Actor Donald Sutherland says he’s proud of his wheelchair scene in The Mechanic

Donald Sutherland says he’s proud of the wheelchair stunt he carried out himself in new action movie The Mechanic.

The 75-year-old Hollywood legend — who plays Harry, the mentor of professional assassin Arthur, played by Jason Statham in the new action film — says although his character is disabled, he came up with his own idea for how he should escape in one scene.

“I’ve done wheelchairs before but this was the first time I ever had to come down a set of stairs,” Donald said.

“And when we reached that point the director and the stunt coordinator said ‘What you do is you throw the wheelchair down the stairs and then you drag yourself down the stairs’.

“And I said I don’t think that’s right, I don’t think anybody with half a brain would do that, not to offend you.’

“I said let me try something, ’cause there were two bars going down, handrails. So I turned it around and I rolled down. And I was thrilled, ’cause it was my idea and I did it and you can see it’s me doing it and it was hard work and I had a wonderful time.

“I hope people will go to this movie and look at it and somehow empathetically come away with something that says, ‘Wait a second maybe I should call my son.’

“Or ‘Maybe I should have a word with my dad’.”