Walton Goggins Saved Olivia Wilde From Being Stampeded to Death by Horses on ‘Cowboys & Aliens’ Set: ‘I Owe Him My Life. He’s a Real-Life Hero’
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- Olivia Wilde revealed on the 'Armchair Expert' podcast that Walton Goggins saved her life on the set of the 2011 film 'Cowboys & Aliens,' directed by Jon Favreau.
- During a scene in which Wilde, Daniel Craig, and Harrison Ford galloped across the desert with roughly 40 horses behind them, Wilde was bucked off after her horse jumped a large ditch, hitting her head and back.
- Wilde landed on the other side of a dirt lip where the oncoming horses couldn't see her through the dust; she recalled hearing them approach 'like thunder' and thought it would be 'quick... like pulverized applesauce.'
- Walton Goggins spotted Wilde fall and in a split second turned his horse sideways to block the onrushing herd, causing the riders around him to split — some assuming he had 'gone insane' — while shielding her body on the ground.
- Despite positive reviews — Variety called 'Cowboys & Aliens' 'a full-bodied, roundly satisfying yarn' — the film opened in July 2011 to a disappointing $175 million worldwide against a roughly $160 million production budget.
Why it matters: Thirteen years on, Olivia Wilde's podcast retelling resurfaces a near-tragedy from a 2011 box office disappointment — 'Cowboys & Aliens' grossed $175M worldwide against a ~$160M budget — as a viral life-saver story for Walton Goggins, with the rescue's split-second specificity giving it legs beyond typical Hollywood-set lore.
