SANTA FE, N.M. — Since the deadly “Rust” movie set shooting near Santa Fe in October 2021, there has been a bigger focus on movie set safety.

Roger Ivens can tell you all about it. Ivens took some friendly advice to heart in 2018.

“You should be an actor. You have the look of a bad guy. It’s like you’re so nice in real life, but you can look mean,” Ivens said.

He picked up a few small roles, landed an agent and a manager, and moved to New Mexico in 2020 for a role in “Stranger Things.”

“I’m in season four, episode eight. I’m the Helicopter Sniper,” he said.

It was his biggest role to date, and his first one in New Mexico.

About a year later, he auditioned for “Rust.” Now, he has mixed feelings about not getting the part.

“I would like to be a director one day. I usually stand behind the director, and I like to be engaged into everything that’s going on,” Ivens said. “Definitely was alarming to me at the time. And, you know, I could have very well been a part of that.”

Ivens said he has felt the effects of “Rust” on every set he has been a part of since.

“They even talk about ‘Rust.’ Like, you know, we need to learn from past mistakes in the film industry,” he said.

Ivens most recently landed a role in Kevin Costner’s “New Horizon: An American Saga” movie series. He says that production stayed away from real guns.

“The chamber of every rifle is welded shut. So there’s absolutely no way that any projectile could have come from there. But at the same time, we still did all those safety checks,” Ivens said.

State Sen. Jeff Steinborn is the president of Film Las Cruces. It’s the economic development organization for film in Doña Ana County and southern New Mexico communities.

“I started it as a legislator after seeing the success of the film industry in northern New Mexico and wanted to try to foster that success and those opportunities in my community,” Steinborn said.

His community saw the immediate and long-term impact of the “Rust” shooting. The city had two action movies in the works with Bruce Willis and Mel Gibson shortly after the shooting.

“We adapted quickly, and I think we, we learn from it for sure. Everyone involved in the film industry,” Steinborn said.

Steinborn says the New Mexico Legislature hasn’t had conversations about film set safety. He questions whether there is a need for it.

“Weapons and rounds have been used safely on literally thousands of movies. And, you know, I think the union has a very good safety record. And this one incident had a horrible, devastating result, but it doesn’t necessarily mean that there’s insufficient rules,” Steinborn said.

It’s a tragedy that sparked tough questions and put a lasting focus on safety.

“I think it’s made the film union more vigilant and aggressive and focusing in on work hours, other kinds of protocols to protect workers. And that’s, I think, the place to focus,” Steinborn said.

“We have learned, the film industry has learned, that we need to be safer with guns and not use real guns,” Ivens said.

KOB 4 reached out to the Albuquerque Film Office, the New Mexico Film Office and the local branch of IATSE for comments on the lasting impact. No one was available to sit down for an interview.