Interview by Craig Taylor 

Are you happy?

Ben Bellman, ex-stuntman
  
  


I was a stuntman for five years. I don't remember any of it. I'm told Gladiator was my first film. Others included Charlotte Gray, The Count Of Monte Cristo, Die Another Day. I drifted into it and really enjoyed it.

Five years ago, I was so badly injured it's amazing I'm alive. I was flown to hospital in pieces. My mother and girlfriend flew out to Spain because they thought I'd died. I'd done 1,000 skydives before. I fell out of a plane. I don't know if the parachute opened. Every bone in my body was smashed. I'm half made of metal now. I beep in machines.

They thought I wouldn't be able to walk, see or speak. I've got no memory, so it's hard for me even to think back to that time. I'm vaguely happy. I love my carer, my mother, and coming to the head-injury day centre. The staff are very kind. I'm not angry. I've refound happiness.

Every day I do stretching and exercise in my room. I used to teach sports and do triathlons. I swim, do fencing and yoga. I used to teach yoga. I spent a year learning it in India. I don't remember that.

I love ballet. Goya and Caravaggio. Chekhov and Shakespeare. I don't know why, but I do. I read sports books every day. I have to hold them close, because I was blind after the accident. My sight is getting better and my days are full. I lived; I'm happy about that. I lack memory, but every day I wake up and feel a bit more human.

 

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