'Lost' member of Jackass left after suffering brutal injury
If you watched Jackass in the early noughties, you mostly like remember Johnny Knoxville, Steve-O or Wee-man – but not Stephanie Hodge.
However, the LA model/actress actually played a huge part in the first few seasons and was the show’s first female stunt women.
Well, that was until she suffered a brutal injury that would cause her bow out from the series for good.
Prior to appearing alongside the MTV pranksters, Hodge met Knoxville while working their first big screen feature, 2000’s Coyote Ugly.
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The unlikely meeting led to them become friends between take, as they shared interested in skateboarding subculture.
By the time Jackass was in production, Hodge was friends with most of the main cast and immediately, said yes to being in the series – thinking it would flop.
In an interview with Asylum, she admitted that she didn’t even tell her family about the show – despite appearing in several stunts.
"I was like, 'Yeah, I'll do it'," she said, adding: "I'll get paid a couple of hundred bucks and nobody will see it.”
Hodge made her debut by taking part in a boiled egg eating contest with Preston Lucy and Craig Nieratko as the token ‘hot girl’.
Having scoffed down nine eggs and speedily puked them back up, the moment back made TV history and gave birth to the franchise.
“I was in New York working and the episode I was on aired, and my phone started ringing like crazy,” she recalled with the phone constantly ringing.
She even remembers her family’s reaction: “My parents called me. My brother saw it. Everybody f**king saw it. They all said that they wished I would have told them because they all got calls saying, 'Your daughter is puking on TV.'"
However, the hilarious escapades wouldn’t last forever.
Hodge was the first cast member to have a serious injury as they filmed atop a snow-covered mountain in Portland, Oregon.
The stunt saw the cast hurtle down a hill on everyday objects, including a portable toilet, a step ladder and a mattress – complete with bedding.
Having seen the rest of the cast perform the stunt, Hodge volunteered for the last object.
“They were like, 'It would be so much funnier if it was a girl instead of a guy' and I said 'OK, I'll do it', not really realizing what that meant," she admitted.
As she descended the mountain, she hit a snowbank and was launched into the air, resulting in her snapping her pelvis and spine, This more than definitely marked the end of Hodge’s stunt career.
"The accident was just that: an accident," she told the publication, adding: “Obviously they don't want anybody to get hurt, no matter what the situation -- not friends or anyone working with them. I think it was just an unfortunate situation”.
After the accident, Hodge slowly began to recover with hours of physical therapy and said that MTV took ‘really good care’ of her as her body repaired.
Despite what happened, it only strengthened her friendship with her co-stars and she even went on to star as a ring girl in the 2002 Jackass film.
While it took a huge toll on her body, Hodge said she was ‘100 percent proud’ to have a contribution to the infamous prank franchise.
Topics: Celebrity, Film and TV, Jackass, Johnny Knoxville
Katherine Sidnell