Alec Baldwin kills crew member on set with "prop gun"

[Jeff S.]

There were previous AD/ND’s on set, as well as safety complaints. Those two facts dramatically change the circumstances from “freak movie set accident” to “pattern of unsafe conditions.”

The prosecutor, apparently, has communicated with other actors (not connected to Rust) who say they always check weapons themselves (which they should). And if you’re handed a gun on a set, as an actor, where there have already been accidental discharges, then any reasonable person would take extra precaution (not just trust a gun handed to you).

[camel]

There were previous AD/ND’s on set, as well as safety complaints. Those two facts dramatically change the circumstances from “freak movie set accident” to “pattern of unsafe conditions.”

The prosecutor, apparently, has communicated with other actors (not connected to Rust) who say they always check weapons themselves (which they should). And if you’re handed a gun on a set, as an actor, where there have already been accidental discharges, then any reasonable person would take extra precaution (not just trust a gun handed to you).

That is good gun handling. You do not get an excuse because someone told you it was.
Fucking bunch of dumb.

[camel]

There were previous AD/ND’s on set, as well as safety complaints. Those two facts dramatically change the circumstances from “freak movie set accident” to “pattern of unsafe conditions.”

The prosecutor, apparently, has communicated with other actors (not connected to Rust) who say they always check weapons themselves (which they should). And if you’re handed a gun on a set, as an actor, where there have already been accidental discharges, then any reasonable person would take extra precaution (not just trust a gun handed to you).

Sorry. But fuck about and find out.

[Maple Syrup Actual]

I don't know what Alec Baldwin's level of responsibility was as a producer; I don't know how "in charge" he was there and I don't know what buck stops with him because I don't know how the chain of command works in that industry.

As an actor, despite hating the guy, I would say "this either is or is not his fault, depending on what he was doing and what others expected."

If he was in a car driving scene, and got into a car that was on a dolly and did as instructed and the car came off the dolly and crushed someone, I'd say "not his fault."

If he got in the car, and between takes just decided on his own that he was going to jerk the wheel and mash the gas, and that's the reason the car came off the dolly, because he went off the reservation and did things against the instructions of whoever is in charge of the car, then it's on him.

So if they weren't expecting him to go spinning cylinders and firing into the camera or whatever, and he did that because he's got the attention span and discipline of a 2-year old (that part at least seems extremely likely to me) then he's on the hook. But if they were like "this is the gun, in the condition it's going to be used in, 30 seconds from now when we do this take, let's do a dry run" then no matter what kind of a POS the guy is, you can't really put it on him, because the gun was going to get fired for that shot, no matter what. The ammo was essentially a time bomb.

That said, I know 2 hollywood armourers and they both thought he was pretty culpable from day 1, and obviously they know a lot more about prop control and chain of command on a movie set than I do. They also both harshly criticized the gun handling protocols on that set but I don't really know who is ultimately responsible for that. I'd assume the armourer but I don't know if there's a system in which people above the armourer share responsibility because otherwise in theory you could hire an armourer who was a complete nutcase, and be insulated perfectly from the fallout, and that seems unlikely to me.

Anyway it strikes me that there's a lot of nuance here...like if the actual shot was going to be done with the camera controlled remotely because they have a policy of "don't shoot at cameras with people behind them even with a cold gun" or something, and therefore his actions were a deviation from some component of their protocols, that's on him. But if he followed all the instructions, it's not...unless the nature of the instructions is also partly his responsibility, in which case maybe it is again.



None of the above is about his legal status because I don't know anything about the laws covering this incident, I'm just talking about how I perceive his moral blameworthiness.

[ccmdfd]

That said, I know 2 hollywood armourers and they both thought he was pretty culpable from day 1, and obviously they know a lot more about prop control and chain of command on a movie set than I do.

I'd love for them to come out and get on the air and say what they have to say about this. Also specifically, are there any industry standards, rules that actors are supposed to follow regarding this.

[RoyGBiv]

As an actor, despite hating the guy, I would say "this either is or is not his fault, depending on what he was doing and what others expected."

If someone handed you a gun and told you it was filled with blanks, would you point it at a person and pull the trigger without checking?

I'm sure actors get complacent and there's a legit expectation that everyone is doing their job correctly. But....

1. Live ammo on set
2. Using the prop guns for live fire the night before
3. Not checking them or controlling the guns for live ammo the next day
*** Makes the armorer culpable for certain.

Baldwin.... ?? You make some good points pro and con...

Would be interesting to ask the LE and training professionals here whether they would/should be held responsible for failing to confirm that a sim weapon they were handed was actually filled with blank/sim rounds before firing it at someone... I don't recall anyone commenting specifically on this, but, it's an old thread... I've had only 1 similar hands on experience and most definitely checked down the magazine (and hoped that the guys shooting back at me did the same), but I can certainly see people getting complacent after many rounds of training.

[0ddl0t]

[Maple Syrup Actual]

If someone handed you a gun and told you it was filled with blanks, would you point it at a person and pull the trigger without checking?

I'm sure actors get complacent and there's a legit expectation that everyone is doing their job correctly. But....

1. Live ammo on set
2. Using the prop guns for live fire the night before
3. Not checking them or controlling the guns for live ammo the next day
*** Makes the armorer culpable for certain.

Baldwin.... ?? You make some good points pro and con...

Would be interesting to ask the LE and training professionals here whether they would/should be held responsible for failing to confirm that a sim weapon they were handed was actually filled with blank/sim rounds before firing it at someone... I don't recall anyone commenting specifically on this, but, it's an old thread... I've had only 1 similar hands on experience and most definitely checked down the magazine (and hoped that the guys shooting back at me did the same), but I can certainly see people getting complacent after many rounds of training.

Would I point it at someone and pull the trigger without checking it? No, probably not. But I'm not someone who's likely to have much difficulty discerning blanks, or bad handling practices. It means something entirely different to me when I see people handling guns badly than it does to most people.

I know people who've been in a bunch of movies and in most cases, if you said to one of them, "here's a prop gun, point it at the camera and pull the trigger" I guarantee they would do so. They're in no position to verify the ammo and for all I know, removing the ammo from a prop gun on set would itself be a safety violation because it would violate some kind of chain of custody protocol or something.

Clearly everyone responsible for the gun handling on this set failed, but I don't know to what degree an actor would be considered culpable, absent the producer status I heard this guy had on this movie.

If I got hired to be an actor and someone said, "okay, get in this car, it's rigged to stay still on this dyno roller so the engine spools up under load so when we tell you, you step on the gas" and then the dyno rollers locked up and the car launched across the set and crushed someone to death, would I be responsible because I hadn't cracked open the machine to see how it was going to keep the car in place etc? What if my 14 year old niece was the actor? Would she have been required to evaluate the machinery? What if the guy who set it up was in the habit of using the car for brake stands and launches in the lot behind the set at night? Would I know that? Would my niece know it? What did Alec Baldwin know?

Clearly major issues on set and maybe there's liability involved in hiring an incompetent armourer, but in and of itself, getting handed a prop gun they tell you is safe for the set, and following instructions on using it, and killing someone with it while acting in accordance with the express instructions of the people who control that stuff...no, to me that doesn't say "wrongdoing".

If he ignored instructions etc, obviously a pretty different story. I don't know anything about whether he did or didn't, so I don't really have an opinion on his actions. If it turns out he ignored warnings or was himself shooting these guns at night and had pockets half full of blanks and half full of bullets because this stuff was always getting ignored on set, then I would consider that some kind of negligent homicide, but I have no idea what his role there was or what he was aware of so I can't really fire up my torch/pitchfork combo despite the fact that he seems like the kind of guy I'd stick a torch or a pitchfork through just for being him.

[Maple Syrup Actual]

I'd love for them to come out and get on the air and say what they have to say about this. Also specifically, are there any industry standards, rules that actors are supposed to follow regarding this.

Yeah, I think they'd both like to be in a position to speak publicly about it - one started to post about it on his personal FB page but reined it in pretty fast. The other has only spoken privately about it but they both talked about the need to "cheat the shot" so you didn't have to point guns straight at camera operators, and the layers of redundancy and checking they were fanatical about...really just the obvious stuff we'd all probably insist on.

But I think speaking out publicly would be not great for career prospects, unfortunately.

[Joe in PNG]

Think of the absolute dumbest person you know. Got them in mind? Now drop a lot of IQ points. That's your actors. Okay, now hand them a prop gun that is going to be pointed at you, with them pulling the trigger.

Do you trust them to be able to actually check if the gun is loaded for reals, loaded with blanks, or loaded with dummies? Do you trust them to do the thing where they drop the mag, THEN run the action in the proper order, and properly check that the chamber is clear? Or even trust them to do the thing with the thing and not lock the gun up hard and tight so you have to spend a lot of expensive filming time getting the gun to run again?