Should I question everyone's competence on a movie set, if I become an actor?

That’s really the job of the director and the producer, but you can certainly be wary.
Too much wariness, though, may make you a pain in the ass to work with.

Although I agree with @filmfann , I was raised to ALWAYS assume that there’s a live bullet in the chamber & to verify BEFORE touching the trigger!!! I bet Baldwin wishes that he had been that pain in te ass one more time!!! There’s something that hasn’t been leaked to the press yet that I hope comes out during the trial!!!

YES!

This development just makes no sense to me. No sense.

New York Times: “We’re trying to definitely make it clear that everybody’s equal under the law, including A-list actors like Alec Baldwin,” Andrea Reeb, a special prosecutor appointed by Santa Fe County’s district attorney to help handle the case, said in an interview.

Everyone’s equal under the law, but not everyone is equally guilty under the law. I think this is nuts.

I would certainly say, though, that “trust but verify” would be the wisest course, especially in instances where the consequences of error could be huge.

@LadyMarissa There’s something that hasn’t been leaked to the press yet that I hope comes out during the trial!!!

Wanna clue us in?

@Jeruba This makes it pretty clear why the Santa Fe DA is bringing charges:

https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/19/us/santa-fe-alec-baldwin-rust-charged/index.html

No. That would be as wrong as assuming everyone on trial for a crime was guilty before being judged by a jury.

@janbb, thanks. But the points listed under the subhead “There was such a lack of safety’ on set”: all those statements about contributing conditions—by making those assertions, isn’t the DA treating those as proven facts? And aren’t they really things that ought to be established by means of evidence, not asserted beforehand as givens?

@Jeruba I suspect that they are proven facts. The incident happened a year or two ago and has been investigated. The DAs office doesn’t bring charges unless they feel they have an established case.

But neither you nor I are lawyers or prosecutors so my guess is that they know what they are doing.

@janbb Good article. It cleared up some things in my mind.

From what I read, Alec was part of the production team, so actually some of the responsibility would technically fall on him. But it doesn’t seem right to me either.

Not should, but feel free to do so. Perhaps having a checklist of things to do/say/ask to satisfy your apprehension would be an easy, eventually routine, way to handle this for yourself. You could present it to the group you are working with…..more eyes and ears.

If Alec Baldwin is one of the producers and if checking the gun was his job, not the other producers, or whoever else’s, then it makes some sense. Although is the prosecutor saying who put the real bullet in the gun? Is that person charged? Are there no cameras like there are cameras to point at that?

“The movie’s armorer who was in charge of weapons on the set, will also be charged with two counts of involuntary manslaughter.”
Ok, the headlines made it sound like the actor was number one gulty.
https://www.newsweek.com/alec-baldwin-live-round-gun-rust-frances-fisher-involuntary-manslaughter-halyna-hutchins-1775271

@safai If Alec Baldwin is one of the producers and if checking the gun was his job, not the other producers, or whoever else’s, then it makes some sense.

What if, in doing his job as Producer, he got a poorly trained or incompetent weapons master? It’s certainly his fault.

@filmfann But according to that, as an employer of the actor he or she got a poorly trained or incompetent actor? It’s certainly his fault? I don’t know.

It might be worth waiting to see how the case comes out before speculating and judging.

On the news, they said they have video of him with his fingers on the trigger (not the actual incident but other times) despite him saying, and to prove him wrong when he’s said he never puts his finger on the trigger. They also said he is liable because he is the Producer so he has some liability for safety on the set. Also, during the required gun safety training, he missed part of it and was on his cell phone with his family for part of it. Lesson to everyone – just because you’re the boss and you can fuck off during these things, it looks really bad for you in Court when it’s found out you were lacking the training that the pee-ons were all required to sit through.