Following the tragic shooting death of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins on the set of the Alec Baldwin film Rust in New Mexico last month, actor Dwayne Johnson is joining a chorus of other Hollywood professionals who are now vowing to never use real guns on movie sets again.
While promoting his latest film Red Notice, the former wrestler explained that he is now pledging to only use rubber guns on all projects from his production company.
The actor stated in a recent interview with Variety that his Seven Bucks Productions company “won’t use real guns at all” for any movie, television show, or other projects. He went on to state the gun effects would be taken care of in post-production for future projects, of which the CGI expertise in the movie industry is probably adequate to pull off without a hitch.
“I can’t speak for anyone else, but I can tell you, without an absence of clarity here, that any movie that we have moving forward with Seven Bucks Productions — any movie, any television show, or anything we do or produce — we won’t use real guns at all … We’re going to switch over to rubber guns, and we’re going to take care of it in post … We’re not going to worry about the dollars; we won’t worry about what it costs,” Johnson said.
This follows after The Boys showrunner Eric Kripke pledged to not use prop guns firing blanks and going the CGI-constructed muzzle flash route instead. Others have joined Kirpke’s call to do the same, such as The Boys VFX supervisor Stephan Fleet saying costume-made fake guns utilizing artificial kick back, vapor smoke and an LED flash light should be developed. The Boys star Jack Quaid, Supernatural‘s Conner Tracey, and The Sandman creator Neil Gaiman also voiced support for the change.
The incident that resulted in Hutchin’s death also injured Rust director Joel Souza, though he has since left the hospital. The investigation is still ongoing for the incident, in which Baldwin reportedly discharged a prop gun loaded with live ammo, despite being told by the film’s assistant director it was “cold” or safe to use.
Production for Rust has halted indefinitely.