Melissa McCarthy Took Painful Fall on Set of New Comedy, “Spy”

Fox(AUSTIN, Texas) — In Spy, Melissa McCarthy portrays a desk-tied CIA analyst who gets a lucky shot at going undercover when other agents are compromised. It’s a role that has the comedian doing crazy stunts, but the actress said it came with a price.

“I slipped on wet marble and I went down,” McCarthy told E! News at the movie comedy’s premiere at the South by Southwest Festival in Austin, Texas. “I threw my back out so badly, we spent the whole week trying to get me walking again. It was intense and it was kind of at the beginning of the movie. It was a little dicey.”

McCarthy said she didn’t expect the stunts to be so difficult.

“I have to say, I didn’t know how hard it would be, but yet, I weirdly loved it. I tried to do everything,” she explained. “I had an amazing stunt woman who could do things better but I was like [my character] is not supposed to be bionic.”

Director Paul Feig was initially worried when McCarthy took her painful fall, but was later convinced the actress could continue.

“She’s such a strong person. She’s an athletic person and the things I was asking her to do, I knew she could pull off,” he said. “The minute she put her leg up in the door in Bridesmaids, it was like, ‘OK, I’m not worried about Melissa anymore.”

Spy, which also stars Jude Law, Jason Statham, Rose Byrne and Bobby Cannavale, will hit theaters June 5.

McCarthy and Feig will work together for a third time in the forthcoming all-female remake of Ghostbusters with McCarthy’s Bridesmaids co-star, Kristen Wiig, along with Saturday Night Live stars Leslie Jones and Kate McKinnon. The film opens in theaters July 22, 2016.

“I’m pretty excited,” McCarthy said of the film. “Kristen and I got together recently and I was like, ‘This is going to be so much fun.'”

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