No Test Bombs for ‘Twilight,’ Witness Says

The special-effects technician who fired the explosives that led to the deaths of three actors on the “Twilight Zone” film set testified Monday that no full-scale planning sessions or test explosions were conducted before the filming of the grandiose fatal scene in which fireballs from his mortars accidentally struck a low-flying helicopter.

But the technician, James Camomile, said his boss, special-effects coordinator Paul Stewart, warned him shortly before the filming that he should not fire his explosives until the helicopter was a safe distance away.

Stewart, film director John Landis and three associates are on trial in Los Angeles Superior Court on charges of involuntary manslaughter in the 1982 deaths of actor Vic Morrow and two child actors. The three were killed when struck by the helicopter that was knocked out of the sky by the special-effects explosions.

Camomile, who is to return to the witness stand today, is deemed a key witness by both sides. But his first day of testimony was rather low-key, with some questions remaining unanswered, other questions remaining unasked and several answers contradicting one another.

For example, Camomile, in direct examination, agreed with Deputy Dist. Atty. Lea Purwin D’Agostino that special effects sequences, like the fatal Vietnam battle scene in “Twilight Zone,” are inherently dangerous. Later, on cross-examination, he told Stewart’s attorney, Arnold L. Klein, that he had believed that the specific scene was not dangerous--and that he would not have participated if he had believed otherwise.

At different points in the day, Camomile, a technician for 10 years, also changed his mind about the position of the helicopter when he ignited the explosives. In his initial testimony, Camomile said the chopper was in the same spot it had been during a positioning run-through. Later he reversed himself and said the helicopter was closer to the explosives during the filming.

Although the latter testimony falls into line with the prosecution’s theory of the case, neither D’Agostino nor Klein pressed Camomile for details on just where he was looking and what he was thinking as he set off the explosions.

Nonetheless, at day’s end, each side maintained that Camomile, who has been granted immunity by the prosecution, had helped its case.

D’Agostino said, “Camomile didn’t do anything wrong . . . and if he didn’t, who did?”

The prosecutor also cited as helpful to her case Camomile’s testimony that the two child actors had been positioned only five feet from special effects explosives before the filming of an earlier scene.

Klein contended that Camomile “made a mistake” by firing the explosives before the helicopter was safely out of the way. The “prosecution has (not) proven these people are guilty,” he said.