Growing up in a tiny South Australian outback town, Ky Furneaux was never the kind of kid who sat still. Riding horses bareback and disappearing into the bush for hours, she grew up with a thirst for adventure.
“You should be a stuntwoman,” a kid once told her, seeing Ky tumble down sand dunes during school camp.
But at age 19, that kind of future almost came crashing down.
Driving to Adelaide, Ky was in a car accident and scans revealed she’d fractured her spine.
“Doctors said I wouldn’t be physically active for the rest of my life,” the now 52-year-old from Torquay, VIC, tells New Idea.
She candidly explains that, in those days, if you suffered a broken back, you were a write-off.
Ky was determined to prove everyone wrong, though and after months in a back brace, she focused on physiotherapy and swimming, later switching to rock climbing.
“A friend suggested I give it a try because it’s one of the best land-based activities for rebuilding strength, flexibility and agility,” she says.
It made her back ache, but the pain was manageable and as she got stronger she could see how far she’d come.
When she was holidaying in Canada and met a stunt performer in a pub, that kid’s suggestion that she be a stunt woman came back to her.
Incredibly she was at a point, physically, where she believed she could do it.
Her big break in Hollywood
Spending three years training in kickboxing, taekwondo, weapons, fight scenes and stunt skills, her big break came in 2003, doubling Sharon Stone in Catwoman.
Soon after, she doubled Jennifer Garner in Elektra.
The girl once told she wouldn’t be active again was suddenly front and centre in Hollywood’s biggest action scenes. From then, Ky’s career skyrocketed.
“I worked on blockbusters including Thor, The Avengers, X-Men and Pirates of the Caribbean, and doubled stars including Anne Hathaway and Jessica Biel,” she says.
But behind the movie magic it could be a dangerous job.
A close call
On X-Men, Ky was filming a scene where real cars were hurled through the air, exploding around the stunt team. She was dragged backwards in the nick of time.
Watching nearby, Hugh Jackman couldn’t believe it.
“‘S**t, that was close,’ he said to me,” Ky laughs.
On Thor, Ky also worked alongside Chris Hemsworth while doubling the warrior Sif, played by Jaimie Alexander. During one huge fight scene, she battled 10 villains at once, kicking and swinging weapons.
In 2012, Ky received the stunt industry’s version of an Oscar; a Taurus World Stunt Award for Best Female Stunt Performer.
Standing on stage, she couldn’t help thinking back to that hospital room.
“I thought, if only I could see that doctor who told me I’d never be active again,” she says.
Although Ky loved Hollywood, the outdoors is where she always feels most alive, and after 16 years in the stunt industry, she embarked on a new adventure as a survival expert.
She’s since appeared on shows including Naked and Afraid and has also written eight survival books.
From a hospital bed with a broken back, to Hollywood explosions and surviving in the wilderness, she’s proved anything is possible.
“We’re capable of far more than we think,” Ky says. “Choose your life, lose your limits.”
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