Stuntman on cult Scottish horror film The Wicker Man

Born: August 10, 1938;

Died: March 26, 2019

ANTHONY “Bronco” McLoughlin, who has died aged 80, showed Indiana Jones how to use a bullwhip, he took Edward Woodward’s place when things hotted up inside The Wicker Man and he even doubled for Father Ted in a scene where a park bench turns out to be part of a fairground attraction called the Crane of Death and is hoisted high into the air.

McLoughlin appeared in dozens of movies and television shows in Britain, his native Ireland and elsewhere, including the original 1977 Star Wars and James Bond, Rambo and Superman films.

In The Wicker Man (1973) Edward Woodward played a police officer who flies to a remote Scottish island to investigate the disappearance of a little girl and ends up as a human sacrifice, burnt inside the giant wicker structure of the title. McLoughlin doubled for Woodward inside the wicker man in long shots after the structure was set alight.

McLoughlin wore a harness which was attached by wire to a cherry picker and was pulled clear as the flames intensified around him. The film received little attention on its initial release in the UK and almost disappeared before being reassessed and hailed as a cult classic.

These days no list of great Scottish movies would be complete without mention of it. McLoughlin would later return to Scotland for the historical drama Rob Roy (1995) starring Liam Neeson.

McLoughlin ran away from boarding school at 16 to pursue his dream of becoming a cowboy and wound up in the Hollywood Stuntmen’s Hall of Fame. He said in an interview in 2013: “I have no regrets and lots of fabulous memories… All I have left to do now is to finish replacing all my lost teeth, which are scattered all around the world.”

The son of an army officer, Anthony Gerard McLoughlin was born in Curragh, County Kildare in 1938, the youngest of 11 children. After absconding from school, he shipped out to Australia. “I got a job on a cattle station, and that's where I learned to ride,” he said. “I really learned about horses, how to look after them and to do what you want them to do."

He spent 12 years in Australia, working with horses and competing on the rodeo circuit, where he acquired the nickname Bronco because of his skill at staying on bucking horses.

After returning to Ireland, he learned that the Hammer Films company was about to shoot the adventure movie The Viking Queen (1967) in County Wicklow and were looking for men with exceptional horse-riding skills.

McLoughlin found his equine experience, derring-do attitude and practical approach were in demand with other film-makers. He got stunt work on The Lion in Winter (1968), Alfred the Great (1969) and David Lean’s Irish drama Ryan’s Daughter (1970), before coming to south-west Scotland to double for Edward Woodward in the climactic scenes of The Wicker Man.

One of his most memorable and challenging sequences was as a Jesuit priest who is strapped to a crucifix by South American natives and thrown into rapids at the beginning of the historical epic The Mission (1986). For a shot of priest and crucifix plunging over a waterfall McLoughlin was replaced by a life-like replica made by Madame Tussauds.

Stunt coordinator Vic Armstrong admitted in his autobiography that as a joke they left McLoughlin on the cross for longer than they needed and let him get much closer to the rapids, as he got increasingly agitated.

"I screamed back, 'Keep quiet, Bronco, we're shooting.' And the water was getting rougher and rougher and he started to have visions of plummeting to his doom while we were running down the bank ready to save him at the last minute."

McLoughlin worked as a stuntman on Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984), Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989), the television prequel series The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles (1992) and on the James Bond movies A View to a Kill (1985) and Tomorrow Never Dies (1997).

He also worked as an animal trainer and wrangler on several films, he was horse master and camel master on Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade and he had small acting roles in films. He was a storm trooper in Star Wars, where his hearing was damaged by an explosion, and a would-be assassin, out to get Daniel Day-Lewis, with a gun concealed in his top hat, in Martin Scorsese’s Gangs of New York (2002).

McLoughlin always liked to be doing something which had an end-result and was no fan of the current craze for simply working out in the gym. His daughter Frances told the Hollywood Reporter: "He'd say, 'If you want to get fit, help your neighbour build a wall.’”

McLoughlin died in his sleep at home in County Wicklow. His first wife Angela predeceased him. He is survived by his second wife Karen and by two daughters.

BRIAN PENDREIGH