Part III of our deep dive with the folks from WinTech who worked behind the scenes on some of the boats and equipment used in "The Boys in the Boat" movie, particularly Terry O'Neill, who wound up coaching the actors.

In addition to the boats WinTech built for the film and the other technical support that we looked at in Part 1 and Part 2 of this series, WinTech's UK-based Head of Global Operations Terry O'Neill wound up taking on just one more task to help the producers of the film: coaching the eight actors who needed to go from novices to oarsmen in a five month window--not unlike how the Washington walk-ons they would soon depict got started themselves in 1933 and 1934.

O'Neill, an Olympic coach for GB at the the 1988, 1992, and 1996 Games, had originally offered to ask around amongst his contacts in British rowing, while he was securing transport for the shells and ordering wooden oars to help the production get started, for someone who could coach the group.

When he found no takers for what would have been a six month commitment, O'Neill said he would do it himself, and Executive Producer Barbara A. Hall took him up on the offer. Suddenly, O'Neill, the retired Olympic coach, was back in a launch, getting the "boys" ready to race.

Film still, courtesy of MGM Studios

Two months before filming even started, O'Neill had the actors hard at work, learning to row at a camp he ran for them at Radley School starting in February of 2022.

"I worked out a schedule for the actors," said O'Neill, who sketched out a plan that should look pretty familiar to most rowers who can remember their own introduction to the sport.

"We started them on the rowing machine and we taught them the basic body movements. Then we went into the rowing tank and we introduced the oar control before we took them into a boat."

O'Neill said that the way the rowing looks in the final film was helped by the fact that they filmed the rowing scenes sequentially, starting at the point in the story when Joe Rantz and company were just trying out for the sport themselves.

"The first time they get into the barge, Old Nero, the actors had just finished their two months of basic training. They still were a bit rough around the edges, but that didn't matter, because they were supposed to be people who couldn't row."

Then, throughout the months of filming, according to O'Neill, "we were still getting practice and improving." After shooting wrapped for the day, the eight actors would go out for a training row, and kept up that routine throughout the filming--which itself progressed through the practices and each of the races depicted in the film to culminate in the 1936 Olympic final.

Film still, courtesy of MGM Studios

Having access to the resources at Radley for that initial camp played a crucial role in getting the actors to the level the film needed, said O'Neill.

"The support and help we got from Radley School was fantastic, because at that time, we didn't have any boats. We needed to teach these guys on rowing machines, the rowing tank and in tub fours. We got all of that equipment from Radley.

"Nothing was too much trouble for them. They provided us with catamarans, megaphones, and everything every day that we were there and whatever we asked for, they helped us with."

In addition to the eight actors cast to play each of the actual 'Boys' in the 1936 crew, O'Neill also had a group of experienced rowers hired as stand-ins to row the other boats which appear in the film, and those athletes played a role in getting the stars of the film up to speed as the group got out on the river in Radley's boats.

"We started them off in tub fours, using two of the stand-ins who could row and two of the actors. Then we gradually built up to put all eight actors into fours and mixed them up. And then eventually, after about four weeks, we put them into an eight.

O'Neill also had help in the launch from Nick Harding, an assistant coach that brought what O'Neill gratefully called "the patience of a saint" to the process of teaching the rowing stroke to the group.

Harding, who rowed at Oxford and had done some coaching before becoming a screenwriter in the industry, also provided O'Neill with a perspective on what the rowers needed to get right for the purposes of the film.

"Nick and I would be going out in the launch, and I would say, look at that. Tell him to control the oar depth. But Nick would tell him, 'Keep your head still." What Harding understood, said O'Neill, was that most of the shots would be of the actors' heads and bodies.

"They're not going to show a lot of the actual bladework, he would say, and as long as they keeping their head still and looking like they are in control, that's all you need to worry about in a film.

Film still, courtesy of MGM Studios

"It was perfect," said O'Neill about what Harding brought to the process, "because he had a far more realistic view than I did."

"I treated them as if they were Olympic athletes. I tried to get them into that frame of mind that when they got in the boat, they had to think about looking and rowing like Olympic champions. To a large extent that was quite important, because they did take it really seriously. I was impressed with the actors.

"They're actually quite a tough bunch because we started in February and it was freezing down in Oxford. Some days we were out in the snow, and it didn't matter. Rain, snow, hail, we went out and did the work, and they never complained. They never made any fuss and they got on with it. I was really impressed with their attitude."

O'Neill even used the original 1936 crew as a model for his charges, dipping into the trove of film from the era available on Youtube.

"I would show the actors videos of the actual crew and tell them you're really privileged because you're portraying some of the greatest athletes have ever walked on this planet. To do that justice, you've got to start thinking like that once you get down in that boat. You've got to switch on and forget that you're who you are. You're now an Olympic rower and you've got to get into that mentality."

In the end, thanks to the way director George Clooney planned out the filming of the rowing sequences to parallel the development of the actors themselves as rowers, the daily practices and all the hard work the actors put in during those initial cold February days at Radley paid off.

Clooney, at right, directing a scene set at the 1936 Olympics (courtesy MGM Studios)

"By the time they got to three months down the road, the actors were actually quite good," said O'Neill. "In the final shots of them racing at the Olympics, it is the actors rowing, and they went over the line at 46."

O'Neill still remembers the day they filmed that scene, towards the end of the production.

"The boys came off the water and they all charged into the room where I was and all jumped on me, yelling, we've done it, we went over the line at 46!

"They were so chuffed, and I did get a sense of achievement that they had done it, and so did they."

Callum Turner, the actor who plays Joe Rantz, talked about that moment of achievement in a press conference shortly before the film's premiere.

"There was a euphoric feeling when we did it because we were aiming towards that," Turner recalled. "There were so many moments, where you’re learning a new skill and one as difficult as this, that you just don’t think you’re going make it. And to actually do it was a wonderful thing, and you’re doing it with eight other people. It’s remarkable."

Joel Edgerton, who plays Coach Al Ulbrickson in the film, noted at the same press conference that he could see--and appreciate--the way the coaching and training brought the actors together as a crew as they worked on the film.

Edgerton, standing, as Coach Ulbrickson, with a crew of the 'stand-in' rowers is a scene from the film (courtesy MGM Studios)

"Watching these guys go through it, together, and watching the evolution, watching them change in the way that they worked together, it added this dimension which happens with those scenarios after months, where they galvanized as a group and had relationships that really suited the film," Edgerton said, calling it "a real pleasure to watch that from the outside.

"I just remember thinking, through all that pain is going to come so much benefit for the movie and pleasure for them having been through the experience."

For O'Neill, he was happy to be involved, from helping with the boats and oars to getting to coach again. He did admit that teaching novices to row is not easy, but he found it worth it to be able to play a role in bringing the story to the screen.

"To be perfectly honest, I read the book and thought it was absolutely fantastic. I couldn't put it down and with the thought that someone was going to make a film of that book, I would have done anything I could to help."

"The Boys in the Boat" opens in theaters on December 25th.

For more on this story, read Part 1 of the feature here and Part 2 of the feature here.