Topic: Present-Day Actress Joins The Moe Howard Break-A-Rib Club

[Pilsner Panther]

Doing physical stunts is still dangerous stuff:

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/01/10/theater/10wicked.html?oref=login&th

I've never even heard of Idina Menzel before, but she deserves a sincere tip of the "doiby" for working this hard to entertain an audience. She just joined the great pantheon of injured comic actors:

Moe Howard: Broken rib, eye injury.

Curly Howard: Broken leg, and general injuries which probably contributed to his series of strokes.

Red Skelton: Ruptured diaphragm, after taking a hard pratfall on his TV show.

Buster Keaton: Broken neck,[/i] from doing a stunt where he fell off the back of a moving train— which he didn't even notice at the time! It was years later when he went to his doctor for a check-up and an X-ray, and the doctor asked him, "When did you break your neck?" It was clearly visible on the X-ray.

Harold Lloyd: Two fingers blown off his left hand by a "prop" bomb that turned out to be a real one. Afterwards, he always wore a prosthetic hand on camera to disguise the injury.

There are others, I'm sure... who ever said that doing physical comedy is  easy?

 

[Watts Dee Matter]

I know how that is, me and a couple pals do small comedy acts, and as with the three stooges along with many other like comedics, there is always a chance of getting hurt, and if you don't have stunt doubles you have to do it yourself. I have broken my wrist falling backwards before doing a fun stunt. I was pushed backwards off a chair, and to prevent hitting the back of my head, i put my hand back and thats the end of that.    But when people are watching you, you have to continue the skit, you never want the viewer to know if you have gotten hurt. If they do know you have gotten hurt, they wont laugh, and it will turn into a serious event, rather a funny event.