Julia Maggio, Winona Ryder\u2019s \u201cStranger Things\u201d stunt double. on the set of \u2018Stranger Things\u2019 season 5 in 2025.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\nMaggio, who was nominated for an \u201coutstanding stunt performance\u201d Emmy for \u201cCobra Kai,\u201d recalled, \u201cJoyce, the character\u2026..we had this axe on our back for an entire season. I wondered why. And it was so exciting to show up that day and realize why.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
The stunt performer said that series creators the Duffer brothers hadn\u2019t told her that Joyce would be killing Vecna prior to filming that scene.<\/p>\n
\u201cI did not know [that would happen] until we got to set that day. So, it was as surprising to me as other people as well. It was a super fun secret to keep for an entire year, or year and a half before this show came out.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Maggio, who has also done stunts for \u201cJessica Jones,\u201d explained that stunts aren\u2019t just about doing an action scene. <\/p>\n
\u201cThere were a lot of things that went into to making sure that it was safe for Winona to do. That\u2019s the thing about stunts in general \u2014 a lot of our work is safety, and testing things out to see who can do what, or how much the actor can do. I got the really fun job of testing out the rig that we had for this.\u201d<\/p>\nJulia Maggio, Winona Ryder\u2019s \u201cStranger Things\u201d stunt double. on the set of Season 5 in 2025.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\nMillie Bobby Brown and Winona Ryder in \u201cStranger Things.\u201d Season 5. \u00a9Netflix\/Courtesy Everett Collection<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\nShe explained that they had \u201cmultiple axes\u201d for the scene where Joyce chops off Vecna\u2019s head.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWe had a blunt blade axe on set, as well as a bunch of different prop axes. And we had a bunch of different things of a target for Joyce to hit.\u201d<\/p>\n
One of the targets \u2013 or the \u201crig\u201d \u2013 that stood in for Vecna was, \u201cthis insanely thick jelly. I thought the axe was going to slam straight through this gel for her to hit. And it was so thick\u2026 Everybody on set was touching it to see how thick it was.\u201d<\/p>\n
She explained that they set the jelly up as a target for Ryder to hit, when she was beheading Vecna.\u00a0<\/p>\nNoah Schnapp as Will Byers and Winona Ryder as Joyce Byers in \u201cStranger Things\u201d Season 5. COURTESY OF NETFLIX \u00a9 2025<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\nJulia Maggio, Winona Ryder\u2019s \u2018Stranger Things\u2019 stunt double. on the set of Season 5 in 2025.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\u201cIt was really cool to work with so many departments to make that moment come to life.\u201d<\/p>\n
No stunts were that dangerous or exhausting to handle in the final season, however. If anything, the weather was the most tiring.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe crazy night shoots that we did for episode four. It was July, it was summer. And as you see for Joyce, she\u2019s wearing a very thick jacket,\u201d she told The Post. \u201cSo we were in the July heat together, in this jacket and it was very hot running around.\u201d<\/p>\n
That episode ended with a climactic battle, where Will revealed that he had \u201csorcerer\u201d power.\u00a0<\/p>\nWinona Ryder as Joyce Byers in \u201cStranger Things\u201d Season 5. COURTESY OF NETFLIX \u00a9 2025<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\nDavid Harbour as Jim Hopper and Winona Ryder as Joyce Byers in \u201cStranger Things\u201d Season 5. COURTESY OF NETFLIX \u00a9 2025<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\u201cWe were shooting for 13 hour days, this entire huge casting crew to make these amazing scenes come to life,\u201d she recalled.\u00a0<\/p>\n
When she joined \u201cStranger Things\u201d in Season 5, Maggio went to several wardrobe and wig fittings. But she didn\u2019t know that she had secured the job until an encounter with the creators.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u201cThe Duffer brothers came up behind me and put an arm around me and said, \u2018Good morning, Winona.\u2019 And I turned around, I was like, \u2018hi, my name\u2019s Julia. I\u2019m her stunt double today.\u2019 And they looked at me and were like, \u2018This is gonna work.\u2019\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
\u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source celebrity.land \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Joyce Byers is seeing double.\u00a0 Winona Ryder\u2019s epic takedown of the evil Vecna in the final \u201cStranger Things\u201d season took a lot of manpower \u2014\u00a0led by her stunt double, Julia Maggio. \u201cIt takes a village to do a scene like that,\u201d she exclusively told The Post. \u201cStranger Things\u201d aired its series finale on New Year\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2242624,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25174],"tags":[21741,25404,23191,305890,347963,22205,21913,364445],"class_list":["post-2242623","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-gossip","tag-entertainment","tag-exclusive","tag-netflix","tag-stranger-things","tag-stunts","tag-television","tag-tv","tag-winona-ryder"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/Exclusive-Winona-Ryders-Stranger-Things-stunt-double-reveals-she.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2242623","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2242623"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2242623\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2242625,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2242623\/revisions\/2242625"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2242624"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2242623"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2242623"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2242623"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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