Kiwi stunt woman dares to be dangerous

For someone who relies on her body to be fit, strong and cut, that greasy, glistening breakfast doesn't look too healthy.

Bacon, sausages, toast, tomatoes and two types of eggs - scrambled and eggs benny - are piled on the plate of New Zealand stunt woman Zoe Bell. She's just jokingly asked the waitress at Auckland's Heritage Hotel if she can put the beers from last night on the breakfast tab as well. The waitress doesn't answer.

Across the room All Black coach Graham Henry is silently stuffing his face, and players Rico Gear, Jerry Collins and others, trickle in for brekkie.

Oblivious to the sports stars nearby, Bell is chowing down, chatting, and every now and then cussing, which brings a series of disapproving looks from nearby tables.

Bell is rough and ready. That goes with her job - throwing herself off 15m high platforms, being set on fire, kicking ass, and being a stunt double for Uma Thurman in Kill Bill.

But this 23-year-old stuntwoman, who, as an 18-year-old, made her name as the lead stunt double for Lucy Lawless on Xena, is also professional, friendly, and bloody funny.

Bell, who now lives in Los Angeles, is back in New Zealand to promote the documentary Double Dare, which screens at the Auckland International Film Festival from July 8 to 24.

The documentary follows Bell's life - from her beginnings on Xena, to Hollywood, to landing her breakthrough, the role in Quentin Tarantino's Kill Bill.

Interwoven with Bell's story is the life of veteran stuntwoman Jeannie Epper (she played actress Lynda Carter's double in Wonder Woman). Epper is in her mid-60s and still working in Hollywood's notoriously macho stunt industry.

The two women come from very different backgrounds. Epper's family is the most famous stunt family in Hollywood, while Bell grew up as a sports-crazed, trampoline-addicted youngster on Waiheke Island, who just happened on the fact you can make a living out of doing stunts.

"You know, when you're little," says Bell, "and you talk about what you wanna be. I never had one of those.

"The only thing I ever said was if someone could pay me to do sports. And that's what I'm doing. That gives me goose bumps. How many people get to do that?"

Despite the age gap and their different upbringings, when Bell moved to the United States a couple of years ago she and Epper became great friends. "I love that chick. I instantly felt like I was at a pyjama party, like we were both 16 again," she says of staying at Epper's house.

The young New Zealander had heard many a Hollywood horror story but thanks to Epper's experience and her standing in the industry she helped Bell to establish herself in LA.

"She helped me in terms of less about how to be a stuntwoman, and more about how to be a woman in Hollywood. The fact that if she hadn't dealt with a certain amount of shit in her time, I'd probably still be dealing with it. So thanks, Jeannie."

Surprisingly, Bell is no thrillseeker. Stunts are a science, despite the guts and bravado it takes to pull them off, she says seriously.

"I don't feel like I'm an adrenalin junkie. I might be overrating myself here but it's more calculating than that. It's not like bungy jumping.

"There's a lot more that goes into it. It's less about the rush and more about the skill involved in it and the profession. Every now and then you get a kick out of it, which is great."

Double Dare shows the complexities of fight scenes (for example, the bloodbath fight scene in Kill Bill took three weeks to shoot), the difficulties of harness work, and the dangers of high falls.

When Bell got to the US she had only ever done one high fall - "when Xena fell off her flying horse," she laughs - so, just for fun, she did her first high fall on US soil from just over 15m metres (that's 50 ft, if you're in America). Later, in Catwoman - starring Halle Berry and Sharon Stone - she did a 22-storey fall.

"The first rehearsal we did was fine because I just got to go, 'Aaaaahhhh' as they dropped me. But after that there's so much thinking involved and there are things that I had to get right, and suddenly, once you're performing you're not riding it any more. It becomes a science."

Which means sometimes things can go wrong. Although she has never feared for her life while doing a stunt ("Both times I thought I was going to die, my Dad saved me. Thanks, Dad") she used to think she was bullet-proof.

"I hurt my back on Xena early on, and I was pretty scared for my ability to be able to walk again for a few split seconds," she sniggers.

"That was a bit of a wake up call for me. It probably needed to happen, you know, 19 and you're [expletive] invincible. I can't be hurt. Oh really? Well check this out.

"It's all very well being the person who can make anything happen, even if the rig is shit. I ran with that for a little while, but sometimes it just won't work.

"What I learned was there's a time and a place to be tough and a time and a place to be smart. And I hadn't practised the smart part very regularly until I got hurt."

Epper puts a lot of trust in God to keep her safe and she even has a Christian counsellor who offers her advice. "She's typically American; it's not unusual over there," says Bell, flippantly.

So are you religious?

"No. I don't think so. Not that I know of," she laughs.

Who do you trust to keep you safe?

"I guess ultimately it's my responsibility. Even if someone else gets me damaged, I can be pissed that they were negligent, but ultimately I should learn from that so it doesn't happen to me again. In saying that, my safety is in the hands of many other people - the guys on the end of the ropes, the guys who set up the rigs ... so my safety is the responsibility of a lot of different people, but ultimately I'm the head of that department.

"It's just like anything in life. Just like crossing the road, I'm the one looking for cars; no one else gives a shit. I'm, 'My God mate'. I'm, 'God. That's it. Oh my God. I just figured it out'."

And as Bell found out, not even God can get you a job in Hollywood. It's mostly about schmoozing. "It is avoidable," she deadpans. "But [in Hollywood] you constantly have to keep reminding people that you exist, which means a lot of ass kissing. And the term for it is hustling."

However, for her big break on Kill Bill no schmoozing was required. Double Dare follows Bell to the audition where Tarantino was drawn to her because of her unrelenting approach to doing flips on a mini-tramp. Tarantino says, in typically dramatic fashion, that: "We had no one. We were [expletive] bricks until Zoe walked in."

When she took the call about getting the part she was asked if she could clear her schedule and head to Beijing to train. Of course she could, she was gagging to work, yet Bell managed to remain cool and calm, if not a little dumbstruck.

Earlier this month Bell, and the Kill Bill crew, won Best Fight for the "trailer fight" scene between Uma Thurman and Daryl Hannah at the MTV Movie Awards.

"I was hired as the crash-and-smash double. So I was hired to fall on my ass basically. I wasn't too happy about that. But," she beams, "what are you going to do?"