STEAMED OVER INADEQUATE DISABILITY.

Byline: Valerie Kuklenski Staff Writer

IT'S CLEAR this is not just another awards show when two guests stroll down the red carpet, waving, smiling and holding hands as their evening wear goes up in flames.

There's even more that sets Friday's second annual World Stunt Awards apart from all the other kudofests. Consider that many in this specialized Hollywood trade don't want awards because they wouldn't dream of stealing a star's thunder.

``You know, a lot of times in films lately, they haven't even been giving us credits as stunt performers, but they'll give (the caterers) credits,'' said Debbie Evans, a veteran stunt motorcyclist and driver. ``And I don't think that's right at all. In this day and age when people know there are stunt performers, I see no reason at all why we can't be recognized.''

But it's mainly about the Taurus Foundation, which is presenting its first grants to injured stuntmen. Bob Brown said that's what inspired him to do his record-setting jump, which one expert says could have earned him $70,000 if it were done for a big-budget blockbuster. (The studios have yet to donate to the foundation. Paramount and 20th Century Fox executives did not return calls seeking comment.)

``That's the overriding thing here,'' Brown said. ``We can actually create a fund for the injured, or stuntmen who get killed, for their children. We don't have that. You get disability, and that's nothing. And these stuntmen go out there and hang it out day in, day out.''

Mitch Geller, executive producer of the World Stunt Awards, says other stunt foundations have folded or failed to get off the ground. It took some effort to persuade thousands of stunt performers that this one was solid.

``Any one of these (nominees) could be the guy next year who gets hurt on a set,'' Geller said. ``By giving up their anonymity for a night, they're helping us create a cause.''

So, for a night, they enjoy watching clips of their industry's finest, and they laugh when host Arnold Schwarzenegger notes the irony in the metal detectors outside the hangar. ``Don't they know that stunt people's bodies are being held together by metal screws and metal plates?'' he says.

And they enjoy the recognition.

``Without stunt people, Hollywood would go dead,'' actor Michael Clarke Duncan said before the show. ``Because these are the people who take the falls, the hits, the jumps, the leaps, the car chases, the fight scenes. We could not possibly do this without the stunt people.''

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Stuntman Tanner Gill strolls the red carpet engulfed in flames at the World Stunt Awards.