Today we’d like to introduce you to Dennis Madalone.
Hi Dennis, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start, maybe you can share some of your backstory with our readers.
It started with me as a five-year-old boy living in South Plainfield, New Jersey. And out of nowhere, at age five, I started jumping off the roof of my house and throwing myself down the stairs. My mom and dad said, ” Something must be wrong with Dennis; why is he doing these things?”
Two years later at age seven, I was watching an old James Cagney movie on TV, and my dad came downstairs and said, ‘What are you watching?’ I said, “I’m watching James Cagney.” Dad asked if I wanted to be like James Cagney; I said, “I love James Cagney, but I want to be the guys he beating up!”
Fast forward…I’m now eighteen years old, graduating high school, and I suddenly have a magnet inside me, pulling me towards California. So off I went two weeks after graduating, on my way to Hollywood, California, with a suitcase and fifty-two bucks.
Once I got to Hollywood, I found the only man in world that was training young stuntmen on Main Street in Santa Monica… His name is Paul Stader, one of the most iconic stuntmen in the business.
After training in the gym for a year-and-a-half my New Jersey energy suddenly exploded in the business. And not only was I working as a stuntman, but I was also Stunt Coordinating at Universal Studios at age twenty.
Three years later, I found myself on the set at CBS Studios doubling the actor Ross Martin on a Movie Of The Week titled:
The Wild Wild West Revisited starring Robert Conrad. As I walked on the set, there was a roped-off area, and in the area was James Cagney and his wife!
I was thinking to myself, “That’s James Cagney, WOW!” This is so cool, and I’m just twenty feet away from him.
The word on the set was…Cagney was a guest of his director friend, Burt Kennedy.
So, I headed to make-up and hair and padded up for my stunt, then went back to the set and got into the scene where I was getting beat up all over the place and literally being propelled and thrown twenty feet through the air, landing back first on the concrete stage floor.
After doing multiple takes, Burt Kennedy, our director, said, “That’s a cut and a print!” The crew applauded, and it was an amazing moment! Suddenly the director said, “That’s a wrap on Dennis.”
As I started pulling off my wig, the bodyguard for James Cagney walked up to me and said, “Mr. Cagney would like to meet you.”
At that point, everything went into slow motion; as I walked up to the roped-off area, Mrs. Cagney lifted the rope and said, “James would like to talk to you.” I said to Mrs. Cagney, “Oh, wow! Yes, yes.”
As I walked up to Mr. Cagney, he was sitting down and he looked at me and his eyes opened up wide, he said to me his favorite line as in many of his movies, “SIT DOWN KID.”
He said, “What was that contraption that threw you through the air?”
I said, “It’s an Air-Ram, made of hydraulics and air pressure.”
And he said, “We used to use a wooden box with springs under it, and that would throw us for a “dilly” now and then.
It felt like were on the stage all by ourselves. And suddenly, I had a flashback, and there I am, seven years old, and I was watching James Cagney on TV. And my dad asked me do I want to be like James Cagney, and I said, “No, I love James Cagney; I want to be the guy he beats up.”
At that moment snapped out of it: I’m sitting with James Cagney. I said to myself I may not be the guy’s James Cagney was beating up…but I got to get beat up in front of James Cagney.
There are so many amazing stories and journeys I’d like to share: fourteen years of Stunt Coordinating Star Trek and hundreds and hundreds of TV episodes, Feature Films, and Movies Of The Weeks, And Stunt World Records.
We all face challenges, but looking back, would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
It’s been an amazing journey from New Jersey to California
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
Hollywood Stuntman / Hollywood Stunt Coordinator — specializing in 100ft High Falls, Flipping Cars, and Being lit on Fire
Stunt World Record Holder
I’m most proud of the flag that I fly in my heart for my family & friends
How do you think about luck?
Luck has guided me well.
Lucky to have so many heroes in my life.
Luck has been a major part.
Contact Info:
- Website: Americawestandasone.com
