Rust Unlikely To Resume Filming Following On-Set Death, New Gun Legislation Moving Forward
In the wake of the tragic accident on the set of the independent western film "Rust" which resulted in cinematographer Halyna Hutchins' death, producer/star Alec Baldwin says he has "doubt" that production on the movie will resume.
Someone from TMZ was among a group of paparazzi that followed Baldwin and his family this past weekend and questioned the actor about the project's future, and Baldwin, who has become the public face of this incident after unwittingly firing the shot that killed Hutchins and injured the movie's director, said he did not think it would be getting underway again. "No, I doubt it," Baldwin answered, "I sincerely doubt it."
There's still an investigation in progress as to exactly how the chain of safety could have been so thoroughly eroded on the set of "Rust," and questions of criminal and civil liability still loom large.
Baldwin Supports Limiting Firearms on Sets
Baldwin told TMZ he is "extremely interested" in "an ongoing effort to limit firearms" during productions of filmed entertainment. "Some new measures have to take place," he said. "Rubber guns, plastic guns, no real armaments on the set. That's not for me to decide ... I'm not an expert in this field. So whatever other people decide is the best way to go, in terms of protecting people's safety on film sets, I'm all in favor of – I will cooperate with that in any way that I can."
Meanwhile, the shockwaves of the fatal incident continue to reverberate throughout Hollywood and beyond. Los Angeles city councilman Paul Koretz had already introduced a resolution to support legislation that bans live guns and ammunition on film sets, and it now looks as if that type of legislation is moving forward. According to Deadline, California Senator Dave Cortese has received input from the state's lawyer's office on a draft of a bill that would help concretize the reforms that people have been calling for in the wake of Hutchins' death.
Cortese, who is the chair of the Senate Labor Committee, said the planned legislation would ban firearms capable of shooting live ammunition of any kind – although there could be exceptions for things like on-set security and/or actual law enforcement who have a presence on the sets. Cortese knows there are plenty of safety regulations currently in place to prevent the type of accident that occurred on the set of "Rust," but obviously those safeguards fell apart and this new legislation aims to make sure that doesn't happen again. The goal, Cortese said, is to make sure "that everybody uniformly is complying to the same rules and knows that there are legal consequences if they don't." If this bill passes, those consequences would be civil in nature – i.e. monetary fines – instead of criminal. The plan, according to the Senator, is to "take the industry's best practices and put them into law."