The scene that almost killed Winona Ryder
In October 1996, Winona Ryder began production on a new movie at 20th Century Fox Studios in Los Angeles. It was a film that meant a lot to her, as she watched the first entry in the franchise as a little girl and had been blown away by its strong female lead character. One problem with the film, though, was that it was starting production with the most difficult, dangerous, and time-consuming sequence in the entire piece. A sequence which would involve Ryder submerging herself in water – something she hadn’t done since she nearly drowned in childhood.
In 1997, Ryder spoke to TV Hits about signing up for what was then known as Alien 4. Naturally, she couldn’t reveal any details about the plot or her character. Still, she explained, “I’ve always been a big science-fiction buff, and Alien especially had a huge impact on me when I saw it because Sigourney Weaver was the first female action hero I ever saw. It was really flattering to be offered the role.”
The role was Annalee Call, a new crew member of a group of mercenaries on the spacecraft Betty in Alien: Resurrection. Call is part of the group of characters who are forced to swim through a flooded kitchen on the space station Auriga, pursued by two vicious xenomorphs the whole time.
Stage 16 at Fox was converted into a 35-by-45-metre tank for the scene, which held 548,000 gallons of water at a depth of 4.5 metres. Before the film, the cast worked with professional divers to use the complicated diving equipment and then committed to two and a half weeks of training at the studio with stunt coordinator Ernie Orsatti and underwater cinematographer Peter Romano. It was an extraordinarily intimidating proposition for all the actors, but Ryder was particularly terrified of it.
In the DVD featurette ‘Death From Below’, Ryder revealed that she had a deep-seated fear of water, which stemmed from an incident in childhood. She explained: “I was about 12 years old, and I nearly drowned. I had to be resuscitated and everything. So, I hadn’t gone underwater since then.”
The actor didn’t think she’d be able to accomplish what the production needed of her, so she went to studio executives and begged them to let her stunt double do the underwater shots. She was told: “Don’t worry. There’s always ways to work around that kind of stuff.” Unfortunately, because Ryder’s hair had been cut into a pixie style for the film, the character didn’t have enough hair to feasibly cover a stunt double’s face.
Ryder realised she was going to have to do the scene, and when she first began training in the pool, she was surprised by how natural it felt. Then it came time to shoot in the actual kitchen tank, though, and it couldn’t have been more different than the controlled training scenario.
The Beetlejuice star confessed, “I just remember the first day I had a complete anxiety attack. I thought, ‘There’s no way. They’re just going to have to replace me.'”
Amazingly, though, she gritted her teeth and found a way to perform in the sequence, which involved her going very deep underwater. She credited the trainers and Weaver with helping her through the harrowing shoot.
Actor JE Freeman, who played villainous scientist Dr Mason Wren in the film, marvelled at the bravery Ryder showed in the face of a legitimate phobia. He said: “For her to have put herself in that position, even though she was incredibly timid, to face that kind of fear…If you’re not afraid, you’re not courageous. She knew there was a fear there, and she faced it anyway.”
