DIARY OF A STUNT DRIVER

Phil Hill may not have played a starring role in the original Ford v Ferrari story, but his son Derek Hill has been integral to the modern reimagining as one of the lead stunt drivers in the new movie. Here, he lifts the lid on what went on behind the action scenes of the film

- 

The storyline of Le Mans ‘66 - the 20th Century Fox film about Carroll Shelby leading the Ford factory team to a podium-packing victory in the 1966 Le Mans 24 Hours - had been kicking around Hollywood for some time. Fox had bought the rights to the AJ Baime book Go Like Hell. But the movie now released is instead a new take on the true story, developed by director James Mangold, and scripted by Jez Butterworth, John-Henry Butterworth and Jason Keller.

Mangold finally began shooting and the process went on for 67 days, with units working in California, New Orleans, Atlanta, Savannah and Statesboro, Georgia, as well as at Le Mans itself.

When I first got the call inviting me to become involved, there were just a couple of months to go before filming began. My introduction came through stunt coordinator, Robert Nagle, a former racer turned movie industry stunt man. As a fan of the period and of motor racing in general he'd had this story on his radar for many years. Now I was engaged simply as one of his stunt driver team.

Even though my father wasn't in the 1966 Ford team, he'd been with them for the preceding two years when the team was run by John Wyer. For 1966 he'd joined Chaparral and it was probably too esoteric, and inessential to the plot, for the movie to feature my old man as a driver, although he gets one or two mentions in the story line.

In contrast, Alex Gurney (Dan's son) and Jeff Bucknum (Ronnie's son) both have their fathers featured. Alex had a couple of lines in the movie, playing Dan, so he was considered 'an actor'. Jeff, whose father co-drove the third-place car, was ever vigilant to see his father was fairly depicted.