bull's horn; but after stitches, Canutt returned to the competition. It wasn't until a year later that a plastic surgeon could correct the injury.
he competed in the bucking event and met Pete Knight
.
He traveled to Los Angeles for a rodeo, and decided to winter in Hollywood, where he met screen personalities. It was here that Tom Mix
, who had also started in rodeos, invited him to be in two of his pictures. Mix added to his flashy wardrobe by borrowing two of Canutt's two-tone shirts and having his tailor make 40 copies. Canutt got his first taste of stunting with a fight scene on a serial called Lightning Brice; he didn't stay, and left Hollywood to play the 1920 rodeo circuit.
The Fort Worth rodeo was nicknamed "Yak's show" after he won the saddle-bronc competition three years in 1921, 1922 and 1923. He had won the saddle-bronc competition in Pendleton in 1917, 1919, and 1923 and came second in 1915, and 1929. Canutt won the steer bulldogging in 1920, and 1921 and won the All-Around Police Gazette belt in 1917, 1919, 1920 and 1923. While in Hollywood in 1923 for an awards ceremony, he was offered eight western action pictures for producer Ben Wilson at Burwillow Studios; the first was to be Riding Mad.
used some in his film The Gaucho
. Fairbanks and Canutt became friends and competed regularly at Fairbanks' gym. Canutt took small parts in pictures of others to get experience. It was in Branded a Bandit (1924) that his nose was broken in a 12-foot fall from a cliff. The picture was delayed several weeks, and when it resumed Canutt's close shots were from the side. A plastic surgeon reset the nose, which healed, inspiring Canutt to remark that he thought it looked better.
When his contract with Wilson expired in 1927, Canutt was making appearances at rodeos across the country. By 1928 the talkies were coming out and though he had been in 48 silent pictures, Canutt knew his career was in trouble. His voice had been damaged from flu in the Navy. He started taking on bit parts and stunts, and realized more could be done with action in pictures.
In 1930 between pictures and rodeoing, Canutt met Minnie Audrea Yeager Rice at a party at her parents' home. She was 12 years his junior. They kept company during the next year while he picked up work on the serials for Mascot Pictures Corporation
. They married on November 12, 1931.
When rodeo riders invaded Hollywood, they brought a battery of rodeo techniques that Canutt would expand and improve, including horse falls and wagon wrecks, along with the harnesses and cable rigs to make the stunts foolproof and safe. Among the new safety devices was the 'L' stirrup, which allowed a man to fall off a horse without getting hung in the stirrup. Canutt also developed cabling and equipment to cause spectacular wagon crashes, while releasing the team, all on the same spot every time. Safety methods such as these saved film-makers time and money and prevented accidents and injury to performers. One of Yakima's inventions was the 'Running W' stunt, bringing down a horse at the gallop by attaching a wire, anchored to the ground, to its fetlocks and launching the rider forwards spectacularly. This rendered the horse badly shaken and unusable for the rest of the day. The 'Running W' is now banned and has been replaced with the falling-horse technique. It is believed that the last time it was used was on the 1983 Iraqi film al-Mas' Ala Al-Kubra
when the British actor and friend of Yak Marc Sinden
and stuntman Ken Buckle (who had been trained by Yak) performed the stunt three times during a cavalry charge sequence.
It was while working on Mascot serials that Canutt practiced and perfected his most famous stunts, including the drop from a stagecoach that he would employ in John Ford
's 1939 Stagecoach. He first did it in Riders of the Dawn in 1937 while doubling for Jack Randall
. In his 1981 film Raiders of the Lost Ark
, Steven Speilberg paid homage to Canutt, recreating the stunt when a stuntman, Terry Leonard, (doubling for Harrison Ford
) 'dropped' from the front of a German Army transport truck, was dragged underneath (along a prepared trench) and then climbed up the back and round to the front again.
while doubling for him in a motorcycle stunt for The Shadow of the Eagle
in 1932. Wayne admired Canutt’s agility and fearlessness, and Canutt respected Wayne’s willingness to learn and attempt his own stunts. Canutt taught Wayne how to fall off a horse.
In 1932, Canutt's first son Edward Clay was born and nicknamed 'Tap', short for Tapadero
, a Spanish word for a stirrup
covering. It was in 1932 that Canutt broke his shoulder in four places while trying to transfer from horse to wagon team. Though work was scarce, he got by combining stunting and rodeo work.
In 1934, Herbert J. Yates
of Consolidated Film Industries
combined Monogram
, Mascot
, Liberty, Majestic, Chesterfield, and Invincible Pictures to form Republic Pictures
, and Canutt became Republic's top stuntman. He handled all the action on many pictures, including Gene Autry
films; and several series and serials, such as The Lone Ranger
and Zorro
. For Zorro Rides Again
, Canutt did almost all the scenes in which Zorro wore a mask, and he was on the screen as much as the star John Carroll
. When the action was indicated in a Republic script, it said "see Yakima Canutt for action sequences."
William Witney
, one of Republic's film directors, said:
In the 1936 film San Francisco
Canutt replaced Clark Gable
in a scene in which a wall was to fall on the star. Canutt said: "We had a heavy table situated so that I could dive under it at the last moment. Just as the wall started down, a girl in the scene became hysterical and panicked. I grabbed her, leaped for the table, but didn't quite make it." The girl was unhurt but he broke six ribs.
Canutt tried to get into directing; he was growing older and knew his stunting days were numbered. Harry Joe, Canutt's second son, was born in January 1937. Joe and Tap would become important stuntmen, working with their father.
In 1938, Republic Pictures started expanding into bigger pictures and budgets. Canutt's mentor and action director for the 1925 Ben-Hur
, Breezy Eason
was hired as second unit director, and Canutt to coordinate and ramrod the stunts. For Canutt this meant hiring stuntmen and doing some stunts himself, but laying out the action for the director and writing additional stunts.
John Ford
hired Canutt on John Wayne
's recommendation for Stagecoach, where Canutt supervised the river-crossing scene as well as the Indian chase scene, did the stagecoach drop, and doubled for Wayne in the coach stunts. For safety during the stagecoach drop stunt, Canutt devised modified yokes and tongues, to give extra handholds and extra room between the teams. Ford told him that whenever Ford made an action picture and Canutt wasn't working elsewhere, he was on Ford's payroll. Also in 1939, Canutt doubled Clark Gable
in the burning of Atlanta in Gone With the Wind
; he also appeared as a renegade accosting Scarlett O'Hara (Vivien Leigh
) as she crosses a bridge in a carriage driving through a shantytown.
(1940). Though in discomfort for months after an operation to repair his bifurcated intestines, he continued to work. Republic's Sol Siegel offered him the chance to direct the action sequences of Dark Command
, starring Wayne and directed by Raoul Walsh
. On Dark Command, Canutt fashioned an elaborate cable system to yank back the plummeting coach before it fell on the stuntman and horses; he also created a breakaway harness from which they were released before hitting the water.
It was in 1943 while doing a low budget Roy Rogers
called Idaho that Canutt broke both his legs at the ankles in a fall off a wagon. He recovered to write the stunts and supervise the action for another Wayne film In Old Oklahoma
. In the next decade Canutt became one of the best second unit and action directors. MGM brought Canutt to England in 1952 to direct the action and jousting sequences in Ivanhoe
with Robert Taylor
. This would set a precedent by filming action abroad instead of on the studio lot, and Canutt introduced many British stuntmen to Hollywood-style stunt training. Ivanhoe was followed by Knights of the Round Table
, again with director Richard Thorpe
and starring Robert Taylor. Canutt was again brought in for lavish action scenes in King Richard and the Crusaders
.
Canutt directed the close-action scenes for Stanley Kubrick
's Spartacus, spending five days directing retakes that included the slave army rolling its flaming logs into the Romans, and other fight scenes featuring Kirk Douglas
, Tony Curtis
and John Ireland
.
, Canutt staged the chariot race with nine teams of four horses. He trained Charlton Heston
, (Judah Ben-Hur) and Stephen Boyd
, (Messala
) to do their own charioteering. He and his crew spent five months on the race sequence. In contrast to the 1925 film
, not one horse was hurt, and no humans were seriously injured; though Joe Canutt, while doubling for Charlton Heston, did cut his chin because he did not follow his father’s advice to hook himself to the chariot when Judah Ben-Hur's chariot bounced over the wreck of another chariot.
Walt Disney
brought Canutt in to do Second Unit for Westward Ho, the Wagons!
in 1956; the first live action Disney picture followed by Old Yeller
the next year, and culminating in 1960's Swiss Family Robinson
which involved transporting many exotic animals to a remote island in the West Indies.
Anthony Mann
specifically requested Canutt for Second Unit for his 1961 El Cid
, where Canutt directed sons Joe and Tap doubling for Charlton Heston
and Christopher Rhodes
in a stunning tournament joust. "Canutt was surely the most active stager of tournaments since the Middle Ages" – from Swordsmen of the Screen. He was determined to make the combat scenes in El Cid the best that had ever been filmed. Mann again requested him for 1964's The Fall of the Roman Empire
. Over the next ten years, Canutt would continue to work bringing his talents to Cat Ballou
, Khartoum
, Where Eagles Dare
and 1970's A Man Called Horse.
For his contribution to the motion picture industry, Yakima Canutt has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame
at 1500 Vine Street. In 1967, he was given an Honorary Academy Award for achievements as a stunt man and for developing safety devices to protect stunt men everywhere. He was inducted into the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum
(Hall of Fame).
Yakima Canutt died of natural causes at the age of 90 in North Hollywood, California.
He is buried at Valhalla Memorial Park Cemetery
there.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
rodeo rider
Rodeo
Rodeo is a competitive sport which arose out of the working practices of cattle herding in Spain, Mexico, and later the United States, Canada, South America and Australia. It was based on the skills required of the working vaqueros and later, cowboys, in what today is the western United States,...
, actor
Actor
An actor is a person who acts in a dramatic production and who works in film, television, theatre, or radio in that capacity...
, stuntman
Stunt double
A stunt double is a type of body double, specifically a skilled replacement used for dangerous film or video sequences, in movies and television , and for other sophisticated stunts...
and action director.
Biography
Born Enos Edward Canutt in the Snake River Hills, near Colfax, WashingtonColfax, Washington
Colfax is the county seat of Whitman County, Washington, United States.The population was 2,805 at the 2010 census.It is situated amidst wheat-covered hills in a valley at the confluence of the north and south forks of the Palouse River. U.S...
; he was one of five children of John Lemuel Canutt, a rancher, and Nettie Ellen Stevens. He grew up in eastern Washington on a ranch near Penawawa Creek, founded by his grandfather and operated by his father, who also served a term in the state legislature. His formal education was limited to elementary school in Green Lake, Washington, then a suburb of Seattle. He gained the education for his life's work on the family ranch, where he learned to hunt, trap, shoot, and ride.
He broke a wild bronco when 11. As a 6 feet (1.8 m) sixteen-year-old he started bronc riding at the Whitman County Fair in Colfax in 1912 and at 17 he won the title of World's Best Bronco Buster. Canutt started rodeo riding professionally and gained a reputation as a bronc rider, bulldogger
Steer wrestling
Steer wrestling, also known as bulldogging, is a rodeo event in which a horse-mounted rider chases a steer, drops from the horse to the steer, then wrestles the steer to the ground by twisting its horns. Like all rodeo events, there are concerns from the animal rights community that the competition...
and all-around cowboy. It was at the 1914 Pendleton Round-Up
Pendleton Round-Up
The Pendleton Round-Up is a rodeo held in Pendleton, Oregon, United States, during the second full week of September each year, since 1910. The rodeo brings roughly 50,000 people every year to the city of Pendleton...
, Pendleton, Oregon
Pendleton, Oregon
Pendleton is a city in Umatilla County, Oregon, United States. Pendleton was named in 1868 by the county commissioners for George H. Pendleton, Democratic candidate for Vice-President in the 1864 presidential campaign. The population was 16,612 at the 2010 census...
he got his nickname "Yakima" when a newspaper caption misidentified him. "Yakima Canutt may be the most famous person NOT from Yakima Washington" says Elizabeth Gibson, author of Yakima, Washington. Winning second place at the 1915 Pendleton Round-Up brought attention from show promoters, who invited him to compete around the country.
"I started in major rodeos in 1914, and went through to 1923. There was quite a crop of us traveling together, and we would have special railroad cars and cars for the horses. We'd play anywhere from three, six, eight ten-day shows. Bronc riding and bulldogging were my specialties, but I did some roping." said Canutt.
During the 1916 season, he became interested in divorcee Kitty Wilks
Kitty Canutt
Kitty Canutt, stage name Kitty Wilks , was a professional bronc rider, and the All-Around Champion Cowgirl at the 1916 Pendleton Round-Up in Pendleton, Oregon, for her bucking horse and relay race events...
, who had won the Lady's Bronc-Riding Championship a couple of times. They married on July 20, 1917 while at a show in Kalispell, Montana; he was 21 and she 23. The couple divorced about 1922. While bulldogging in Idaho, Canutt's mouth and upper lip were torn by a bull's horn; but after stitches, Canutt returned to the competition. It wasn't until a year later that a plastic surgeon could correct the injury.
World's champion
Canutt won his first world championship at the Olympics of the West in 1917 and won more championships in the next few years. In between rodeos he broke horses for the French government in World War I. In 1918, he went to Spokane to enlist in the Navy and was stationed in Bremerton. In the fall he was given a 30-day furlough to defend his rodeo title. Having enlisted for the war, he was discharged in spring 1919. At the 1919 Calgary StampedeCalgary Stampede
The Calgary Stampede is an annual rodeo, exhibition and festival held every July in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. The ten-day event, which bills itself as "The Greatest Outdoor Show on Earth", attracts over one million visitors per year and features one of the world's largest rodeos, a parade, midway,...
he competed in the bucking event and met Pete Knight
Pete Knight
Pete Knight is the name of:* Pete Knight , World Champion Rodeo Bronc Rider and international superstar of Rodeo* William J. Knight , American test pilot, astronaut and politician nicknamed "Pete"...
.
He traveled to Los Angeles for a rodeo, and decided to winter in Hollywood, where he met screen personalities. It was here that Tom Mix
Tom Mix
Thomas Edwin "Tom" Mix was an American film actor and the star of many early Western movies. He made a reported 336 films between 1910 and 1935, all but nine of which were silent features...
, who had also started in rodeos, invited him to be in two of his pictures. Mix added to his flashy wardrobe by borrowing two of Canutt's two-tone shirts and having his tailor make 40 copies. Canutt got his first taste of stunting with a fight scene on a serial called Lightning Brice; he didn't stay, and left Hollywood to play the 1920 rodeo circuit.
The Fort Worth rodeo was nicknamed "Yak's show" after he won the saddle-bronc competition three years in 1921, 1922 and 1923. He had won the saddle-bronc competition in Pendleton in 1917, 1919, and 1923 and came second in 1915, and 1929. Canutt won the steer bulldogging in 1920, and 1921 and won the All-Around Police Gazette belt in 1917, 1919, 1920 and 1923. While in Hollywood in 1923 for an awards ceremony, he was offered eight western action pictures for producer Ben Wilson at Burwillow Studios; the first was to be Riding Mad.
Actor
Canutt had been perfecting tricks such as the Crupper Mount, a leap-frog over the horse's rump into the saddle. Douglas FairbanksDouglas Fairbanks
Douglas Fairbanks, Sr. was an American actor, screenwriter, director and producer. He was best known for his swashbuckling roles in silent films such as The Thief of Bagdad, Robin Hood, and The Mark of Zorro....
used some in his film The Gaucho
The Gaucho
The Gaucho is a 1927 movie starring Douglas Fairbanks and Lupe Vélez set in Argentina. The lavish adventure extravaganza, filmed at the height of Fairbanks' box office clout, was directed by F...
. Fairbanks and Canutt became friends and competed regularly at Fairbanks' gym. Canutt took small parts in pictures of others to get experience. It was in Branded a Bandit (1924) that his nose was broken in a 12-foot fall from a cliff. The picture was delayed several weeks, and when it resumed Canutt's close shots were from the side. A plastic surgeon reset the nose, which healed, inspiring Canutt to remark that he thought it looked better.
Stuntman
In 1930 between pictures and rodeoing, Canutt met Minnie Audrea Yeager Rice at a party at her parents' home. She was 12 years his junior. They kept company during the next year while he picked up work on the serials for Mascot Pictures Corporation
Mascot Pictures Corporation
Mascot Pictures Corporation was a minor film company of the 1920s and 1930s best known for producing film serials and B-westerns. Mascot's serial The King of the Kongo was the first serial to include sound, beating Universal Studios by several months.Mascot was formed in 1927 by film producer Nat...
. They married on November 12, 1931.
When rodeo riders invaded Hollywood, they brought a battery of rodeo techniques that Canutt would expand and improve, including horse falls and wagon wrecks, along with the harnesses and cable rigs to make the stunts foolproof and safe. Among the new safety devices was the 'L' stirrup, which allowed a man to fall off a horse without getting hung in the stirrup. Canutt also developed cabling and equipment to cause spectacular wagon crashes, while releasing the team, all on the same spot every time. Safety methods such as these saved film-makers time and money and prevented accidents and injury to performers. One of Yakima's inventions was the 'Running W' stunt, bringing down a horse at the gallop by attaching a wire, anchored to the ground, to its fetlocks and launching the rider forwards spectacularly. This rendered the horse badly shaken and unusable for the rest of the day. The 'Running W' is now banned and has been replaced with the falling-horse technique. It is believed that the last time it was used was on the 1983 Iraqi film al-Mas' Ala Al-Kubra
Al-Mas' Ala Al-Kubra
Al-Mas'ala Al-Kubra is a 1983 Iraqi movie focusing on the formation of Iraq out of Mesopotamia in the aftermath of the First World War....
when the British actor and friend of Yak Marc Sinden
Marc Sinden
Marc Sinden is an English theatre producer, documentary director and actor. His father is the actor Sir Donald Sinden.-Theatre:...
and stuntman Ken Buckle (who had been trained by Yak) performed the stunt three times during a cavalry charge sequence.
It was while working on Mascot serials that Canutt practiced and perfected his most famous stunts, including the drop from a stagecoach that he would employ in John Ford
John Ford
John Ford was an American film director. He was famous for both his westerns such as Stagecoach, The Searchers, and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, and adaptations of such classic 20th-century American novels as The Grapes of Wrath...
's 1939 Stagecoach. He first did it in Riders of the Dawn in 1937 while doubling for Jack Randall
Addison Randall
Addison Byron Owen Randall was an American film actor, chiefly in Westerns...
. In his 1981 film Raiders of the Lost Ark
Raiders of the Lost Ark
Raiders of the Lost Ark is a 1981 American action-adventure film directed by Steven Spielberg, produced by George Lucas, and starring Harrison Ford. It is the first film in the Indiana Jones franchise...
, Steven Speilberg paid homage to Canutt, recreating the stunt when a stuntman, Terry Leonard, (doubling for Harrison Ford
Harrison Ford
Harrison Ford is an American film actor and producer. He is famous for his performances as Han Solo in the original Star Wars trilogy and as the title character of the Indiana Jones film series. Ford is also known for his roles as Rick Deckard in Blade Runner, John Book in Witness and Jack Ryan in...
) 'dropped' from the front of a German Army transport truck, was dragged underneath (along a prepared trench) and then climbed up the back and round to the front again.
John Wayne
While at Mascot, Canutt met John WayneJohn Wayne
Marion Mitchell Morrison , better known by his stage name John Wayne, was an American film actor, director and producer. He epitomized rugged masculinity and became an enduring American icon. He is famous for his distinctive calm voice, walk, and height...
while doubling for him in a motorcycle stunt for The Shadow of the Eagle
The Shadow of the Eagle
The Shadow of the Eagle is a Mascot film serial starring John Wayne in his first serial role. This serial is now in the public domain.-Plot:...
in 1932. Wayne admired Canutt’s agility and fearlessness, and Canutt respected Wayne’s willingness to learn and attempt his own stunts. Canutt taught Wayne how to fall off a horse.
"The two worked together to create a technique that made on-screen fight scenes more realistic. Wayne and Canutt found if they stood at a certain angle in front of the camera, they could throw a punch at an actor’s face and make it look as if actual contact had been made."Canutt and Wayne pioneered stunt and screen fighting techniques still in use. Much of Wayne's on-screen persona was from Canutt. The characterizations associated with Wayne - the drawling, hesitant speech and the hip-rolling walk - were pure Canutt. Said Wayne, "I spent weeks studying the way Yakima Canutt walked and talked. He was a real cowhand."
In 1932, Canutt's first son Edward Clay was born and nicknamed 'Tap', short for Tapadero
Tapadero
A tapadero, sometimes referred to as a "hooded stirrup," is leather cover over the front of a stirrup on a saddle that closes each stirrup from the front. A tapedero prevents the rider's boot from slipping through and also prevents brush encountered while working cattle on the open range from...
, a Spanish word for a stirrup
Stirrup
A stirrup is a light frame or ring that holds the foot of a rider, attached to the saddle by a strap, often called a stirrup leather. Stirrups are usually paired and are used to aid in mounting and as a support while using a riding animal...
covering. It was in 1932 that Canutt broke his shoulder in four places while trying to transfer from horse to wagon team. Though work was scarce, he got by combining stunting and rodeo work.
In 1934, Herbert J. Yates
Herbert Yates
Herbert John Yates was the founder and president of Republic Pictures, famous for being the home of John Wayne, Gene Autry, and Roy Rogers...
of Consolidated Film Industries
Consolidated Film Industries
Consolidated Film Industries was a film laboratory, and film processing company, and was the leading film laboratory in the Los Angeles area for many decades. CFI processed negatives and made prints for motion pictures and television...
combined Monogram
Monogram Pictures
Monogram Pictures Corporation is a Hollywood studio that produced and released films, most on low budgets, between 1931 and 1953, when the firm completed a transition to the name Allied Artists Pictures Corporation. Monogram is considered a leader among the smaller studios sometimes referred to...
, Mascot
Mascot Pictures Corporation
Mascot Pictures Corporation was a minor film company of the 1920s and 1930s best known for producing film serials and B-westerns. Mascot's serial The King of the Kongo was the first serial to include sound, beating Universal Studios by several months.Mascot was formed in 1927 by film producer Nat...
, Liberty, Majestic, Chesterfield, and Invincible Pictures to form Republic Pictures
Republic Pictures
Republic Pictures was an independent film production-distribution corporation with studio facilities, operating from 1934 through 1959, and was best known for specializing in westerns, movie serials and B films emphasizing mystery and action....
, and Canutt became Republic's top stuntman. He handled all the action on many pictures, including Gene Autry
Gene Autry
Orvon Grover Autry , better known as Gene Autry, was an American performer who gained fame as The Singing Cowboy on the radio, in movies and on television for more than three decades beginning in the 1930s...
films; and several series and serials, such as The Lone Ranger
The Lone Ranger
The Lone Ranger is a fictional masked Texas Ranger who, with his Native American companion Tonto, fights injustice in the American Old West. The character has become an enduring icon of American culture....
and Zorro
Zorro
Zorro is a fictional character created in 1919 by New York-based pulp writer Johnston McCulley. The character has been featured in numerous books, films, television series, and other media....
. For Zorro Rides Again
Zorro Rides Again
Zorro Rides Again is a 12-chapter Republic film serial. It was the eighth of the sixty-six Republic serials, the third with a western theme and the last produced in 1937. The serial was directed by William Witney & John English and starred John Carroll as a modern descendant of the original Zorro...
, Canutt did almost all the scenes in which Zorro wore a mask, and he was on the screen as much as the star John Carroll
John Carroll (actor)
John Carroll was an American actor and singer. He was born Julian Lafaye in New Orleans, Louisiana....
. When the action was indicated in a Republic script, it said "see Yakima Canutt for action sequences."
William Witney
William Witney
William Nuelsen Witney was an American film and television director. He is best remembered for the movie serials he co-directed with John English for Republic Pictures such as Daredevils of the Red Circle, Zorro's Fighting Legion and Drums of Fu Manchu.He directed many Westerns during his career,...
, one of Republic's film directors, said:
"There will probably never be another stuntman who can compare to Yakima Canutt. He had been a world champion cowboy several times and where horses were concerned he could do it all. He invented all the gadgets that made stunt work easier. One of his clever devices was a step that attached to the saddle so that he had leverage to transfer to another moving object, like a wagon or a train. Another was the “shotgun,” a spring-loaded device used to separate the tongue of a running wagon from the horses, thus cutting the horses loose. It also included a shock cord attached to the wagon bed, which caused wheels to cramp and turn the wagon over on the precise spot that was most advantageous for the camera."
In the 1936 film San Francisco
San Francisco (film)
San Francisco is a 1936 musical-drama directed by Woody Van Dyke, based on the April 18, 1906 San Francisco earthquake. The film, which was the top grossing movie of that year, stars Clark Gable, Jeanette MacDonald, and Spencer Tracy. The then very popular singing of MacDonald helped make this film...
Canutt replaced Clark Gable
Clark Gable
William Clark Gable , known as Clark Gable, was an American film actor most famous for his role as Rhett Butler in the 1939 Civil War epic film Gone with the Wind, in which he starred with Vivien Leigh...
in a scene in which a wall was to fall on the star. Canutt said: "We had a heavy table situated so that I could dive under it at the last moment. Just as the wall started down, a girl in the scene became hysterical and panicked. I grabbed her, leaped for the table, but didn't quite make it." The girl was unhurt but he broke six ribs.
Ramrod
In 1938, Republic Pictures started expanding into bigger pictures and budgets. Canutt's mentor and action director for the 1925 Ben-Hur
Ben-Hur (1925 film)
Ben-Hur is a 1925 silent film directed by Fred Niblo. It was a blockbuster hit for newly merged Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. This was the second film based on the novel Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ by Lew Wallace...
, Breezy Eason
B. Reeves Eason
B. Reeves Eason was an American film director, actor and screenwriter. His directorial output was limited mainly to low-budget westerns and action pictures, but it was as a second-unit director and action specialist that he was best known...
was hired as second unit director, and Canutt to coordinate and ramrod the stunts. For Canutt this meant hiring stuntmen and doing some stunts himself, but laying out the action for the director and writing additional stunts.
"In the five years between 1925 and 1930, fifty-five people were killed making movies, and more than ten thousand injured. By the late 1930s, the maverick stuntman willing to do anything for a buck was disappearing. Now under scrutiny, experienced stunt men began to separate themselves from amateurs by building special equipment, rehearsing stunts, and developing new techniques." – from Falling: How Our Greatest Fear Became Our Greatest Thrill by Garrett Soden.
John Ford
John Ford
John Ford was an American film director. He was famous for both his westerns such as Stagecoach, The Searchers, and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, and adaptations of such classic 20th-century American novels as The Grapes of Wrath...
hired Canutt on John Wayne
John Wayne
Marion Mitchell Morrison , better known by his stage name John Wayne, was an American film actor, director and producer. He epitomized rugged masculinity and became an enduring American icon. He is famous for his distinctive calm voice, walk, and height...
's recommendation for Stagecoach, where Canutt supervised the river-crossing scene as well as the Indian chase scene, did the stagecoach drop, and doubled for Wayne in the coach stunts. For safety during the stagecoach drop stunt, Canutt devised modified yokes and tongues, to give extra handholds and extra room between the teams. Ford told him that whenever Ford made an action picture and Canutt wasn't working elsewhere, he was on Ford's payroll. Also in 1939, Canutt doubled Clark Gable
Clark Gable
William Clark Gable , known as Clark Gable, was an American film actor most famous for his role as Rhett Butler in the 1939 Civil War epic film Gone with the Wind, in which he starred with Vivien Leigh...
in the burning of Atlanta in Gone With the Wind
Gone with the Wind (film)
Gone with the Wind is a 1939 American historical epic film adapted from Margaret Mitchell's Pulitzer-winning 1936 novel of the same name. It was produced by David O. Selznick and directed by Victor Fleming from a screenplay by Sidney Howard...
; he also appeared as a renegade accosting Scarlett O'Hara (Vivien Leigh
Vivien Leigh
Vivien Leigh, Lady Olivier was an English actress. She won the Best Actress Academy Award for her portrayal of Blanche DuBois in A Streetcar Named Desire , a role she also played on stage in London's West End, as well as for her portrayal of the southern belle Scarlett O'Hara, alongside Clark...
) as she crosses a bridge in a carriage driving through a shantytown.
Second Unit Director
In 1940, Canutt sustained serious internal injuries when a horse fell on him while doubling for Clark Gable in Boom TownBoom Town (film)
Boom Town is a 1940 adventure drama Hollywood film starring Clark Gable, Spencer Tracy, Claudette Colbert, Hedy Lamarr, and Frank Morgan. A story written by James Edward Grant in Cosmopolitan magazine titled "A Lady Comes to Burkburnett" provided the inspiration for the film.-Plot:"Big John"...
(1940). Though in discomfort for months after an operation to repair his bifurcated intestines, he continued to work. Republic's Sol Siegel offered him the chance to direct the action sequences of Dark Command
Dark Command
Dark Command is a 1940 western film starring Claire Trevor, John Wayne and Walter Pidgeon loosely based on Quantrill's Raiders in the American Civil War. Directed by Raoul Walsh from the novel by W.R...
, starring Wayne and directed by Raoul Walsh
Raoul Walsh
Raoul Walsh was an American film director, actor, founding member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and the brother of silent screen actor George Walsh...
. On Dark Command, Canutt fashioned an elaborate cable system to yank back the plummeting coach before it fell on the stuntman and horses; he also created a breakaway harness from which they were released before hitting the water.
It was in 1943 while doing a low budget Roy Rogers
Roy Rogers
Roy Rogers, born Leonard Franklin Slye , was an American singer and cowboy actor, one of the most heavily marketed and merchandised stars of his era, as well as being the namesake of the Roy Rogers Restaurants franchised chain...
called Idaho that Canutt broke both his legs at the ankles in a fall off a wagon. He recovered to write the stunts and supervise the action for another Wayne film In Old Oklahoma
In Old Oklahoma
In Old Oklahoma is a 1943 American film starring John Wayne, Martha Scott, Albert Dekker, Gabby Hayes, Marjorie Rambeau, and Dale Evans. The movie was directed by Albert S. Rogell and is usually shown under the title War of the Wildcats...
. In the next decade Canutt became one of the best second unit and action directors. MGM brought Canutt to England in 1952 to direct the action and jousting sequences in Ivanhoe
Ivanhoe (film)
The Ivanhoe films are based on the novel by Sir Walter Scott. The novel has been made into a film several times; starting with two adaptations in Ivanhoe in 1913....
with Robert Taylor
Robert Taylor (actor)
Robert Taylor was an American film and television actor.-Early life:Born Spangler Arlington Brugh in Filley, Nebraska, he was the son of Ruth Adaline and Spangler Andrew Brugh, who was a farmer turned doctor...
. This would set a precedent by filming action abroad instead of on the studio lot, and Canutt introduced many British stuntmen to Hollywood-style stunt training. Ivanhoe was followed by Knights of the Round Table
Knights of the Round Table (film)
Knights of the Round Table is a 1953 Technicolor Cinemascope historical film made by MGM. Directed by Richard Thorpe and produced by Pandro S. Berman, it was the first film in Cinemascope made by that studio...
, again with director Richard Thorpe
Richard Thorpe
Richard Thorpe was an American film director.Born Rollo Smolt Thorpe in Hutchinson, Kansas, he began his entertainment career performing in vaudeville and onstage. In 1921 he began in motion pictures as an actor and directed his first silent film in 1923. He went on to direct more than one hundred...
and starring Robert Taylor. Canutt was again brought in for lavish action scenes in King Richard and the Crusaders
King Richard and the Crusaders
King Richard and the Crusaders is a 1954 historical drama film made by Warner Bros.. It was directed by David Butler and produced by Henry Blanke from a screenplay by John Twist based on Sir Walter Scott's novel The Talisman. The music score was by Max Steiner and the cinematography by J. Peverell...
.
Canutt directed the close-action scenes for Stanley Kubrick
Stanley Kubrick
Stanley Kubrick was an American film director, writer, producer, and photographer who lived in England during most of the last four decades of his career...
's Spartacus, spending five days directing retakes that included the slave army rolling its flaming logs into the Romans, and other fight scenes featuring Kirk Douglas
Kirk Douglas
Kirk Douglas is an American stage and film actor, film producer and author. His popular films include Out of the Past , Champion , Ace in the Hole , The Bad and the Beautiful , Lust for Life , Paths of Glory , Gunfight at the O.K...
, Tony Curtis
Tony Curtis
Tony Curtis was an American film actor whose career spanned six decades, but had his greatest popularity during the 1950s and early 1960s. He acted in over 100 films in roles covering a wide range of genres, from light comedy to serious drama...
and John Ireland
John Ireland (actor)
John Benjamin Ireland was an actor and film director.-Biography:Born in Vancouver, British Columbia, he was raised in New York City from the age of 18. He started out in minor stage roles on Broadway...
.
Ben Hur
For Ben-HurBen-Hur (1959 film)
Ben-Hur is a 1959 American epic film directed by William Wyler and starring Charlton Heston in the title role, the third film adaptation of Lew Wallace's 1880 novel Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ. The screenplay was written by Karl Tunberg, Gore Vidal, and Christopher Fry. The score was composed by...
, Canutt staged the chariot race with nine teams of four horses. He trained Charlton Heston
Charlton Heston
Charlton Heston was an American actor of film, theatre and television. Heston is known for heroic roles in films such as The Ten Commandments, Ben-Hur for which he won the Academy Award for Best Actor, El Cid, and Planet of the Apes...
, (Judah Ben-Hur) and Stephen Boyd
Stephen Boyd
Stephen Boyd was an Irish actor, from Glengormley, Northern Ireland, who appeared in around 60 films, most notably in the role of Messala in Ben-Hur.-Biography:...
, (Messala
Messala
The name Messala , or Messalla, can refer to several people in Ancient Rome:*Marcus Valerius Messalla**The Roman general Marcus Valerius Messalla Corvinus.**The ancient Roman Senator Marcus Valerius Messalla Niger....
) to do their own charioteering. He and his crew spent five months on the race sequence. In contrast to the 1925 film
Ben-Hur (1925 film)
Ben-Hur is a 1925 silent film directed by Fred Niblo. It was a blockbuster hit for newly merged Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. This was the second film based on the novel Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ by Lew Wallace...
, not one horse was hurt, and no humans were seriously injured; though Joe Canutt, while doubling for Charlton Heston, did cut his chin because he did not follow his father’s advice to hook himself to the chariot when Judah Ben-Hur's chariot bounced over the wreck of another chariot.
Walt Disney
Walter Elias "Walt" Disney was an American film producer, director, screenwriter, voice actor, animator, entrepreneur, entertainer, international icon, and philanthropist, well-known for his influence in the field of entertainment during the 20th century. Along with his brother Roy O...
brought Canutt in to do Second Unit for Westward Ho, the Wagons!
Westward Ho, The Wagons!
Westward Ho, the Wagons! is a 1956 live-action Disney western film, aimed at family audiences. Based on Mary Jane Carr's novel Children of the Covered Wagon, the film was produced by Bill Walsh, directed by William Beaudine, and released to theatres on December 20, 1956 by Buena Vista Distribution...
in 1956; the first live action Disney picture followed by Old Yeller
Old Yeller
Old Yeller is a 1956 children's novel by Fred Gipson, which received a Newbery Honor in 1957. It was illustrated by Carl Burger. The title is taken from the name of the big yellow dog who is the center of the book's story...
the next year, and culminating in 1960's Swiss Family Robinson
Swiss Family Robinson (film)
Swiss Family Robinson is a 1960 American Technicolor feature film starring John Mills, Dorothy McGuire, and Sessue Hayakawa in a tale of a shipwrecked family building an island home. The screenplay by Lowell S. Hawley was loosely based upon the 1812 novel Der Schweizerische Robinson by Johann...
which involved transporting many exotic animals to a remote island in the West Indies.
Anthony Mann
Anthony Mann
Anthony Mann was an American actor and film director, most notably of film noirs and Westerns. As a director, he often collaborated with the cinematographer John Alton and with James Stewart in his Westerns.-Biography:...
specifically requested Canutt for Second Unit for his 1961 El Cid
El Cid (film)
El Cid is a historical epic film, a romanticized story of the life of the Christian Castilian knight Don Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar, called "El Cid" who in the 11th century fought the North African Almoravides and ultimately contributed to the unification of Spain.Made by Samuel Bronston Productions in...
, where Canutt directed sons Joe and Tap doubling for Charlton Heston
Charlton Heston
Charlton Heston was an American actor of film, theatre and television. Heston is known for heroic roles in films such as The Ten Commandments, Ben-Hur for which he won the Academy Award for Best Actor, El Cid, and Planet of the Apes...
and Christopher Rhodes
Christopher Rhodes
Sir Christopher George Rhodes, 3rd Baronet was an English film and television actor.-Early life:Rhodes was the only son of Sir John Rhodes, 2nd Baronet, and was educated at Eton College and Magdalen College, Oxford. During the Second World War he served with the Essex Regiment, reaching the rank...
in a stunning tournament joust. "Canutt was surely the most active stager of tournaments since the Middle Ages" – from Swordsmen of the Screen. He was determined to make the combat scenes in El Cid the best that had ever been filmed. Mann again requested him for 1964's The Fall of the Roman Empire
The Fall of the Roman Empire (film)
The Fall of the Roman Empire is a 1964 English-language epic film produced by Samuel Bronston Productions and the Rank Organisation, and released by Paramount Pictures. It was directed by Anthony Mann and produced by Samuel Bronston with Jaime Prades and Michal Waszynski as associate producers. The...
. Over the next ten years, Canutt would continue to work bringing his talents to Cat Ballou
Cat Ballou
Cat Ballou is a 1965 comedy/Western film which tells the story of a woman who hires a famous gunman to protect her father's ranch, and later to avenge his murder, but finds that the man she hires is not what she expected...
, Khartoum
Khartoum (film)
Khartoum is a 1966 film written by Robert Ardrey and directed by Basil Dearden. It stars Charlton Heston as General Gordon and Laurence Olivier as the Mahdi and is based on Gordon's defence of the Sudanese city of Khartoum from the forces of the Mahdist army during the Siege of Khartoum.Khartoum...
, Where Eagles Dare
Where Eagles Dare
Where Eagles Dare is a 1968 World War II action-adventure spy film starring Richard Burton, Clint Eastwood and Mary Ure. It was directed by Brian G. Hutton and shot on location in Upper Austria and Bavaria....
and 1970's A Man Called Horse.
For his contribution to the motion picture industry, Yakima Canutt has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame
Hollywood Walk of Fame
The Hollywood Walk of Fame consists of more than 2,400 five-pointed terrazzo and brass stars embedded in the sidewalks along fifteen blocks of Hollywood Boulevard and three blocks of Vine Street in Hollywood, California...
at 1500 Vine Street. In 1967, he was given an Honorary Academy Award for achievements as a stunt man and for developing safety devices to protect stunt men everywhere. He was inducted into the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum
National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum
The National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum is a museum in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, with more than 28,000 Western and American Indian art works and artifacts. The facility also has the world's most extensive collection of American rodeo, photographs, barbed wire, saddlery, and early rodeo trophies...
(Hall of Fame).
Yakima Canutt died of natural causes at the age of 90 in North Hollywood, California.
He is buried at Valhalla Memorial Park Cemetery
Valhalla Memorial Park Cemetery
Valhalla Memorial Park Cemetery is located at 10621 Victory Boulevard in North Hollywood, California.The cemetery has a special section called the Portal of the Folded Wings Shrine to Aviation that is the final resting place for a number of aviation pioneers — barnstormers, daredevils and...
there.
Selected filmography
- Stagecoach (1939) second unit director, uncredited; stunt coordinator, uncredited; uncredited - stunts/Cavalry scout
- IvanhoeIvanhoe (1952 film)Ivanhoe is a 1952 historical film made by MGM. It was directed by Richard Thorpe and produced by Pandro S. Berman. The cast featured Robert Taylor, Elizabeth Taylor, Joan Fontaine, George Sanders, Emlyn Williams, Finlay Currie and Felix Aylmer...
(1952) second unit director - Knights of the Round TableKnights of the Round Table (film)Knights of the Round Table is a 1953 Technicolor Cinemascope historical film made by MGM. Directed by Richard Thorpe and produced by Pandro S. Berman, it was the first film in Cinemascope made by that studio...
(1953) second unit director uncredited - King Richard and the CrusadersKing Richard and the CrusadersKing Richard and the Crusaders is a 1954 historical drama film made by Warner Bros.. It was directed by David Butler and produced by Henry Blanke from a screenplay by John Twist based on Sir Walter Scott's novel The Talisman. The music score was by Max Steiner and the cinematography by J. Peverell...
(1954) second unit director - Old YellerOld Yeller (1957 film)Old Yeller is a 1957 Walt Disney Productions film starring Tommy Kirk, Dorothy McGuire and Beverly Washburn, and directed by Robert Stevenson. It is about a boy and a stray dog in post-Civil War Texas. The story is based upon the 1956 Newbery Honor-winning book Old Yeller by Fred Gipson. Gipson...
(1957) second unit director - Ben-HurBen-Hur (1959 film)Ben-Hur is a 1959 American epic film directed by William Wyler and starring Charlton Heston in the title role, the third film adaptation of Lew Wallace's 1880 novel Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ. The screenplay was written by Karl Tunberg, Gore Vidal, and Christopher Fry. The score was composed by...
(1959) second unit director - Swiss Family RobinsonSwiss Family Robinson (film)Swiss Family Robinson is a 1960 American Technicolor feature film starring John Mills, Dorothy McGuire, and Sessue Hayakawa in a tale of a shipwrecked family building an island home. The screenplay by Lowell S. Hawley was loosely based upon the 1812 novel Der Schweizerische Robinson by Johann...
(1960) second unit director - El CidEl Cid (film)El Cid is a historical epic film, a romanticized story of the life of the Christian Castilian knight Don Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar, called "El Cid" who in the 11th century fought the North African Almoravides and ultimately contributed to the unification of Spain.Made by Samuel Bronston Productions in...
(1961) second unit director - The Fall of the Roman EmpireThe Fall of the Roman Empire (film)The Fall of the Roman Empire is a 1964 English-language epic film produced by Samuel Bronston Productions and the Rank Organisation, and released by Paramount Pictures. It was directed by Anthony Mann and produced by Samuel Bronston with Jaime Prades and Michal Waszynski as associate producers. The...
(1964) second unit director - Cat BallouCat BallouCat Ballou is a 1965 comedy/Western film which tells the story of a woman who hires a famous gunman to protect her father's ranch, and later to avenge his murder, but finds that the man she hires is not what she expected...
(1965) second unit director; executive in charge of production; uncredited stunt coordinator - KhartoumKhartoum (film)Khartoum is a 1966 film written by Robert Ardrey and directed by Basil Dearden. It stars Charlton Heston as General Gordon and Laurence Olivier as the Mahdi and is based on Gordon's defence of the Sudanese city of Khartoum from the forces of the Mahdist army during the Siege of Khartoum.Khartoum...
(1966) second unit director - Where Eagles DareWhere Eagles DareWhere Eagles Dare is a 1968 World War II action-adventure spy film starring Richard Burton, Clint Eastwood and Mary Ure. It was directed by Brian G. Hutton and shot on location in Upper Austria and Bavaria....
(1968) second unit director - A Man Called HorseA Man Called Horse (1970 film)A Man Called Horse is a 1970 American Western film starring Richard Harris and directed by Elliot Silverstein.-Plot:The film is based on a short story, "A Man Called Horse", published in 1968 in the book Indian Country by Dorothy M. Johnson...
(1970) second unit director
Film awards
- 1959 – National Board of Review of Motion PicturesNational Board of Review of Motion PicturesThe National Board of Review of Motion Pictures was founded in 1909 in New York City, just 13 years after the birth of cinema, to protest New York City Mayor George B. McClellan, Jr.'s revocation of moving-picture exhibition licenses on Christmas Eve 1908. The mayor believed that the new medium...
Special Citation shared with Andrew Marton for directing the chariot race in Ben-Hur - 1967 – Academy Honorary AwardAcademy Honorary AwardThe Academy Honorary Award, instituted in 1948 for the 21st Academy Awards , is given by the discretion of the Board of Governors of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to celebrate motion picture achievements that are not covered by existing Academy Awards, although prior winners of...
for achievements as a stunt man and for developing safety devices to protect stunt men everywhere - 1976 – Inducted into National Cowboy Hall of FameNational Cowboy & Western Heritage MuseumThe National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum is a museum in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, with more than 28,000 Western and American Indian art works and artifacts. The facility also has the world's most extensive collection of American rodeo, photographs, barbed wire, saddlery, and early rodeo trophies...
- 1978 – Academy of Motion Picture Arts and SciencesAcademy of Motion Picture Arts and SciencesThe Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is a professional honorary organization dedicated to the advancement of the arts and sciences of motion pictures...
"A tribute to Yakima Canutt" dinner - 1984 – The Motion Picture & Television FundMotion Picture & Television FundThe Motion Picture & Television Fund is a charitable organization that offers assistance and care to those in the motion picture and television industries with limited or no resources...
's Golden Boot AwardGolden Boot AwardsThe Golden Boot Awards honor actors, actresses, and crew members who have made significant contributions to the genre of Western television and movies. The award is sponsored and presented by the Motion Picture & Television Fund... - Hollywood Walk of FameHollywood Walk of FameThe Hollywood Walk of Fame consists of more than 2,400 five-pointed terrazzo and brass stars embedded in the sidewalks along fifteen blocks of Hollywood Boulevard and three blocks of Vine Street in Hollywood, California...
star at 1500 Vine Street.