Film and TV propmasters — and in particular, the armorers who handle on-set guns and other weapons — remain stunned and baffled by what happened on the Santa Fe set of “Rust,” leading to the death …
. Their early consensus: A combination of low budgets, overworked and inexperienced crewmembers and a sloppy lack of following protocol led to a tragedy that could have been prevented.
Merrick said trained armorers teach the “three golden rules” of gun handling, and it’s the same on a range as it is on a movie set: “You always treat a gun as if it’s loaded. You never point a gun at another person, and you always keep your finger off the trigger until you’re absolutely ready to fire. In a scene like happened in New Mexico, I can’t speak to all of it until the investigation comes through. But what’s evident is that a gun was pointed at a person and the trigger was pulled.
“The types of firearms used in the filming of ‘Rust,’ because it is set in the Old West, are what are called ‘single action,’” Corrie said. “They require a manual mechanical operation to bring each round into firing position. Much in the same way that a pump action shotgun requires the pumping action to bring a shotgun shell into battery for it to fire, the revolvers of that period, requiring the cocking of a hammer which rotated a cylinder, which placed around into firing position.
Those safety procedures “were completely and utterly ignored,” Corrie said. “And in any industry when you ignore safety procedures or cut corners on those safety procedures, people end up getting hurt.” “I really need to reiterate that the actors have a focus on their dialogue and their emotion and where they got to stand on their lighting and how to react to the other actor,” Merrick said. “Their head is full. And in order for an actor to be fully vested in a performance, they need to have competence in their surroundings.
“My guess is that this is a young kid in over their head,” he said. “Here’s an opportunity to work on a big Hollywood film. And who knows, they may be handed equipment they’re not familiar with. Here’s an old western gun opening, great, I’ll figure it out. Why there was live ammunition on set, I cannot tell you, there never should have been.”
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