A Taiwanese worker died and two others were injured in Taipei yesterday when scaffolding collapsed on the set of US film director Martin Scorsese’s latest movie, officials said.
The three workers, all in their 50s, were rushed to a nearby hospital after the accident at Central Motion Picture Corp’s (CMPC) Chinese Culture and Movie Center about 10am, Taipei City’s Construction Management Office said.
Chen Yu-lung (陳玉龍) was pronounced dead on arrival at the hospital, while the other two men sustained leg fractures and head injuries, the Taipei City Fire Department said.
Photo: Liu Hsin-de, Taipei Times
The three had been helping dismantle a Japanese-style building to make room for the movie set, the Taipei Department of Cultural Affairs said.
A spokesperson for Scorsese’s film crew expressed their “shock and sorrow” about the accident.
“Today there was an unfortunate accident at CMPC Studios in Taiwan, where the Martin Scorsese film, Silence, is in pre-production,” the spokesperson said in a statement to the Deadline Hollywood Web site. “An existing structure on the CMPC backlot had been deemed unsafe by the production, and accordingly a third-party contractor was hired to reinforce and make it safe prior to any production-related work commencing in this building. Sadly, during this process, the ceiling collapsed, resulting in the death of one of the contractor’s employees and injuries to two others. Everyone is in shock and sorrow and expresses their deepest concern and sympathy to the families of the individual who died and those who were injured.”
Construction Management Office section head Hung Te-hao (洪德豪) said the office has issued a halt-work order on the site, and that the film crew will be fined for not obtaining permission to build temporary facilities at the site.
It is not known if Scorsese was at the site at the time of the accident or when he will begin filming.
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