Fresh off his show-stealing performance in Jesus Christ Superstar Live on NBC on Sunday night, rock music icon Alice Cooper is addressing one of his most infamous stunts from his storied career.
Cooper — who made a name for himself with wild live performances that included electric chairs and razor blades — nearly died while rehearsing a stunt in April 1988 at Wembley Stadium in England.
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“When I go to the circus and there’s a guy in a cage with 12 tigers, there’s always a chance that one of the tigers didn’t get the message,” Cooper told Entertainment Weekly. “When you see a guy on a tight wire, you know that there may be a second you witness a tragedy. I always wanted that in our show: What they’re seeing could be the last night of Alice Cooper.”
The stunt was meant to be a mock execution, with Cooper pretending to be hung by a noose via a wooden gallows. To avoid injury, Cooper wore a harness with a thick piano wire hanging from the ceiling that would catch him after the gallows would drop him several feet.
Cooper had done the stunt dozens of times at different shows, but there was a problem — he never considered changing out the wire for a new one.
The wire snapped during one of the practice runs, and Cooper came within inches of having the noose snap his neck. The only thing that saved the “School’s Out” singer was some quick thinking.
“In an instant I flipped my head back. That must’ve been a fraction of a second because if it caught my chin it would have been a different result,” Cooper explained. “It went over my neck and gave me a pretty good burn. I went down to the floor and pretty much blacked out.”
Despite it nearly costing him his life, Cooper went on to do the stunt during the show as if nothing had happened.
“You’re going to get paid, you’re going to see the world, and you’re going to get stitches,” Cooper said.
Cooper performed as King Herod in NBC’s live broadcast of the Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice rock opera, much to the delight of viewers watching along at home.
He admitted during an interview prior to the performance that he channeled the late Alan Rickman’s performance as Severus Snape in Harry Potter while performing the role.
“When I first heard about it, I thought Alan Rickman — that condescending sort of arrogant character, and I kind of fashioned what I would do after what I thought Alan Rickman would do if he were alive,” Cooper said.
