Behind The Stunts
CANDY The Stunts as Performed by Ian Van Temperley & Andy Godbold
Jon Auty 1/8/2013
The latest single from Robbie Williams tells the story of a guardian angel who is trying to protect a pretty girl. His character, wearing a pink suit, can’t be seen by the young lady and he does everything he can to get her attention, but to no avail. The video was directed by Joseph Kahn who has directed videos for many top recording stars over the last ten years including George Michael, Chris Brown, Kelly Clarkson, The Pussycat Dolls and two award winning videos for Britney Spears. The story of Candy calls for Robbie to undertake many action scenes. For this British Stunt Coordinator Ian Van Temperley was called in to not only supervise the set pieces, but also to perform the stunts on Robbie’s behalf.
It is safe to say that Ian earns every penny of his fee on this shoot which took place over two days in August 2012 in the Spitalfields Market area of London.
Robbie starts his video trying to keep the girl, Candy, safe and sound. She is played by actress Kaya Scodelario who had previously starred in the TV series Skins. A defenceless old dear and her husband stroll along the pavement and find themselves in the path of an oncoming Robbie who punches the lady in the face‌as you do. Then a car is seen approaching at speed. Robbie jumps onto the bonnet and is knocked down. Ian performs the stunt and really takes a beating. Arriving at an angle he approaches from the driver’s side and leaves via the passenger door area.
The impact throws him over the passenger door area and dumps him on the road. A very fine knockdown.
Here we see some shots as Ian rehearses his knockdown with another vehicle.
You can clearly see the padding on his arm as the initial impact is punishing. A knockdown of this nature is usually performed between 20 – 25mph and the final shots were very possibly a touch faster. As seen below.
The end result is an excellent knockdown, beautifully performed and nicely edited giving the audience the impression that Robbie is doing the stunt himself…another job well done. But that was only the start of it. Up next a highfall.
Sitting atop the Halifax Building Society in Spittalfields in London, stuntman Ian Van Temperley checks out the landing area for his fall.
An assistant holds Ian’s legs as he gets up onto the edge of the building just before getting action from the director. He keeps his eye on the target as he falls and hits the box rig with perfect accuracy.
This photograph, taken by someone visiting the set, shows the fall and the size of the box rig. Plenty of boxes and mats placed on top for support. A shot does appear in the video from the roof, but no photographs are available. The final edit shows Ian passing through shot and ending up as Robbie sat at a table outside a coffee shop with Candy who is updating her status…as you do. Many high falls these days use airbags, but the height of this fall allows for a smaller landing area. Box rigs were the stable diet of stunt professionals throughout the sixties and seventies and only falls over a hundred feet we considered ‘air-bag’ material. In 1983 stuntman Mike Potter fell 80ft into a box rig no bigger than the one pictured here.
Now we should consider our next stuntman in this video. Mr Andy Godbold. Andy is our bike specialist and for this video he can be seen riding a bike that hits Robbie’s angel and is thrown off his bike into a pile of wooden pallets. The pallets were created digitally, but the fall was done for real.
As we can see from these on set photos Andy rides his bike into the crash mat and flips over. The bike flips and could hit him in the face so he must be aware of the bikes position at all times. Andy is also seen in another section of the video.
Andy can be seen here in the yellow top taking part in a series of scuffles in the street with Robbie in the thick of the action. Now the major stunt in the video takes its pride of place. The other stunts, all very exciting and very challenging, but the next is extremely dangerous and visually stunning.
Robbie bursts into flames and he dances across the road. Something that could have been done in post-production, but it just wouldn’t have worked. So Ian Van Temperley steps up and performs a dancing full body burn.
Robbie is filmed doing his dance steps across the road as Candice, oblivious to what he is having to put himself through, walks on ahead. Everything needs to be timed to fit in with the steps. Andy realised this and worked in the high arm swing to create a swaggering march.
Dressed in the unmistakable pink suit, Ian strides across the road. Flames 3ft above his head, his body engulfed in flame. He crosses the road, walks along the pavement, drops to his knees and then flat on his belly. This is the signal for his team to come in and put him out. Absolutely stunning.