Etymology of Movie Grips

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hello, how are you doing?

This is Bob Paré, and I’m calling you from just outside of Hartford, Connecticut.

Welcome to the show, Bob.

How can we help you?

I work in the motion picture industry as a grip and electrician, and there’s a lot of lore around where that word grip actually comes from. I wondered if you had any information about that.

Tell us what a grip does.

Yeah. A grip is someone who, once the electricians place the lights, the grips are the ones who kind of shape the light. They’ll either block it or they’ll block a little bit of it. The grips are also responsible for placing the camera wherever it goes, if it’s mounted on a car or hanging from a tree. And I’m primarily responsible for items like safety on the set.

And have you heard some of the folk etymologies about the origin of grip?

I’ve heard some of it. And so far, the most popular is that back in the day, when we first started in the motion picture industry, the grips were pretty much the only ones who carried tools around on the set. And a bag of that particular size was typically called a grip. That’s not that colorful and not that appealing. So I’ve been trying to stop my own rumor, which is I’ve been trying to perpetuate the rumor that grips were named after Charles Dickens’ raven, whom he used in his story Barnaby Rudge, because ravens are among the smartest of birds. They make their nests out of whatever they can find, and they’re highly intelligent. Kind of like grips. They have to get it done quick and get it done creatively, often under a great deal of pressure. So it’s just quite a bit more colorful explanation. So I’m hoping it has more to do with that.

That is indeed a colorful story, Bob, which I’ve never heard before and probably is nowhere near accurate. But we like it. Unfortunately, Occam’s razor applies here. It’s one of two really easy descriptions. The one about the grip, the kind of bag that you might carry tools in, is a really solid lead. But a lead that I like even more is that there is in French grip, gripe, which means to seize or to hold. It’s got a variety of meanings. And it is believed by people that I trust that the word entered the American film industry from the French film industry where the word was used before. And it came over, like fully formed is the word grip, which is more or less the same in French and English. And it referred both to the act and to the person and then later to the person.

I understand in the U.K. It’s a little different. The word came to the United States and then went to the U.K. But either one of those, the story that I’ve heard, which I don’t put any credence in at all, is the one that the grip was the guy who was wrapping his body around the hand cranked camera so that it wouldn’t move while the shot was being made.

Oh, that’s too bad.

I like that.

Yeah. So they would just stop it from bouncing. But that is kind of they figured that out. They didn’t have to put a body on it. There’s such things as bricks and weights and concrete blocks and lead plates. There are other ways that they would do that without having to hire a guy just to wrap himself around the camera.

So the simplest, least colorful explanation, huh?

Yeah, unfortunately.

Oh, well. That doesn’t stop us from perpetuating my rumor anyway. I’ve been doing it, so we’ll see what happens.

Well, if it comes back to us, we’ll know who started it.

Yeah. That’s right.

Thank you so much for your call.

Thank you.

Thanks a lot.

Take care now.

Bye, Bob.

Bye.

Bye.

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