Motorcycle Stuntman - Hollywood John Hateley

Hateley won his first amateur dirt-track championship at age 14. He entered his first professional event the next year, and at age 19 was named AMA Pro Rookie of the Year.

Hateley won his first amateur dirt-track championship at age 14. He entered his first prof

As the years passed by, Hateley's reputation as a professional stunt rider steadily grew. He was one of the few full-time professional riders and his versatility as a racer translated well to the film industry. He could do pretty much anything the directors suggested.

In '78, he and Hartline worked on Deathsport with David Carradine and Playboy model Claudia Jennings. The film was forgettable (Hartline dubbed it "space-age bullsh*t"), but the two learned a lot on the set.

"Deathsport was a laugh and a giggle because we really got our feet wet," Hartline said. "We rode these Yamaha 400s that were built with aluminum shields and laser blazers and rocket lights. We were jumping these things and flying over things and blowing them up. You know: B-movie stuff."

Working in the film industry appealed to Hateley. He quit racing full-time in '82. The money was good and the studios supplied bikes, clothing and expense accounts. He was in the right place at the right time, and due to his connections with stunt coordinators and his riding ability became the motorcycle stuntman of choice in the mid-'80s.

Hartline took a similar path. "We saw lots of good-lookin' chicks, we got real nice lunches and all that," he said. "The movie stuff was a kick in the ass. I was a guy that was too lazy to work and too nervous to steal. The movie business had my name all over it."

Hateley and Hartline worked in a number of movies as stuntmen and occasional extras, including 1982's Megaforce, a science-fiction flick starring Barry Bostwick and produced by lunatic director and former stuntman Hal Needham. The action centered around a band of mercenaries who tore up the desert on dirtbikes and dune buggies. Needham needed roughly 50 drivers to pull off his film, and hired a number of notable riders including "Wheelie King" Doug Domokos, stuntman and former motocross star Mike Runyard, and the legendary Bud Ekins.

The crew spent three months filming at a dry lake bed in Nevada. The film used real M48 military tanks and armored personnel carriers, and night and day scenes featured rockets, explosions and hand grenades. The stunt riders were required to wear spandex uniforms and park their machines in formation when on set.

"I've worked on a lot of war movies," Hartline said, "and Megaforce was as much like going to war as I can remember."

"There were some real crazy situations that happened during filming," Hateley said. "Hal Needham was one of the early ballsy stuntmen that would try anything and didn't care if he hurt himself or someone else." This included a night shoot that found the whole crew riding across an unexpectedly icy patch of desert after Needham bought a water truck and sprayed down the area.

When the vehicles stormed into town, lights blazing and on the gas, they slipped and spun on the ice-slicked dirt road into a massive pile-up of bikes, bodies and dune buggies. Domokos flipped over backwards into a cactus, J.N. Roberts jumped a dune buggy more than a hundred feet in the dark, and literally hundreds of hand-fired rockets filled the skies.

"These rockets would go a mile. If you were in the wrong spot, somebody would hit you in the back," Hartline said. "There was a Mormon kid from Salt Lake City who landed the job as a driver because he was friends with Donnie and Marie Osmond. He was the only one who really got banged up."

"Nobody got buried and we all got paid," Hateley summed up.

After Megaforce, Hateley continued to appear regularly on the silver screen. He performed motorcycle stunts in Raw Deal and Inner Space, and doubled Fred Ward in the Michael Nesbit-produced film Time Rider. He also worked as stunt coordinator for the latter, a natural progression in his career and one that would change his life.