Jon-Erik Hexum
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| Jon-Erik Hexum | |
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| Born | Jon Eric Hexum November 5, 1957 Tenafly, New Jersey  United States |
| Died | October 18, 1984 (aged 26) Century City, California |
Jon-Erik Hexum (November 5, 1957–October 18, 1984) was an American actor and model, best known for accidentally killing himself on the set of a television series in which he was a central cast member.
Born to Norwegian immigrant parents,[1][2] he was the star of the science fiction series Voyagers!, which aired on NBC during the 1982–83 television season. He also appeared in made for television movies The Bear and Making of a Male Model co-starring Joan Collins and Roxie Roker, and in an episode of Hotel, before being cast in the action series Cover Up. He had also received attention in tabloids for his relationships with E. G. Daily, Heather Thomas and Emma Samms.
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[edit] Biography
Jon-Erik Hexum was born in Englewood, New Jersey, to Gretha and Thorleif Hexum. He and his older brother, Gunnar, grew up in Tenafly, New Jersey. His parents split up when Jon-Erik was five years old. His mother had to work two jobs to earn enough money to support her children.
After graduating from high school, where he proved to be a versatile pianist, actor in school plays and the school’s first male cheerleader, Hexum went on to the Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland in order to study biomedical engineering. However, he soon gave it up and switched to the Michigan State University in East Lansing, where he graduated in Philosophy.[3]
During that time, he worked as a radio disc jockey and actor in minor stage roles. He was also an accomplished diver. Only a few days after graduation, he moved to New York in 1980 in order to pursue his acting career. While working cleaning venetian blinds in offices, he met Bob LeMond of LeMond/Zetter Management, the manager of John Travolta, who saw great potential in Hexum. LeMond asked him to move to Los Angeles in 1981 in order to audition for a movie called Summer Lovers, directed by Randal Kleiser. Even though Jon-Erik lost the part to Peter Gallagher, he was soon cast as the lead in the upcoming NBC TV show Voyagers!
Voyagers! only lasted one season, mainly because it was shown during the same time-slot as the popular television show 60 Minutes. Nevertheless, the show was and still is popular among children and science fiction fans. The plot of the show saw two time travelers, Hexum and the young Jeffrey Jones - played by child actor Meeno Peluce - fixing history when problems arose. The stories involved figures like Spartacus, Harriet Tubman, Charles Lindbergh, President Lincoln, Charles Dickens, Joe Louis, and others as the pair tried to put history back on track. The program was a form of edutainment and was sponsored by Scholastic magazine. The show was shown on affiliate channels throughout the 1980's after its network cancellation and was shown on the Sci Fi network in the 1990's. In the summer of 2007 the entire series was released on DVD. There are numerous websites on the internet that are devoted to the Voyagers! series and to Jon-Erik Hexum.
During his time in L.A., Hexum worked as a nightclub door man, cab driver and carpet cleaner to pay the bills. After a promotion tour which he financed himself, Jon-Erik was cast for the movie Making of a Male Model with Joan Collins in 1983. He played a ranchhand who is invited by a modeling agent (Collins) to move to New York and pursue a modeling career. The film was Hexum’s breakthrough, but it also labeled him as a hunk and sex symbol, much to his dismay.
After being considered for various television projects he eventually accepted a leading role in the television show Cover Up, where he played an undercover CIA agent. He described the role as “part Indiana Jones, James Bond, Mr. Magoo and Superman”.[4]
During the weekends, he was promoting the movie The Bear about college football coach Paul "Bear" Bryant, in which he had a short, but well reviewed, part.
Eric Paulsen, journalist and news anchorman of WWL-TV in Louisiana, is Hexum’s cousin.
[edit] Death
Hexum died after shooting himself in the head with a prop gun loaded with blanks on the set of the CBS series Cover Up, a program about a pair of fashion photographers/models who were actually secret agents. Hexum, who played a weapons expert, was said to constantly be playing with the guns as if they were toys and once angered co-star Jennifer O'Neill so much that she chastised him on-set for his carelessness.[5]
In 1999, both O'Neill and Hexum’s then-girlfriend, Elizabeth Daily were interviewed for the E! show Mysteries and Scandals, where they criticized the bad management at the set of Cover Up, which required the actors to stay at the set up to 18 hours a day. They described Hexum as overworked and tired at the time of his accident.
It is also known that the weapon Hexum used in the previous scene was not taken away from him by the prop master during a break – as the studio safety guidelines demanded.
The exact details of the accident are unknown. There have been several studio reports released by 20th Century Fox shortly after the accident, giving varying accounts of the circumstances leading up the accident.[6]
On October 12, 1984, after finishing a scene in which Hexum’s character was sitting on a bed, unloading a .44 Magnum revolver, to replace the bullets with blanks, which was required for the next scene – a procedure Hexum was not familiar with and which was usually done by the prop masters- a break was announced while the set was being prepared for a reshooting of the same scene.
Hexum fell asleep on the set and awoke, realizing the shooting had again been delayed. He put the gun to his right temple and fired, mortally wounding himself. According to an early studio report, Hexum was alone on the set at the time of the accident and there were no eyewitnesses. However, another report mentions several witnesses who allegedly saw Hexum pointing the gun at his head. It is assumed he intended to make a humorous reference to the prolonged break. Other alleged eyewitnesses, like the drapery installer Frank Laux[7] claim that Hexum unloaded all blanks but one and played a game of Russian roulette with a gun he considered harmless.
Hexum’s last words according to eyewitness reports do not match either. He allegedly said: “Let’s see if I get myself with this one.”, “Let’s see if I’ve got one for me.”, “Let’s see what would happen if I played the game.” or “Can you believe this crap?” (referring to the prolonged break)
Hexum apparently did not realize that blanks use paper or plastic wadding to seal gun powder into the shell, and that this wadding is propelled out of the barrel of the gun with enough force to cause severe injury or death if the weapon is fired within a few inches of the body, especially if pointed at a particularly vulnerable spot, such as the temple or the eye. Although the paper wadding in the blank that Hexum discharged did not penetrate his skull,[8] the wad struck him in the temple with enough blunt force trauma to shatter a quarter-sized piece of his skull and propel the pieces into his brain.
According to a crew member on the set:
- "Jon smiled and pulled the trigger. There was a loud bang and a bright flash, then black smoke. Jon screamed in agony, then looked kind of amazed as he slumped back onto the bed with blood streaming from a severe head wound. It was horrible."
Hexum's assistant ran to him and wrapped his head in a towel. An ambulance was called, but before it could arrive, Hexum slipped into a coma, prompting crew members to carry him to one of the studio's station wagons and drive him to Beverly Hills Medical Center. Hexum went into surgery as his family and girlfriend, actress Elizabeth Daily, were notified of his condition. Initially he was listed as being in "serious" condition, but after five hours of surgery, doctors changed the condition to "critical". Hexum was intubated and connected to a respirator, and lingered for six days before doctors pronounced him brain dead. With his mother's permission, Hexum was flown to San Francisco and taken off life support so that his organs could be donated.[9] His body was cremated and his ashes were scattered over Malibu.
Hexum's death from on-set firearms negligence with blank rounds occurred in similar circumstances to that of another famous actor, Brandon Lee, in 1993. In Lee's case, however, the fatal discharge occurred as a result of prop team negligence (firing a dummy round with an intact primer, causing a squib load, and then unintentionally firing the stuck bullet out of the barrel with a blank round), instead of negligence by the actor.
The same month that Hexum died, an issue of Playgirl magazine came out, featuring a photo shoot Hexum had done shortly before his demise. [10]
[edit] Filmography
[edit] Movies
- 1983: Making of a Male Model
- 1984: The Bear
[edit] Television shows
[edit] References
- ^ Jon-Erik Hexum - Biography
- ^ Exclusive Interview With Eric Paulsen
- ^ Jon-Erik Hexum Detour Article
- ^ Biography
- ^ Find a Death: Jon-Erik Hexum
- ^ He's Not Coming Back, Kimberwicke Enterprises and The Jon-Erik Hexum Fan Club, 1994
- ^ Mysteries and Scandals, 1999
- ^ The New York Times
- ^ http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/Hills/1744/LATimes.html
- ^ Playgirl Magazine 1984 back issues and used magazines for sale at USEDmagazines.com
