Images credited to official stills photographer Jasin Boland
With the imminent release of Mad Max: Fury Road, we’ve been dying to know just how mad the behind-the-scenes action was. Turns out, husband and wife stunt performers Dane and Dayna Grant, owners of the New Zealand Stunt School, both played vital parts in director George Miller’s post-apocalyptic action movie.
Dane kindly got in touch with us, so we posed him a few questions about the realities of being a Mad Max: Fury Road stuntie.
FLICKS: What were your roles on ‘Mad Max: Fury Road’?
DANE GRANT: Dayna was hired as the Furiosa Stunt Double which was played by Charlize Theron, whereas I was initially brought on as one of the stunt Warboys with a few different characters. As the film progressed, I was presented with a few amazing extra opportunities where I ended up driving a number of the vehicles and got to rehearse two of the main fight sequences as the lead character, Max.
Incidentally, it was during that rehearsal role that I got to meet my wife, Dayna.
How many stunt performers were a part of ‘Mad Max: Fury Road’, and how many were from your school?
There were hundreds of stunties involved in this film over the years from around the world. As this is an Aussie film, majority of them were from Australia. Apart from Dayna and I, there was one other representation of the NZ Stunt School – one of the school’s first students, Genevieve Aitken, joined the stunt team to double Megan Gale.
This movie looks insane, and I can only assume that professionally insane people would be needed to pull off these incredible stunts. Can you describe the craziest stunt you each had to perform?
Dayna had many insane stunt gags. Some of which involved climbing around the underneath of a moving truck and another hanging out the door of the truck while a huge car crash/explosion happened merely feet away.
I had a few crazy moments as both passenger in the back of a ramping ute literally holding on for life, and behind the wheel driving in a sandstorm with extremely limited vision.
Are there many action sequences in ‘Mad Max: Fury Road’ that rely on computer-generated imagery?
According to George Miller, there’s only the one sequence involving a storm that had to be CGI for obvious reasons. Other than that, it’s all practical stunts for real.
We were basically doing a live theatre show on a moving stage every day for months, just without the live audience.
If a critic were to call one if your stunts in the film “An incredible piece of CGI”, would you take that as an insult or a compliment?
As there aren’t any CGI stunts, we’re safe from having to deal with that insult. Haha.
What kind of training is required to be a stunt performer on ‘Mad Max: Fury Road’?
To start off with, the stunt coordinator held five hour long physical auditions just to select the stunt team. Then an intense bootcamp took place, thereafter it was a rigorous training regime matched up with a strict diet (the stunt performers ate separate food to the rest of the crew throughout filming). The characters had to look the part of being stuck out in this apocolyptic wasteland, yet had to be incredibly strong to defend what little they had in their world.
If there’s one other movie sequel – whether or not it’s actually happening – that you both would love to be a part of, what would it be?
No doubt the next Mad Max.
‘Mad Max: Fury Road’ hits cinemas this Thursday (click here for your cinema’s session times)
