Clive Curtis

Clive Curtis (born before 1957) is a British stuntman , second unit director, actor and weightlifter .

Life

Curtis, who comes from an African-American family, after studying the optometry first (Ophthalmology) as optician and worked in his spare time as a wrestler and weightlifter , where he mainly in the latter discipline - he was eight consecutive British champion in weightlifting - was successful. He gave up his original idea of ​​entering the film business as an actor after he concluded that he was too introverted to act in front of a large audience. Instead, he began training as a stuntman. When he started stunt work in 1975, he was the first black man to practice the profession in Great Britain. After a successful career as a stuntman, Curtis also took on the duties of stunt coordinator from 1983.

The long list of films in which Curtis has worked as an acting stuntman or later also as a stunt coordinator in the past thirty years includes the comic book adaptations Superman II - Alone Against All (1980) and Superman III - The Steel Lightning (1983 ), as well as Batman (1989), the horror film American Werewolf (1983), the anti-utopia Brazil (1985), the science fiction film Aliens - The Return (1986), the anti-war film Good Morning, Vietnam (1987), which took place in the Middle Ages playing epic Robin Hood - King of Thieves , the cheerful romance Four Weddings and a Death (1994), the agent parodies Spies wie wir (1985) and Agent Null Null Nix (1997), the computer game adaptation Tomb Raider , as well as various films from the series around the James Bond secret agents for whom Curtis routinely worked in the 1970s and 1980s, including James Bond 007 - The Spy Who Loved Me (1977), James Bond 007 - On A Deadly Mission (1981), Never Say Never (1983), Yes mes Bond 007 - Octopussy (1983) and James Bond 007 - In the Face of Death (1985).

Curtis, who in addition to wrestling is also a master of boxing, as well as judo and the Far Eastern martial arts , does not only work as a stuntman, but also doubles for regular actors - especially in diving, riding, falling and fighting scenes of all kinds, such as fencing or hand-to-hand combat - as well as jobs as stunt drivers in motor vehicles. Perhaps the most famous stunt scene in which Curtis doubles as a famous actor can be seen in the epic Robin Hood - King of Thieves from 1991: There Curtis "represents" actor Morgan Freeman in the role of Mooren Azeem in a fast-paced setting , in which Azeem and title hero Robin Hood (Kevin Costner) are catapulted over the defensive wall of the castle of the wicked Sheriff of Nottingham and land on a haystack in the courtyard of the castle.

As an actor, Curtis took usually very small roles, of which a henchman of the villain Joker in Tim Burton's the 1989 blockbuster Batman is probably the most famous: In this role, Curtis delivers with the title character of the film (in the IMDB as a thug in bellfry listed ) a brutal duel in the belfry of a Gothic cathedral, which only comes to an end when it falls into the depths of the church tower shaft.

Curtis has worked with directors including James Cameron , Ridley Scott , Barry Levinson , Kevin Reynolds , Tim Burton and Richard Donner and has worked with prominent actors such as Roger Moore , Robin Williams , Kevin Costner , Christopher Reeve , Jack Nicholson , Gene Hackman , Dan Aykroyd , Sean Connery and Bill Murray stood on the set .

Curtis' most recent projects are the films Red Road (2006) and Wish (2007).

Web links

• Clive Curtis in theInternet Movie Database(English)
• Clive Curtis