The dashing Jonathan Goodwin is a renowned TV celebrity, daredevil and escapologist who has earned his fame through death defying stunts and escape acts. Jonathan was best known from his Discovery Channel series “One Way Out”, where he goes to extremes to test the art and physics of escape.
Now back with a new series “The Incredible Mr. Goodwin” which will be airing in Singapore on KIX (StarHub Cable TV Ch 518) and KIX HD (SingTel mioTV Ch 309) from 16 February 2014 at 10pm. In this new series, we will be seeing Jonathan trying to escape a rocket-launched car as it hurtles toward a cliff, fighting to the surface after being bitten by a venomous snake and buried alive, and getting out of a straightjacket while hanging by a burning rope from the iconic London Eye!
Jonathan Goodwin Shares His Insights
Your interest for dangerous escapes started when your dad gave you a book about Harry Houdini when you were 7, has he ever regretted that decision?
I think he probably does in a way. Both my parents, while they are very supportive of what I do, they tell me that I should get a proper job every time I see them. I think that when my dad gave the book to me, he did not realise how seriously I was going to take it and he might have had second thoughts if he knew what would end up happening.
What gave you the courage/confidence to be the ‘daredevil’?
I think it is an evolving process. I think that you don’t all of a sudden turn on a switch and have the confidence to do any specific stunt.
What usually happens to me is that I have an idea then I think of the most outlandish dangerous thing that I could do. And then somebody, either a corporate client or a TV executive, says yeah that is a great idea. I then think crap I actually have to do it now. And at that point in time, I am not confident and I don’t have any of the information that I need in order to be able to complete it successfully.
It’s just an idea on the page and then the biggest part of my job is getting so familiar with whatever that challenge is that I have the confidence to do it, attempt it and know that I’m going to walk away from it in the end.
How many hours a week do you physically and mentally train?
Unless I’m doing something specific, I treat what I do like a job. So I’m in my office or my workshop at 9 o’ clock in the morning and I stop at 5 o’ clock. I treat it basically like an office job.
Who are the brains behind the stunts?
I think most of my inspiration comes from the world of the Victorian showman daredevil and that’s hopefully what we’re trying to do in “The Incredible Mr. Goodwin”.
A hundred years ago, what I do was a job. There were lots of people who did the things that I do now. And that whole world has sort of disappeared a little bit and I think that’s a shame cause there were so many extraordinary people doing incredible things. And now, most people have never heard of them or let alone what they did, the feats that they have accomplished.
And so, I take my inspiration from those guys and I’m very careful not to copy things directly but I certainly take a huge amount of inspiration from the past and from the performers of the past.
What was the very first stunt you attempted?
I do. When I started out, I had the ambition to sort of do large scale stunts but when you are a kid in your bedroom, it is not an easy thing to do. I had the idea of doing an escape where I was tied up and there was something terrible going to fall on me if I didn’t get out in time. That translated down in a very home spun way in being tied to my bed.
I put a bed sheet over me. It was stretched out above me, about a foot and a half above me, and I got my dad to put a hot iron on the bed sheet. I had to escape before the iron burnt through the sheet and hit me in the chest. I should add that I was shirtless at the time.
I can’t tell you exactly how old I was but I was a teenager. And yes, my dad was my first lovely assistant. He used to be a policeman so he’s a good guy to have around when you’re doing such things but also, he’s a very very cheap assistant.
What goes on in your mind before performing a stunt?
I usually have a bit of a checklist. I think it is very easy to become overwhelmed when you are hanging from a building or when you’re underwater, or hanging from a helicopter by your toes. It is very easy to become overwhelmed by the entirety of the situation that you are in.
In those situations, that is when bad things can happen. So What I tend to do is I break down the task at hand into little chunks. I have a checklist and I’m basically going to check each one of those things off the list, one at a time. At that point before you know it, you’ve completed the list and the whole stunt. And you aren’t overawed or scared by the fact that what you are doing is very big or dangerous.
How long does it take for you to prepare for a stunt? And how do you prepare for it?
Again, it sort of depends on what it is. The finale of “The Incredible Mr. Goodwin” was me hanging from the London Eye, the big Ferris Wheel in Central London. A 100 feet up in the air in a straightjacket from a rope which was on fire. From start to finish, the plan to re-create that stunt took about two months.
But at the same time, I have been training to get out of straightjackets since I was a kid so in some ways, you can say that I have been training for that stunt for years.
You have to basically tailor the presentation and the skills needed to pull of that stunt. There is a lot of physical training involved and specifically for the skill that you’re going to use to be able to achieve whatever it is. There is also a lot of mental preparation that goes into it as well.
What does fear mean to you?
Fear, I think is, a really healthy thing. It can really get in the way with regards to the success or failure of what I do so I try to keep it in check. I think if I had to sum it up in a couple of words, I would say that it was an added complication to achieving some of the things that I want to achieve.
Which stunts were you most worried of pulling off? And why?
I don’t like heights. It’s something that I can obviously get over because I’ve done an awful lot of things where I have been very high up in the air. But those are the stunts where I usually have to dig deep and find a mental way of getting over it. One of the scariest things I did in the series was hang from a side of the building and there was actually just one person there with me.
I gave a member of the audience, a lady, a dice and she got to roll the dice and whatever number she rolled was the number of fingers that I was going to hang from on the side of the building. I re-created the side of the building and all of the infrastructure in my workshop. I was practicing doing that and confident that I knew I could do it. When I practiced it, I was two feet of the ground.
When I did it for real and I was 400 feet up in the air, I basically had to re-create in my mind the idea that I was still in my workshop, still doing it and there was actually a safe place to drop that was two feet below me. And I never once looked down. You find these little tricks to try and overcome any of the big fears that are very obviously there.
What do you like most about your job?
There are lots of different things that I love about my job. I love learning new skills. One of my favourite things to do is to tackle a new skill or a new challenge. It goes from the creation of having an idea, thinking about whether it is possible, and then going into my workshop and sort of playing with it, seeing if I can make it work.
To give you an example, I’ve thrown knives and we did a couple of different knife throwing stunts in Season 1 of “The Incredible Mr. Goodwin”. There was a knive thrower in America whose actually a sheriff in his local town.
He was also a knife thrower on the side-lines. He would perform shows where he did the traditional thing where the girl would stand at a board and he would throw knives that go all around the girl so that they don’t hit her. And the thing about this man was that he had no arms so he threw knives with his feet which I think is extraordinary.
The other day I went into my workshop to see exactly how difficult it was and it is incredibly difficult. It is not an easy thing to do but after a certain amount of practice, I managed to get it and successfully throw knives into my knife throwing board with my feet.
The idea of reading about that guy and going into my workshop to see if I can stand up to that challenge to make it work is great and I really enjoy that kind of thing.
Everyone has a limit so what is one stunt that you will never do and why?
I don’t know that I have found one yet. Usually when I have an idea or when there is an initial thought of whether can I do this, it is very natural for me to say well that one is too big or that one is too dangerous or you know what not.
What I tend not to do is I tend not to write it off and I’ll research it and do preparation and just see how unfeasible it is. And 9 times out of 10, the thing that seemed the most dangerous or the most scary about it, that tends to dissolve and you think you can actually do this. It is actually possible. I haven’t found the thing that I’m not willing to try yet.
You’re an escapalogist, knife thrower, free diver, archer, skill hacker, family guy, you have incredible strength and a high threshold for pain. So, which was the hardest capability to possess and which is your favourite? Why?
They are all so very different and I put different effort into each one of them. I think my favourite part of my life and my job would obviously be my family. But I think it is really important to keep that kind of balance and. Both my wife and my daughter were there when we filmed all of “The Incredible Mr. Goodwin” and when I’m a hundred feet up in the air doing something really stupid, it is a great comfort to be able to look down and see my wife’s face and see my daughter rooting for me and giving me all the support that I need. To me, that is one of the most important things.
