Bull rider who trained Luke Perry describes actor's lasting impact on rodeo

By Rissa Shaw | Posted: Tue 12:22 PM, Mar 05, 2019 | Updated: Tue 12:25 PM, Mar 05, 2019

FERRIS, Texas (KWTX) -- Most associate Luke Perry with the hit 90s TV show "Beverly Hills, 90210." It's not the beaches in California, but instead the arenas in Texas many in the rodeo community feel the late actor should be remembered by. ... As he was playing heartthrob Dylan McKay on 90210, trying his hand at movies, he decided to take on the role of legendary bull rider Lane Frost in the 1994 rodeo biopic "8 Seconds."

"I've had 18 world champions come through my school, and Luke was probably one of my best students," said Gary Leffew, a ProRodeo Hall of Fame bull rider. "A lot of guys want to ride bulls, but they never put in the work. He showed up every day, he did the work, he did everything I told him."
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[Leffew's] credentials, mixed with a reputation for training some of the best bull riders in the world, led to calls from Hollywood. ... In 1993, he was hired to teach Perry how to be a bull rider for the movie "8 Seconds," but there was a catch: he had to do it without live bulls. ... "He might break a leg and they got $10 million invested, so they couldn't afford to let anything happen to him," said Leffew. "Since I couldn't put him on a bull to teach him, I had to teach him just through drills and visualization, and actors are so good at mimicking, that's why it was so easy to teach Luke."

Leffew said, like Perry, Oscar winning actor Cliff Robertson was also a good student. ... "I taught Robertson years ago for a movie called J.W. Coop, he picked it up real quick, too," said Leffew. ... To prepare for the filming of "8 Seconds," he said Perry would come train at his ranch in California, then he'd send him to Burbank for jumping horse lessons.
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