The Crocodile Stunt in Live and Let Die: When James Bond’s Escape Was All Too Real
- Daniel Holland
- Aug 9
- 4 min read
In the grand tradition of James Bond villains and their exotic methods of dispatching 007, the franchise has given us piranha-infested pools, deadly shark tanks, and elaborate “snake pit” traps that seem dreamt up by the most imaginative sadists in cinema. Of course, we all know it’s make-believe, in You Only Live Twice, the infamous piranha scene was nothing more than bubbles from concealed jets, and in The Spy Who Loved Me, Richard Kiel’s Jaws was never in any real danger from the rubber shark gnawing at his metal teeth.
So when audiences first saw Roger Moore, as Bond, sprinting across the backs of snapping crocodiles in 1973’s Live and Let Die, most assumed it was just another camera trick, stunt pads, fake reptiles, and a bit of clever editing. For decades, that was the widely accepted story. Until 2017, when long-buried behind-the-scenes footage surfaced, showing stuntman Ross Kananga risking his life among dozens of real crocodiles.
Not only was the stunt real, it was one of the most dangerous ever attempted in the Bond series. And the man who dreamed it up would pay for it with blood, stitches, and a permanent place in cinema history.
A Deathtrap Born from a Location Scout
The idea for the scene began not in a writer’s room, but on a location scout in Jamaica. Screenwriter Tom Mankiewicz and director Guy Hamilton were already seasoned at dreaming up Bond’s 50-second escapes — tight, theatrical deathtraps with maximum audience tension. While scouting, they came across a hand-painted sign that stopped them in their tracks:
“Trespassers Will Be Eaten.”
It wasn’t just a good joke, it had a literary connection. In Ian Fleming’s novel Live and Let Die, Bond finds his CIA ally Felix Leiter mauled by a shark, with the note: “He disagreed with something that ate him.” Here, the predators weren’t sharks, but crocodiles — and the setting couldn’t have been better.
The sign belonged to Jamaica Swamp Safari, a sprawling 350-acre crocodile farm in Trelawny, owned by Ross Kananga. Mankiewicz liked the name so much he gave it to the film’s villain.
Ross Kananga: Jamaica’s Crocodile Man
Kananga was no ordinary animal wrangler. Raised in Florida, he had been working with reptiles from childhood, performing dangerous stunts alongside his father. One of his earliest tricks involved placing his head in an alligator’s open mouth, a stunt that went horribly wrong when the jaws snapped shut.
“He was in there for twenty minutes before the croc relaxed and let him out,” recalled Guy Hamilton. His father wasn’t so fortunate. As Roger Moore later revealed in the documentary Inside Live and Let Die, Kananga had witnessed his father being killed by a crocodile. Pointing to one in the swamp, he told Moore, “That one got my Dad.”
By the time the Bond crew arrived, Kananga’s farm was home to 1,217 crocodiles and just three alligators. It was both a tourist attraction and a working farm, raising the animals for their skins. Kananga was used to risk, just a year earlier, he’d supplied crocodiles for Papillon, starring Steve McQueen and Dustin Hoffman. In that shoot, McQueen had refused to go near a croc until Kananga tied it down and bound its jaws. “When they got to it, McQueen turned to Hoffman and said, ‘You take the head,’” Kananga laughed.
Filming with Real Crocodiles
The first part of the Live and Let Die crocodile sequence was shot with Roger Moore on a retractable bridge and a small islet, opposite Julius Harris as Tee Hee. Most of the crocs were replaced with foam replicas, but a few live ones remained, enough to keep things interesting. Crocodiles can launch themselves 20–30 feet out of the water, so even standing on the bridge wasn’t entirely safe.
Moore, always with a dry joke, asked wardrobe if he could wear crocodile-skin shoes for the scene. It seemed funny until one of the real reptiles made a beeline for him. “What a mistake,” Moore later admitted. “They were out to get me.” Jane Seymour, who played Solitaire, recalled, “Gunshots went off. Ross Kananga himself got in.”
Five Tries, 193 Stitches
Once the principal actors were done, it was Kananga’s turn to don Moore’s full outfit, shoes and all, for the real stunt: running across the backs of live crocodiles to reach safety. The only concession to safety was that the reptiles’ legs were tied down to prevent sudden lunges. Their jaws, however, were left unrestrained.
On the first two takes, Kananga misjudged his steps and plunged into the water. By the third attempt, the crocodiles had figured out his plan and were waiting for him. On the fourth, one snapped at his foot, tearing away a shoe and dragging him under.
“The crocs were chewing off everything when I hit the water, including shoes,” Kananga said in a 1973 interview. “I received 193 stitches on my leg and face.”
Finally, on New Year’s Eve 1972, after five takes and multiple injuries, he made it. The production paid him $60,000 for the stunt, a sum that, in hindsight, seems paltry for such a close brush with death.
A Legacy in Bond Lore
Ross Kananga’s crocodile run remains one of the most talked-about stunts in Bond history, precisely because it was real. Sadly, his life ended young: in January 1978, at the age of 32, he died of a heart attack while spearfishing in the Everglades.
The stunt’s influence carried on. In 2012’s Skyfall, director Sam Mendes paid tribute with Daniel Craig leaping off the back of a CGI komodo dragon — a digital homage to Kananga’s deadly dash. But for all the wonders of modern effects, nothing quite matches the raw danger of watching a man sprint for his life across the backs of living crocodiles.
Sources:
Inside Live and Let Die – DVD/Blu-ray documentary featurette (MGM/UA, 2006)
My Life as a Mankiewicz by Tom Mankiewicz & Robert Crane (University Press of Kentucky, 2012)
The James Bond Archives by Paul Duncan (Taschen, 2012)
MI6-HQ.com – “Live and Let Die: Stuntman Ross Kananga”
BBC Culture – “The Most Dangerous James Bond Stunt Ever” (2017)
The Gleaner (Jamaica) – 1973 interview with Ross Kananga
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