Nick Gillard
Born1959 (age 64–65)
Brighton, England
Occupation(s)Stunt coordinator, stuntman, actor
Years active1977–present

Nick Gillard is an English stuntman and stunt coordinator. He is best known as the lead lightsaber fight and stunt coordinator of the Star Wars prequel trilogy films (1999–2005).

Biography

Gillard was born in Brighton, England. At the age of twelve, he ran away from military school to join the circus where he performed as bareback horse rider. Over the next few years Gillard worked with several circus's including Circus Althoff in Germany and Los Muchachos Circus in Spain. Gillard was invited to do stunts on The Thief of Baghdad. He enjoyed it, and later left the circus to perform stunt work in films, including the original Star Wars.[1][2] Gillard was Mark Hamill's first choice as his stunt double for Return of the Jedi.[3]

As a stuntman, Gillard held the world record for longest fire stunt, with a fire burn without air for over two minutes on Alien 3.[4] He also performed a 200-foot power boat jump over two bridges in the film Amsterdamned, and was set on fire over 100 times.[1]

Among Gillard's movie credits are Sleepy Hollow, Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, Raiders of the Lost Ark and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. Gillard was the fight choreographer of the Star Wars prequels. He had a cameo appearance in Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith[5] as Cin Drallig ("Nic Gillard" spelled backwards). His likeness was used for the character with a larger role in the accompanying video game, for which Gillard choreographed the combat animations.[6]

Filmography

As stunt coordinator, arranger or performer

Film

Television

Video games

As actor

Film

Television

References

  1. 1 2 "Star Wars: Bio – Nick Gillard". Lucasfilm. Archived from the original on 8 August 2003. Retrieved 2 December 2013.
  2. ↑ "Star Wars: Den of Geek goes Jedi training with Nick Gillard". Den of Geek. 12 September 2011. Retrieved 2 December 2013.
  3. ↑ "Nick Gillard / Jedi Training". Salt Lake Comic Con. Archived from the original on 10 March 2014. Retrieved 10 March 2014.
  4. ↑ The Guinness Book of Records 1999. 1998. p. 213. ISBN 0-9652383-9-3.
  5. ↑ "Interview with stunt co-ordinator Nick Gillard (Mr. Optimism)- March 2004". Desiring Hayden.net. March 2004. Archived from the original on 17 July 2012. Retrieved 22 April 2020.
  6. 1 2 "Creating the Lightsaber Battles in ROTS Game". TheForce.Net. 4 May 2005. Archived from the original on 24 July 2011. Retrieved 30 September 2010.
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