Homeopathy is endlessly versatile and has found a home in all sorts of places and kinds of professions. Hollywood and the making of movies is no exception.

In this article, director, John Board tells the story of the dolly grip who wouldn’t stop bleeding – and of the horse who knew just how he felt.

In 2001 I was working with on the feature film, “You Stupid Man”; a New York comedy written and directed by Brian Burns. Although we shot all the interiors in Toronto we spent the first 5 days in New York doing all the exterior shots. It was Brian’s first feature and starred Milla Jovovich amongst other very good actors.

We were on the New York City’s West side running track with Alec Baldwin and David Krumholtz. Our opening scene of the shoot; a long tracking dolly shot with our joggers in motion and talking. They were jogging and we were on the track in front of them. We rehearsed several times and had about 10 minutes of minor lighting to do before taking our first shot. It was exciting. I looked over to talk to the dolly grip but he had disappeared. A moment later Dana who was my other half at the time, ran up to me, very agitated.

“Your dolly grip sneezed and his nose started to bleed. He’s sitting on that bench over there with Kleenex shoved up his nostril and the blood is running down the back of his throat. He says he will have to go to the hospital to get it cauterized if it does not stop soon… Remember the horse story? Maybe that remedy will help. Do you have the remedy here.?” “Yes, in the front pocket of my bag. Ferrum Phosphorica.” (in Boericke Homoeopathic Materia Medica and Repertory, the reference book I use, it says to use it for Hemorrhages, bright from any orifice).

In Budapest when we were shooting M Butterfly our sound man brought along his wife Trich and one day trading stories about homeopathy she told us about her horse that bit into a broken pop bottle and cut open the roof of its mouth. The Vet came quickly but said there was nothing he could do as he could not be sew up the roof of the mouth even if he knocked the horse out: the horse would either live or bleed to death. Trish remembered some homeopathic remedy she was given for excessive menstrual bleeding. She got it and tossed a few globules into the horse’s mouth. Within 2 minutes the horse stopped bleeding.

I looked over at the bench and spotted the man who was about 45, built like a trucker with lots of muscles. Dana ran over to him and popped a pill in his mouth. I sure hoped it would work as the grip was a key member of the shot and had rehearsed the move.

Two or three minutes later the grip came back to set to pull the dolly. He came to me directly. “I never believed that stuff would work. I just took it so as not to offend your girl friend. I’ve taken lots of pills. Thanks.” I was so happy as it would have taken an extra 15 minutes to reset the shot with another grip pulling the dolly and not a great beginning for the shoot.

We spent 5 days shooting exteriors in New York. Every day that grip came and talked to me about different problems either he or his family were having and writing down bits of information from my books. He was very grateful and treated me like a visiting king.

It was such a pleasure to see someone have an epiphany about Homeopathy in front of my eyes.

More Information

For more information about John and his experiences with homeopathy in Hollywood, visit The John Board Hollywood Survival Kit.