Bobby is a 28 year old Stuntman and has been doing stunts in movies since the
beginning of 2008. He has performed in such blockbuster action films as "Batman:
The Dark Knight Rises", "Quantum of Solace", "Harry Potter", "Pirates of the
Caribbean", "Sherlock Holmes", "Captain America", "Robin Hood", the Oscar winning
"Inception", "Skyfall" and "Thor" to name but a few. This has involved being a stunt
double for the likes of Chris Hemsworth, Christian Bale, Daniel Craig, Ryan
Reynolds, and Jake Gyllenhaal.
At the tender age of four, Bobby started his career as a Gymnast, and climbed
through the ranks to compete as a National Squad Member and National Gold
Medallist for Great Britain. Bobby competed and also won gold medals in countries
such as France, Russia, United States of America, and training camps in the
Ukraine.
Bobby retired from Gymnastics at 17 and turned his attention to football, quickly
becoming a semi-professional footballer for Fareham Town FC at the age of 19.
With his huge appetite for performing unabated, he started to perform in Live
Action Shows, Pantomimes, various TV Shows and worldwide modelling campaigns
& commercials for K-Swiss trainers, Adidas, Pepsi, Joop aftershave and many more.
Some of these jobs found Bobby doubling Steven Gerrard, Fernando Torres, and
David Beckham before he decided to become a professional Stunt Performer.
Bobby then trained in all the disciplines needed to achieve the goal of becoming a
Stuntman, which took the best part of 4 years (training full time). This meant
qualifying in skills such as Kickboxing, Swimming, and 10m High Diving,
Gymnastics, Trampolining, and Scuba Diving.
Since then Bobby has performed in 22 full feature movies, alongside such
luminaries as Natalie Portman, Sir Anthony Hopkins, Morgan Freeman, Michael
Caine, Gary Oldman, Samuel L Jackson, Jonny Depp, Leonardo di Caprio, Sir Ben
Kingsley, Geoffrey Rush, Tom hanks, Angelina Jolie, Judy Dench and for directing
greats like Chris Nolan, Steven Spielberg, Paul Greengrass and Ridley Scott. His
career has seen Bobby winning 2 SAG Awards for "Inception" and "Harry Potter the
Deathly Hollows", with 2 further SAG 2013 nominations for "The Dark Knight Rises"
and "Skyfall". Bobby has also received 2 Taurus World Stunt Award nominations for
"Quantum of Solace" and "the Prince of Persia the Sands of Time", and a 2009
Guinness World Record for the most targets hit with a back somersault throw in
one hour.
Here Bobby tackles a new challenge. Promoting a new car. The Ford B-Max. The
tagline for the commercial is ‘Life Is An Open Door’ which is exactly what Bobby
will be diving through in order to capture the moment.
The promo is being directed by non-other than veteran James Bond director Martin
Campbell. The man who gave us Pierce Brosnan as Bond in Goldeneye and saved
the franchise and the man who returned to save it again with Daniel Craig in
Casino Royale. The shooting location is Barcelona and Bobby is under the watchful
eye of stunt co-ordinator Tom Struthers.
The idea is that Bobby climbs up onto the diving board, looks down and sees the
car suspended below him. The doors open, he dives through the car, into the pool!
Now the mathematics has to be applied to this to give it a sense of realism. If he
dives in the glorious swan like fashion he adopts at the top of the board he’ll hit
the car and probably kill himself. So a mechanism was created allowing him to dive
straight and true every time…wind prevailing that is.
Attached by his ankles he assumes the dive position and holds this straight dive
pose as a crane lowers him, at a fair speed equivalent to dive pace, through the
car and into the pool. This is all well and good is the breeze is on your side. The
slightest gust could cause enough movement to throw you into the side of the
vehicle and cause considerable damage…if not worse. So every possibility is taken
into consideration before action is called.
This is Bobby’s view as he looks from the top of the board. An incredible thing to
be asked to do and all to promote a new car. The things we do for an honest buck
eh?
After half a dozen takes at various speeds the shoot is complete and Bobby can
relax.
The finished product is a slick advertising campaign. In adverts like these the car is
always the star, but as we can see from the hard work and determination that
Bobby had put in he is able to take his fair share of the limelight.
Undeniably at the top of his game Bobby continues to push the envelope when it
comes to challenging stunt work. His credits speak for themselves, everyone a
box office smash and each outing gives a new generation of movie goer the rush
of adrenaline similar to the rush he gets from performing.
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