By JANE HOUIN
Ohio Correspondent

COLUMBUS, Ohio — The Ohio Equine Affaire played host to a number of celebrities in the horse world this past weekend, but one in particular charmed the hearts of both young and old. After being introduced to enthusiastic applause, RJ Masterbug nodded and waved to his adoring fans and even took a bow - of the four-legged variety.

RJ, as he is affectionately known, is one of the five horses that played Hidalgo in the movie by the same name. The 9-year-old chestnut, overo Paint stallion now calls Winrock Farm in Amenia, N.Y., his home, where he is owned and loved by Cari Swanson.

RJ was “discovered” as an untamed, unbroken 3-year-old stud colt by renowned movie horse trainer Rex Peterson as he looked for a horse to help play the role of Hidalgo. Though Swanson said RJ’s owners had not planned on even showing the unruly colt to Peterson, 10 minutes was all it took for Peterson to know this was the horse he was looking for.

Swanson reported that RJ came out of the barn to meet Peterson with a handler on each side of him just to maintain some semblance of control. But the colt showed his intelligence and personality to Peterson and never took his eyes off of Peterson in the 10 minutes Peterson worked with him that first day.

For Hidalgo, Peterson was able to teach the lead actor, Viggo Mortensen, to lay down a horse safely, a critical skill during filming when the trainer could not remain close to give cues and the action required significant trust between man and horse.

Full of personality and a born shutterbug according to Swanson, RJ was the horse seen in several of the movie’s most famous scenes, such as running through a tent full of people to rescue a girl, fighting leopards in a ship hold, and picking up Mortensen’s hat, shaking it and handing it to him to tell him to “get going” and get back in the race.

In fact, RJ loves that last trick so much, he even attempted to swipe the hat right off the head of an adoring 2-year old cowboy fan during his Sunday appearance in the Young Riders Youth Pavilion as part of the Stone Horse Celebrity Horse Showcase.
With a face full of character and an arsenal of poses at his disposal, RJ also did most of the movie’s close up shots where he turns around and looks at Mortensen’s character.

Swanson reported several tales of RJ’s movie star experiences – including getting his hair and makeup for shoots on Hidalgo so the five horses that played the role looked identical. Though apparently the makeup artist accidentally hit RJ with some makeup one day, and RJ held a grudge, refusing to stand still for makeup again unless accompanied by Peterson.

This was just a sign, Swanson said, of how much faith and trust RJ placed in Peterson.

For example, Peterson trained RJ to come running from a long distance straight to him in order to film the scene where he rescues the damsel in distress from the tent.

Peterson stressed to the film crew that the extras had to stay still in their spots and not move, or they ran the risk of being virtually steamrolled by RJ.

Unfortunately, during filming of the scene an extra accidentally stepped into RJ’s path as he was heading full bore toward Peterson. Fortunately, Peterson was able to give RJ the command to stop in time, and he stopped just moments from “crushing the man’s skull,” Swanson reported.

Following his movies success, Swanson said RJ became somewhat typecast by Hollywood and had to take some time off before hitting his stride again.

But these days he keeps busy with fan appearances, fundraising events, some new movie projects and even fashion model shoots in New York City.

He recently completed filming of a PBS movie titled American General: Benedict Arnold, which is scheduled to air next fall.
RJ is also serving as the official spokeshorse for Swanson’s Horse Rescue, Rehabilitation and Retirement Foundation, which was founded in 1995 to rehabilitate and find new homes for horses from the sport horse world of competition and Thoroughbred racing.

Peter Stone of Stone Horse has also created a limited edition model of RJ Masterbug, which is available at stone horses.com for $94.99 in the traditional model horse scale and for $39.99 in the smaller-scale size.

For more about RJ as well as the Horse Rescue, Rehabilitation and Retirement Foundation, visit cariswanson.com