The Stuntwoman: The True Story of a Hollywood Heroine (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9781492349105)

She was one Hollywood's first whistle-blowers; a fearless stunt woman who put her career on the line in 1980 to speak out about sex discrimination - and against the rampant abuse of cocaine by Hollywoods' stunt community. Someone's gonna get hurt," she thought. "Someone's gonna get killed. Someone has to tell the studio execs what's going on." For her troubles, she was ridiculed, blacklisted and threatened by the Mafia. When she sued, her attorney swore under oath that he was so afraid of being murdered that he intentionally sabotaged her case on orders from the mob. Her name is Julie Ann Johnson, and in her day, she was one of Hollywood's highest - paid stunt women, and one of the first women to work as a stunt coordinator on a major television series. The show was "Charlie's Angels." The year 1980 was an eventful one: John Lennon was assassinated in New York City: strikes across Poland heralded the coming fall of the Soviet Union; 52 Americans were being held hostage in Iran; Ronald Reagan was elected President of the United States, and cocaine abuse was sweeping America. In Los Angeles that year, comedian Richard Pryor nearly burned himself to death while freebasing cocaine. And in 1980, Julie Johnson began her descent into Hollywood hell.