Linden Ashby (Cameron) has flexed his muscle — literally — throughout his career
Last Christmas while on the set of THE YOUNG & THE RESTLESS, Cameron’s portrayer, Linden Ashby found himself rolling his eyes. It was during the scene in which a distressed Sharon supposedly killed her tormentor by clubbing him over the head with a champagne bottle. A stunt coordinator had been brought in to help with the action. "He’s like, ‘You need to do this and you need to do that,’ and I’m like, ‘What are you talking about? I fall down,’" Ashby recalls with a chuckle. "He said, ‘Yeah, but you can fall wrong! I told him, ‘Go stand over there, get your paycheck and go home!’"
It’s not that Ashby is hostile to stunt men — indeed many of his good friends are professional daredevils — but the actor just happens to be well known for his action roles, including such high octane movies as Mortal Combat and Wyatt Earp, and his own fast-kicking TV series, SPY GAMES. "I’ve gone off 20-feet-high rooftops, with guns blazing where you can’t even see the landing," he laughs. "They didn’t have any compunction about making me do that. They’re like, ‘Okay, Linden, you’ve got two guns, you’re shooting them, run off the edge of the roof — it will be great! I’m like, ‘Oh, okay.’ I don’t think to ask why we’re doing this on the last day of filming."
Let’s Get Physical
Ashby can trace his penchant for physical activity back to his childhood in Florida, where he surfed competitively and his family kept horses. "Growing up, we were like, ‘Yeehaw!’ If we were going to play cowboys and Indians, we were going to do it on horseback, you know, galloping around and getting thrown off," he remembers with a smile. "We had one horse that didn’t like water… so naturally, we tried to ride him into the lake!"
Unbreakable
That devil-may-care spirit led the hunk to take up boxing and martial arts in college, both of which served him well in his future role of action hero. Of course, years of doing many of his own stunts have taken their toll. "The worst was on SPY GAMES because we were doing two fight scenes a week, working all kind of hours," Ashby laughs. "I would get up in the morning and I’m like, ‘Ahhh.’ I had to move really slow — and I was younger then too!"
Nowadays, the Florida native confesses that it isn’t getting any easier. "I spar now Wednesday nights," he shares, joking, "and it’s like I see the punch coming, I see the kick coming. Ten years ago, I would have blocked it. Now it hits me in the side of the head and then my block goes up! You lose a beat."
Despite the aches and pains, though, Ashby isn’t about to call it quits. In fact, he recently talked with the producers of Mortal Combat about doing a third installment. "I’ll fight to save mankind. Battle evil," he chuckles. "Good will triumph… Now I just need to be ready!"
Linden Ashby
