The Fall Guy Director David Leitch Reveals The Most Memorable Stunt In His Career

The Fall Guy is a love letter to stuntman and Hollywood inspired by the 1980s television series of the same name. Colt Seavers (Ryan Gosling) left the world of filmmaking after a devastating injury. However, an opportunity to work with Jody Moreno (Emily Blunt) with her directorial debut, offers him a chance to rekindle his career and the love they once had. Performing death-defying stunts every day while also investigating the strange disappearance of the lead of Jody’s movie (Aaron Taylor-Johnson), Colt stumbles across a criminal conspiracy that puts him in even more danger than the stunts he performs.

Ryan Gosling shows off all his skills as an actor in The Fall Guy, while Emily Blunt brings charm, charisma, and comedy to her role as well. David Leitch has become a notable director due to his story-driven, innovative stunt work. The Fall Guy was an opportunity for him to not only play in multiple genres but also highlight the stuntmen and how integral they are to Hollywood, along with his own career from stuntman to director.

Screen Rant interviewed The Fall Guy director David Leitch. He explained how Gosling was instrumental in shaping not just his character, but the trajectory of the movie as a whole. Leitch also contemplated which movie had the most memorable stunt work in his career and the possibility of returning to the Power Rangers and bringing his skills as an action director.

“Ryan Was Completely Influential In Shaping This Character” Revealed David Leitch

Leitch revealed how Gosling influenced the direction of his The Fall Guy character due to his desire to show off all his skills as an actor, including his romance, comedy, and action chops. Gosling was instrumental on set as the lead of the movie and in the development process of the character he embodies, becoming a close collaborator with Leitch from start to finish.

David Leitch: Ryan was completely influential in shaping this character. He came on early in the development process, the only actor we went to. And we had a conversation early on that was like, “Hey man, I’m good at romance. Have you seen The Notebook? And I did The Nice Guys, I can be funny. I just did this thing called Gray Man. I sort of dipped my toe into action, but I’d love to make The Fall Guy sort of something where I can do all of that stuff and really have fun with all of my skill sets.”

And so, from the development phase, he was really influential in creating this character, and even scene for scene all the way up to shooting, even into post, we were close collaborators on this project.

Letich re-teamed with writer Drew Pearce, with whom he collaborated on Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw, and continues his longstanding collaboration with Kelly McCormick, a talented producer who also happens to be Letich’s wife. Letich discussed the evolution of The Fall Guy story, including how Gosling’s influence shifted the plot from a noir into a more action-oriented romantic comedy, highlighting the importance of the collaborative process.

David Leitch: It’s funny, it started out as a noir, and we were going to do sort of an LA noir, but I think Ryan influenced Kelly McCormick, and [so did] our creative producer and Emily. There were a lot of influences, but we kept leaning more into fun. Ryan brought up the romance. Kelly was working on Emily’s character to take her from makeup artist to director.

The noirish investigation fell off, and we’re starting to lean into this rom-com as we’re developing the script in this sort of collaborative bubble. We just started to lean into the fun and what a beautiful experience it is to make movies and how we spread that joy in this film, so it was like fun choices overrode everything else we could make.

David Leitch Thinks Power Rangers “Could Be A Really Fun World” To Play In As A Director

David Leitch is not only a prominent stuntman turned director, he’s also been in front of the camera as an actor, starting with Power Rangers Light Speed Rescue. Power Rangers is being revamped as an IP after the 2017 movie failed to gain traction, and Leitch could be the perfect director to bring the world to audiences with his ability to not only pull off innovative action but make it character and story-driven, which is at the heart of Power Rangers and the prominent martial arts element of the beloved kids show.

David Leitch: Wow. Yeah, I played Brian, a troubled teen who got possessed, I think, on Power Rangers. So you have to go way back to see mine. I fought Mike Chat, though. It’s a fun fight scene. That being said, I’ll never say never. I think that it could be a really fun world, and it’d be fun to update that. I know that they are, I’m sure that IP is out there and there’s people developing it. So give me a call.

Leitch also reflected on his time as a stuntman and which movie had some of his most memorable stunt work. He explained why The Bourne Ultimatum stands out to him, so much so that he included a clip of it in The Fall Guy. Leitch revealed that The Bourne Ultimatum was also an important step in his journey from stunt performer to director.

David Leitch: Wow, there were so many memorable stunts. I think working with Gary Powell on Bourne Ultimatum. There were a lot of great performers in that movie, but it was a really formidable time. I was ratcheted into a car. I got off the plane, literally drove to the set, was hooked up to a ratchet, the car explodes in front of my face, and it slams me into the car. You see a little clip of it in The Fall Guy at the beginning of the movie.

So working with Gary on that was an interesting time. I was sort of dovetailing into second unit directing, but I was watching him have his real moment and doing some innovative stuff from Casino Royale into Bourne Ultimatum. And so I think that was a really great time in my career, that movie.

About The Fall Guy

He’s a stuntman, and like everyone in the stunt community, he gets blown up, shot, crashed, thrown through windows and dropped from the highest of heights, all for our entertainment. And now, fresh off an almost career-ending accident, this working-class hero has to track down a missing movie star, solve a conspiracy and try to win back the love of his life while still doing his day job. What could possibly go right?

Check out our other interviews here:

• Ryan Gosling & Emily Blunt
• Winston Duke, Stephanie Hsu & Hannah Waddingham

Source: Screen Rant Plus