Meet Alyma Dorsey

Today we’d like to introduce you to Alyma Dorsey.

Hi Alyma, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
In the summer of 2012, Quentin Tarentino asked me to go with him to Louisiana while he filmed Django. At that time, I was his personal trainer and I was also practicing and competing in the Southern California AVP qualifying tournaments as well as the CBVA tournaments as a professional beach volleyball player. After being on set with Quentin every day, I became very intrigued with the stunts and the super-talented stunt performers. I went up to him one day and said, “Q, I think I can do stunts”. He said, “Why yes, you can”! He then introduced me to the stunt coordinator, Jeff Dashnaw. I started hanging with and becoming friends with the stunt performers there. They actually took me under their wings and some of them started training me in their downtime. Little did I know that I was learning from some of the top stunt perfumers in the business who actually became someone my closest friends. 1 week before we wrapped, one of the stunt men told me that there was a meet and greet going on and that I should go introduce myself to the stunt coordinator. Little did I know that the meet and greet was an actual audition for the movie The Butler. I walked into the room thinking that I was just introducing myself, however, when I got there, not only was the coordinator in the room, but also the director and producer of the movie. After introducing myself and having a brief conversation, the Magical words every stung performer wanted to hear was said…”Welcome to the Butler”.

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
My biggest struggle has been learning fast enough so that I am able to take on the hard jobs when called upon and learning how to be great at everything when you know nothing, especially in the beginning. The hardest challenge now is always continuing to learn so you can always get better and not get hurt in the process

As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
I am an action actress. I specialize in all things dealing with action in movies and television. I currently double over 50+ actress. I am known for my driving, motorcycle and boat skills, fight skills (martial arts and street fighting), wire work, tactical skills, horseback riding (English and Western), how hard I hit the ground (I am a ground pounder), rigging, high falls and I am great with dialogue. I book a lot of speaking roles. I am most proud of driving Rescue 1 in the new Baywatch movie with The Rock. I doubled Ilfenesh Hadera in that film. Before filming, I did not know how to drive a boat. I was taught over the weekend before we started filming. I am also proud of being on the Rigging team for Shazam: Fury of the Gods. The 2nd Unit Director and stunt coordinator, Scott Rogers gave me a life-changing opportunity to learn rigging with some of the best in the business. I also ended up winning an award at the Action Icon Awards because I was the first African American Female ever to Rig on a blockbuster movie.

We’d love to hear about how you think about risk taking?
Stunt perfumers are not daredevils, we are calculated risk takers. We take risks all of the time. It is a part of our job. There is so much preparation that goes behind taking a risk in our industry that it has become 2nd nature. Any time we are performing, we are taking a risk because anything can go wrong at any time. But we are also problem solvers. So, we get paid to take the risk and solve any problems that come up while we performing. Our business is all about safety. It is our job to keep each other safe and to mitigate any risk that occurs. Sometimes we are learning on the job and in that case, we have to rely on our training and past experiences to get us through. But we calculate everything that we are about to do.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://instagram.com/alymadorsey
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/alyma.dorsey
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alymadorsey
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/AlymaDorsey1
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@alymadorsey

Image Credits
Riding motorcycle for APB, doubling Tamberla Perry Captain Marvel, skroll Modeling pic Motorcycle shoot me and Leslie Jones on ghostbusters Me as a character on the Orville stunt coördinator, Carrick O’Quinn giving me instructions before we shoot Me rigging Me doubling Michelle Hurd on Star Trek Picard season 3