In a sane world he would have been handed the gun, cleared it by checking it and visually inspecting it, and would have immediately fired the person in charge upon finding a live round in it.
Plus also NEVER pointing the gun at someone, especially someone not in the movie scene that was being rehearsed.
Actors are not expected to be experts in handling firearms, which is why they hire Armorers for the movie to maintain the guns.
This is on the Armorer, who was an inexperienced woman who was working as Armorer on a movie set for only the second time in her life.
This all day long!! It’s the responsibility of the person handling the weapon to be aware of its condition.
“ In a sane world he would have been handed the gun, cleared it by checking it and visually inspecting it, and would have immediately fired the person in charge upon finding a live round in it.”
Sums it up nicely. My wife and her friends were discussing this for a half hour last night. His emotions, his courage, his agony. The Union, and who else wax involved in it. I looked at them and said,”Alec Baldwin, on the set of a movie was handed a weapon. He didn’t check to see if the weapon was loaded. He fired the weapon and killed one and injured another.”
Hard to do with a muzzle-loader, as others have depicted the gun model, a Colt pre-cartridge revolver. How do you check it? Without a depth gauge? Usually the open end of the cylinders are capped with grease to keep the ball from falling out--for sure if there's only a paper wad over the powder and not a ball.