In ski jumping, he might break his neck; here he only risked tripping over his lines and failing to win laughs.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n British ski jumper Michael Edwards known as Eddie The Eagle celebrates a jump, during the Winter Olympics 90 meter ski jumping competition at Calgary\u2019s Olympic Park, on Feb. 23, 1988. (AP Photo\/Jack Smith, File)<\/p>\n British ski jumper Michael Edwards known as Eddie The Eagle celebrates a jump, during the Winter Olympics 90 meter ski jumping competition at Calgary\u2019s Olympic Park, on Feb. 23, 1988. (AP Photo\/Jack Smith, File)<\/p>\n Add AP News on Google <\/p>\n Add AP News as your preferred source to see more of our stories on Google.<\/p>\n Share<\/p>\n Read More<\/p>\n Edwards has added acting to the bustling business of being Eddie the Eagle, feathering his nest and stretching his celebrity far longer than his brief flight as Britain\u2019s first Olympic ski jumper won him fame despite finishing last in the 1988 Calgary Games. <\/p>\n There is almost nothing he hasn\u2019t done since he entered the spotlight. He has recorded songs, danced on ice, dressed twice as a chicken (eagle suits are scarce), been interviewed in an Amsterdam brothel, filmed car and spectacle commercials, and spoken for hours at a time about what he knows best: how he landed here.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n AP Mobile App CTA<\/p>\n Get the AP News App<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m always very, very grateful that I got christened Eddie The Eagle and it\u2019s amazing that I\u2019m talking about it 38 years later,\u201d he told The Associated Press. \u201cI\u2019m hoping that I encourage other people to get out there, get off their bum and go for their dream.\u201d<\/p>\n Unlikely beginnings<\/p>\n It didn\u2019t appear early on that Edwards was headed for fame.<\/p>\n He grew up \u2014 and still lives \u2014 on the edge of the Cotswolds, in western England where snow is rare and the hills would never be mistaken for mountains. His father expected his son to follow him into plastering \u2014 as he did after his father and grandfather. <\/p>\n But an adolescent Edwards had different designs after a school trip to the Italian Alps sparked a passion for skiing. He became a fixture at Gloucester Ski Centre, where a bristly plastic surface shorter than three football fields offers year-round skiing. <\/p>\n He became a good downhiller, but didn\u2019t make the British ski team for the 1984 Sarajevo Olympics. Undeterred, he set his sights higher after realizing Britain had no ski jumpers.<\/p>\n A legend is born<\/p>\n Edwards went to Lake Placid, New York, where he rummaged for skis and gear, including a helmet with no strap that he secured with string and oversized boots he padded out with five pairs of socks. <\/p>\n At 22, he was learning what the world\u2019s best jumpers began mastering as children. <\/p>\n \u201cIt was like a crash course. And, yeah, I did take huge risks,\u201d he said. \u201cWhen I finished ski jumping, I was just as scared to do my last jump as I was to do my first. You never get used to it.\u201d<\/p>\n Short on cash and lacking sponsors, he scrounged food from trash bins, slept in barns, a car and even a mental hospital in Finland \u2014 not to mention medical hospitals.<\/p>\n \u201cIt would be easier to name the bones I haven\u2019t broken,\u201d he quipped. <\/p>\n He fractured his skull twice \u2014 while wearing a helmet \u2014 broke his jaw, smashed his collarbone in five places, broke three ribs and damaged a kidney and a knee. It didn\u2019t stop him. <\/p>\n He worked up to bigger jumps and competed internationally. Despite efforts by British sports federations to prevent him competing, he eventually jumped far enough to represent Great Britain at the Olympics. <\/p>\n From chump to champ<\/p>\n Edwards arrived in Calgary to a sign welcoming \u201cEddie the Eagle\u201d \u2014 unaware it was for him. <\/p>\n Reporters loved his enthusiastic underdog determination and physical appearance. He was hefty by ski jumping standards, had a lantern jaw, wispy moustache and eyes that bulged behind thick lenses in his pink-rimmed aviator-style glasses.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n British ski jumper Michael Edwards known as Eddie The Eagle flies towards 58th, and last place, in the 70 meter ski jump at the Winter Olympics, in Calgary, February 14, 1988. (AP Photo\/Katsumi Kasahara, File)<\/p>\n British ski jumper Michael Edwards known as Eddie The Eagle flies towards 58th, and last place, in the 70 meter ski jump at the Winter Olympics, in Calgary, February 14, 1988. (AP Photo\/Katsumi Kasahara, File)<\/p>\n Add AP News on Google <\/p>\n Add AP News as your preferred source to see more of our stories on Google.<\/p>\n Share<\/p>\n Read More<\/p>\n Few outside the ski jumping world remember the winner, \u201cFlying Finn\u201d Matti Nyk\u00e4nen, who soared over 120 meters and swept all events.<\/p>\n The most famous remains the man who finished last \u2014 19 meters behind his nearest competitor, but setting a new British record of 71 meters (77 yards).<\/p>\n Edwards flapped his arms madly after landing and the crowd of 85,000 went wild.<\/p>\n He returned to a hero\u2019s welcome, escorted by police through throngs at London\u2019s Heathrow Airport.<\/p>\n \u201cMy feet didn\u2019t touch the ground for, oh gosh, about three and a half, four years,\u201d he said. \u201cI was traveling all over the world opening shopping centers, golf courses, hotels, fun rides, doing lots of TV shows and radio shows, meeting film stars, TV stars, musicians, bands, famous people, royalty, all over world and it was amazing.\u201d<\/p>\n Eagle\u2019s wings clipped<\/p>\n The ski jumping world was less enamored and made sure there will never be another ski jumper like Edwards. <\/p>\n \u201cWe have thousands of Eddie Edwards in Norway,\u201d groused Torbjorn Yggeseth, the ski jump technical director for the International Ski and Snowboard Federation (FIS), the sport\u2019s regulatory body. \u201cBut we never let them jump.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n British former ski jumper Michael Edwards, known as Eddie the Eagle, displays one of his first ever taken press photos during an interview at the Ski and Snowboard Center, in Gloucester, England, Wednesday, Nov. 19, 2025. (AP Photo\/Frank Augstein)<\/p>\n British former ski jumper Michael Edwards, known as Eddie the Eagle, displays one of his first ever taken press photos during an interview at the Ski and Snowboard Center, in Gloucester, England, Wednesday, Nov. 19, 2025. (AP Photo\/Frank Augstein)<\/p>\n Add AP News on Google <\/p>\n Add AP News as your preferred source to see more of our stories on Google.<\/p>\n Share<\/p>\n Read More<\/p>\n What\u2019s known as the \u201cEddie the Eagle rule\u201d set a minimum distance beyond his reach and ended Edwards\u2019 jumping ambitions.<\/p>\n As promotional opportunities evaporated, Edwards returned to plastering.<\/p>\n Then a winning turn on Splash! a reality diving contest, helped revive his second career in 2013. Three years later, the biopic \u201cEddie the Eagle\u201d starring Taron Egerton as Edwards and Hugh Jackman as his coach allowed him to retire his trowel.<\/p>\n He now earns 3,000 to 12,000 pounds ($4,000-16,000) for talks several days a week, helping him recover from financial setbacks.<\/p>\n Much of the small fortune he earned from his first wave of fame vanished because a trust fund required to maintain his amateur status was poorly managed, he said. An emotionally taxing divorce in 2016 with the mother of his two daughters drained more savings.<\/p>\n Long-awaited medal<\/p>\n The \u201cBeauty and the Beast\u201d adaptation at the Watersmeet Theatre in Rickmansworth, outside London, is his second foray into pantomime.<\/p>\n Panto, as it\u2019s known, is a uniquely British take on classic fairytales at Christmastime that blends music, dance, slapstick, cross-dressing, jokes for kids and bawdy humor for their parents and often stars minor celebrities alongside aspiring actors.<\/p>\n Zany plot twists sneak in references to Edwards\u2019 fame even though half the audience wasn\u2019t old enough to have even seen the movie when it came out \u2014 never mind watching him in the Olympics.<\/p>\n \u201cJump\u201d by Van Halen plays as his character, Professor Crackpot, the bumbling father of Belle, enters the stage toting his latest invention \u2014 jet-propelled skis. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n
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