Eliza Hutton, the fiancée of late actor Brandon Lee, has spoken out following the accidental shooting on the set of Rust. The Thursday, Oct. 21 incident left director Joel Souza injured and cinematographer Halyna Hutchins dead after Alec Baldwin discharged what he believed to be a prop gun containing blanks instead of live rounds in an incident that many have said is similar to the death of Lee, who was killed when another actor shot him using a gun that was supposed to have been loaded with blanks on the set of The Crow in 1993. Speaking out 28 years after her fiancé’s death, Hutton issued a call for change, calling the incident on the Rust set an “avoidable tragedy.”
In a statement to PEOPLE, Hutton, who had been set to marry Lee on April 17, 1993, noted that nearly three decades ago, she “was shattered by the shock and grief of losing the love of my life, Brandon Lee, so senselessly.” Reflecting on the Rust tragedy, she added that her “heart aches again now for Halyna Hutchins’ husband and son, and for all those left in the wake of this avoidable tragedy.” Hutton, who earlier this week shared a throwback photo of herself and Lee on her private Instagram as she declared that “there’s no such thing as a prop gun,” went on to “urge those in positions to make change to consider alternatives to real guns on sets.”
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A prop gun includes a variety of weapons ranging from a fake firearm constructed from materials such as rubber or wood to actual guns or formerly working guns that have been rendered inoperable. However, even when there is no bullet, a prop gun can still cause injury or even death. In the death of Lee, the prop gun was supposed to have been loaded with blanks, but was actually “loaded with improperly-made dummy rounds.” Although the investigation into the Rust incident is ongoing, an affidavit released over the weekend found that an assistant director on the film handed Baldwin one of three guns that had previously been placed on a table by the set’s armorist. When Baldwin pulled the trigger as he was practicing his quick draw, the firearm discharged a live round, which struck Hutchins, a mother of one, in the abdomen.
Amid the most recent tragedy, there has been a growing call to ban firearms on productions, with Lee’s sister, Shannon Lee, sharing on Twitter, “No one should ever be killed by a gun on a film set. Period.” Bandar Albuliwi, a director who graduated from the American Film Institute Conservatory, created a Change.org petition “to ban the use of real firearms on set and demand better crew working conditions.” The petition, launched amid the ongoing investigation into Hitchins’ death, has received more than 36,000 signatures.
