A real bullet was in the pistol held out to Alec Baldwin on the set of the film "Rust" when, believing to repeat a scene Thursday, he shot the director of photography Halyna Hutchins and injured the director Joël Souza. According to the search warrant application filed by the Santa Fe County Sheriff's Office, to which the Associated Press had access, the cast and crew were preparing to rehearse a scene inside of the wooden chapel in the western settings of Bonanza Creek, near Santa Fe, New Mexico. The assistant director, Dave Halls, got out to walk towards the cart prepared by the gunsmith of the set, on which were three weapons. He grabbed a propeller pistol before entering the chapel.
"Cold gun," he is said to have said aloud to the middle of the team as he handed the gun to Alec Baldwin, an expression used to say that the gun was safe since it was not loaded with live ammunition.
The warrant also states that, according to initial investigations, Dave Halls was unaware that the gun was not loaded with blank bullets.
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"Only one live bullet was accidentally fired on the set by the main actor," said in an email sent to its members, Local 44, a union linked to the IATSE which represents 150,000 professionals in the trades. show, revealed by the Los Angeles Times. Joël Souza was behind Halyna Hutchins, so he would have been injured in the collarbone by the bullet which killed his director of photography.
Who loaded the gun with this live bullet? And why ? This is the central question on which the investigations will focus. Understanding the atmosphere of the shoot could be decisive. In the days leading up to the shooting, members of the film's technical crew complained about working conditions and being poorly paid by the production. Some who resigned were replaced by non-union workers, according to The Hollywood Reporter. According to the Los Angeles Times, several "accidental shootings" would have taken place in the previous weeks, without knowing whether these incidents involved real bullets or empty cartridges. These two elements put together, "there was a serious lack of risk reduction meetings", relates a source close to the film crew, wishing to remain anonymous,in the LA Times.
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Alec Baldwin accidentally kills woman on set in western