Jean Malahni

Stuntwoman Jean Malahni is entertaining and dauntless. She grew up in a colorful family. Jean’s great grandfather worked the Circus then silent films with Jesse Lasky. Her grandmother was a model and her mother was an undercover LAPD Cop. Her love of fire, came from her father, a LAFD Fire Captain.

Jean Malahni’s began her career in 1969 at eleven years old working on one of America’s most iconic television programs, The Brady Bunch. Jean had several bit parts on shows such as Bonanza and the Walton’s and she made numerous commercials. However, it was while working on the Walton’s that Jeans fortunes changed and she was catapulted into her career as a stunt woman. On the set, Jean met Tommy Rosales, a stuntman, who heard about how she had gotten into trouble for jumping off a Disneyland Tram. Tommy recommended that she use her daring to work as a stunt woman and from that point on, Jean would be paid to live dangerously.

Most people would cringe at the thought of being burned alive, but not Jean. She recalls being set ablaze for one of her films as a “hypnotic rush”. She feels her most entertaining stunt was mud wrestled with Regis Philbin in 1980. After getting down and dirty with Regis, she joined the Screen Actors Guild through the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists. She has doubled lead actresses such as Linda Hamilton in Terminator (1984), Rebecca DeMornay in Runaway Train (1985), Madeline Kahn in Clue (1985), Leslie Ann Down in Nomads (1986), Marisa Tomei in The Slums of Beverly Hills (1998), Gina Gershon in Showgirls (1995) and many more.

For a person once afflicted by the disease anorexia and weighing only seventy five pounds, Jean became a stunt woman of heavyweight proportions. Playboy Magazine described her as “a show biz legend” when she modeled for them in 1995. During her thrill seeking years she chauffeured for Madam Alex, the famed 90210 Madam.

In 2000 she reunited with Regis Philbin for a mud wrestling rematch. Besides wrestling, Malahni has been shot in the back, swam with alligators, rode the wing of an airplane, ran through a stampede of horses, and has quipped that she can “do any stunt a man can do and she can do it naked”.

The one role Jean Malahni is most proud of is her role as Mother and Grandmother to her two beautiful daughters and their growing families.

You can read many more stories on the astounding Jean Malahni in her memoir, All Around Stuntwoman With or Without Clothes.

Jean Malahni has advocated to have stunt people receive recognition and awards for their contributions to Hollywood and is a member of the Taurus Stunt Foundation.