Mick Dillon; stunt double for Buster Keaton & Ringo
Hyfler/Rosner
(Filed: 19/08/2006) Telegraph
Mick Dillon, who has died aged 80, was a jockey, stunt
man and actor, and the only man to "double" for Buster
Keaton.
Keaton insisted on doing all his own stunt work, but
by the time he was on location in Spain for A Funny Thing
Happened On The Way To The Forum (1966), which also featured
Phil Silvers and Michael Crawford, he was old and frail, and
the job of running through a wood in the middle of a chariot
race was beyond him. Dillon took his place, and was promptly
knocked over by a chariot in rehearsals. Keaton died just
months later.
Danger was a staple of Dillon's work. In the Beatles'
film Help! (1965) he doubled for Ringo Starr, first
disappearing through a hole in a stage while playing a drum
kit and then hanging by one boot from a skilift. In the Bond
movie You Only Live Twice (1967) Dillon slid down a rope
into a mock volcano; for The Charge of The Light Brigade
(1968) he fell off a horse in place of David Hemmings. In an
episode of The Goodies he walked along the top of a
double-decker bus doubling for a "sleep-walking" Bill Oddie.
Dillon broke a collar-bone crashing through the wing
of a steeplechase fence in Dead Cert (1974), but this was a
minor inconvenience compared to the injury he suffered when
he fell out of a vintage racing car rounding a hairpin bend
for Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (1968) - on that occasion he
fractured his skull.
Michael Patrick Dillon was born on June 15 1926 at
Epsom, Surrey, the son of a head lad in a racing stable. His
grandfather, Patsy Dillon, was a racehorse trainer at
Tralee, Co Kerry, whose methods were far from conventional.
He used to put his apprentices on yearlings and tie their
legs together underneath the horse; if the boys fell off,
they would be thrashed.
All Patsy's sons were sent to be apprenticed in
England, and two of Mick's uncles went on to become
top-class jockeys. Bernard won the 1910 Derby on Lemberg,
but is probably best remembered for his tempestuous marriage
to the music hall star Marie Lloyd. Joe, meanwhile, won the
1903 Irish Derby on Lord Rossmore when he was only 15, and
rode in four Grand Nationals.
Mick Dillon was educated at Lintons Lane Secondary
School, Epsom, where he became head boy. Given his
background, however, he was always destined to go into
racing, and he began riding out for Bobby Dick in 1936; he
was later apprenticed to Cecil Ray and Johnny Dines. The
abiding memory of his first ride in public, at Nottingham in
April 1941 as a 14-year-old, was a voice from behind in the
29-runner field shouting: "Put that whip down, you bloody
little fool!" This was the soon-to-be-crowned champion
jockey, Harry Wragg.
Dillon joined the RAF in June 1944, but on the day he
was called up his father, Jack, insisted that he go to
Stockton to ride a mare called Lady Electra, who duly won.
The air commodore must have been a racing man, for Dillon
escaped punishment when he arrived a day late.
His increasing weight caused Dillon to turn to
National Hunt racing, and he was still riding jumpers in the
late 1950s, when the world of films offered a new career.
Jockeys were wanted for a starting gate scene in the Norman
Wisdom film Just My Luck (1957), and Dillon was soon on the
stunt register of Equity.
He shared shifts with two other stunt men inside Gorgo
(1961), a disgruntled monster from the deep that emerged
from the river Thames and proceeded to trample all over some
of the capital's most famous landmarks. Dillon also appeared
in an ill-fitting plant mutation costume (it barely
concealed the carpet-slippers worn to eliminate the sound of
footsteps) in The Day of The Triffids (1963), and was inside
a Dalek that disappeared down a lift shaft in Dr Who and the
Daleks (1965).
In the Royal Ballet's adaptation of Tales of Beatrix
Potter in 1974 it was Dillon, not the dancer Michael
Coleman, who received a dunking when Jeremy Fisher was
yanked off a giant lily-pad as he tried to land a fish.
As an actor, Dillon seemed uncomfortable with the
script when he took a leading role as a racehorse trainer in
the BBC's children's series Jockey School in 1982. He was,
though, much more at ease in BBC2's racing drama Whip Hand
(1974). The director, Les Blair, let the actors choose the
words; and Dillon was, according to one reviewer,
"absolutely confident and convincing as the head lad".
Dillon later worked as a starting stalls handler on
racecourses until his retirement in 1986.
Mick Dillon died on July 23. He married, in 1948,
Brenda Freeman; she died in 2001, and he is survived by
their two daughters and one son.
King Daevid MacKenzie
> Mick Dillon
> (Filed: 19/08/2006) Telegraph
>
>
>
> Mick Dillon, who has died aged 80, was a jockey, stunt
> man and actor, and the only man to "double" for Buster
> Keaton.
...I assume James Neibaur can correct me on this if I'm wrong, but I'm
fairly sure Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer forced Keaton to use stunt doubles
during his time there in the late '20s and early '30s, and I thought
there was an indication in an episode of "Hollywood" that for one
particularly dangerous gag on one of his earlier films as an independent
director Keaton was forced to use a stunt double by the insurance
company covering his productions...
--
King Daevid MacKenzie, WLSU-FM 88.9 La Crosse, Wisconsin, USA
heard Sundays 8:00 A.M. PST/PDT over KRFP-LP 92.5 Moscow, Idaho and at
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"You can live in your dreams, but only if you are worthy of them."
HARLAN ELLISON
chaptal
room. Buster couldn't get it right so a pole vaulter from UCLA had to be
brought in.
Ed
"Hyfler/Rosner" <rel...@rcn.com> wrote in message
news:9sOdnQ1pyZl-OXvZ...@rcn.net...
tr...@iwvisp.com
What an entertaining subject line.
Stunt Double for Buster Keaton and Ringo!
Ray Arthur