What example illustrates the kind of risks that were once taken with the safety of actors on film sets?

Cinema remained artisanal and daredevil until very late.

In the 1950s, actors were easily allowed to take incredible risks.

An example, Under the Greatest Show On Earth, the blockbuster by Cecil B. DeMille which revealed Charlton Heston in 1952. 

In one of the film’s most spectacular sequences, the train carrying the circus staff and animals is hit by another train.

The wild animals then escape from their cages.

In his biography, Charlton Heston: Hollywood’s Last Icon , author Marc Eliot quotes the actor about this shoot.

“Cecil B. DeMille wanted wild animals to roam freely through the setting, to give the impression of terrifying chaos. I was lying under the wreckage of a wagon. I was set up so that I couldn’t move too much, to make it more realistic.

But I didn’t know that DeMille had released a panther on the set…

She came closer to me and put her big paw on my face… I wasn’t feeling great. At the same time, an elephant approached, which made the panther leave. The elephant was angry and started destroying the set. He tore up beams with his trunk. Terrifying… I managed to slip under the wagon avoiding the tusk blows and the enormous feet of the beast and I escaped unscathed…”

Needless to say, such a scene would be impossible to reproduce today for a thousand reasons!