Alec Baldwin thought Haylna Hutchins had fainted when she fell to the ground while filming his gun on 'Rust'.
Alec Baldwin has given an interview about the Rust tragedy
The 63-year-old actor insisted he never pulled the trigger when the cinematographer was killed and director Joel Souza on the set of the Western in October but explained they were filming an insert shot of him drawing the gun, and Halyna wanted to get an angle of him pulling back the hammer on the weapon.
Stressing he'd been told it was a "cold gun" - meaning there was no live rounds inside - he said: “I let go of the hammer. Bang! The gun goes off. I'd pulled the hammer as far back as I could without cocking the gun...
"The gun was supposed to be empty... nothing with a charge at all."
Alec was baffled when Halyna fell to the ground and it took some time for him to even consider the possibility that she'd been shot by a live round.
He continued in an emotional interview with ABC News' George Stephanopoulos which aired on Thursday (02.12.21): "I thought to myself, 'Did she faint?' The notion that there was a live round in that gun didn't occur to me for 45 minutes to an hour.
“No one could understand. Did she have a heart attack? The idea that someone put a live bullet in the gun was not even in reality.”
“She just laid there kind of in shock."
It was only when the '30 Rock' star was speaking with investigators in the sheriff's department that he was told both Halyna and Joel had been hit by a live bullet and that the cinematographer had passed away.
Critics had slammed Alec for not checking the gun was loaded for himself, but he insisted he's been told on past productions not to do anything with firearms after they had already been deemed safe.
He said: "In the 40 years I've been in this business up until that day, I've never had a problem...
"I'm married, I got six kids, I just want to live my life in peace. And I've got all these people saying, 'Your a murderer.' It's tough."
The veteran actor has been left haunted by the incident and dreams about guns going off.
He said: "These images have come into my mind and kept me awake at night, and I haven't slept in weeks."
Although Alec feels terrible about the tragedy, he doesn't feel guilty because he insisted he wasn't responsible.
He said: "Someone is responsible for what happened, but I know it's not me. I might have killed myself if I thought I was responsible, and I don't say that lightly."
The 'Blue Jasmine' actor was quizzed about reports from crew members who claimed they had raised concerns about safety on the set.
He insisted: "I never heard one word about that.
"I did not observe any safety or security issue in the time that I was there."
Alec grew emotional as he spoke of how much he'd been enjoying making the film before the accident.
He said: "To leave my family for four weeks to shoot this movie, that was a big deal...
"I thought, 'This movie has made me love making movies again.' I used to love making movies. I did. I really thought we were on to something."
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