Rodney Mullen

John Rodney Mullen (born August 17, 1966) is an American professional skateboarder, whose speciality is freestyle and street skateboarding. Widely considered as the godfather of modern street skating, Mullen is credited for inventing numerous tricks such as the flatground ollie, kickflip, heelflip, impossible, and 360-flip, which has since become an essential part of a skater's repertoire.

Mullen dominated the freestyle scene in the 1980s, winning 34 out of 35 freestyle contests during that decade. He was also part of the famed Bones Brigade skateboard team, whose other members including Tony Hawk were also influential in their own right. Mullen later gained mainstream popularity in the Tony Hawk's Pro Skater series of video games starting with the second game, though ironically enough Rodney never showed interest in playing the game at all, though he did provide a lot of creative input in getting his tricks right and was reportedly quite interested in the behind-the-scenes side of things, especially considering his engineering background and interest in technology.

Rodney Mullen provides examples of the following tropes:

As Himself: Most of his film appearances count as this. Zig-zagged in Ghost Recon Breakpoint in that he stated in a now-lost interview that he did not find it difficult to portray his character as he was just being himself when he depicted Jace Skell in the game.
Badass Grandpa: Mullen still actively skates to this day even in his late fifties, even going so far as to skating late at night and well into the early hours of the morning out of a desire to have some solitude; he tends to get anxious with crowds thus his need to find some alone time every now and then.
Hidden Depths: Besides skateboarding, Rodney also has an engineering background; he took up a course in chemical engineering at the University of Florida, leaving during his senior year prior to completing his degree in order to take over management of World Industries with fellow Bones Brigade team member and company co-founder Steve Rocco.
Nice Guy: As shown in this TikTok video.
Renaissance Man: Besides being a skateboarding pioneer and innovator, Mullen has a background in engineering and physics as stated above. He also has a number of patents to his name, such as a skateboard truck design of his creation, and he also formed the basis for the modern popsicle form factor used by most boards to this day. It helps that he came from an intellectual family-his mother was a concert pianist who graduated high school at the age of 14 and his father was a dentist and property developer who previously served the military; Mullen's father initially opposed his son's idea of taking up skating as he considered it a risky, low-brow pursuit, but he relented under the condition that the young Rodney would wear safety gear and quit once he finished high school or got seriously injured. He is also a Linux devotee and an advocate for open-source software, stating in interviews that he sees parallels between the skateboarding community and open-source software, e.g. the rebellious side of open-source programmers having some commonalities with the carefree, anti-establishment punk mentality skaters exhibit.
Sobriquet: "The Mutt", on the basis of his dog-like appearance during his youth.
Stunt Double: Mullen, along with his fellow skater friends, have often been hired to perform as stunt skaters in a number of mainstream film productions, most famously filling in for Ben Stiller in The Secret Life of Walter Mitty. Rodney initially tried to decline Ben's offer, instead vouching some of his friends to serve as Ben's stunt double in the film; the skater eventually relented and donned Ben Stiller's costume as well as a prosthetic mask for him to better resemble the actor.

Rodney Mullen has performed in the following roles:

Films

2022: Tony Hawk: Until the Wheels Fall Off - Himself (HBO Documentary)
2018: Physics Girl - Himself (television series, Episode: "Why this Skateboarding Trick Should be Impossible")
2017: Dryvrs - Skateboarder
2017: Rodney Mullen: Liminal - Himself
2015: Motivation 2: The Chris Cole Story - Himself
2014: Gracias Skateboarding Volumen Uno - Himself
2013: Secret Life of Walter Mitty - Stunt skater (Stunt double for Ben Stiller)
2012: Bones Brigade: An Autobiography - Himself
2004: Tony Hawk's Secret Skatepark Tour - Himself (Documentary)
2004: Almost: Almost: Round Three - Himself (Documentary)
2002: Rodney Mullen: From the Ground Up - Himself (Documentary)
1999: Rodney Mullen vs. Daewon Song: Round 2 - Himself (Documentary)
1998: Canvas: The Skateboarding Documentary - Himself (Documentary)
1997: Rodney Mullen vs. Daewon Song - Himself (Documentary)
1995: Second Hand Smoke - Himself (Documentary)
1993: Virtual Reality - Himself
1992: The Questionable Video - Himself
1989: Gleaming the Cube - stunt skater (Stunt double for actor Christian Slater)
1989: Rubbish Heap - Himself
1988: Public Domain - Himself (Documentary)
1987: The Search for Animal Chin - Himself
1985: Future Primitive - Himself
1984: The Bones Brigade Video Show - Himself
1982: Skateboarding in the Eighties - Himself

Video Games

2000: Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2
2001: Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3
2002: Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 4
2003: Tony Hawk's Underground
2004: Tony Hawk's Underground 2
2005: Tony Hawk's American Wasteland
2006: Tony Hawk's Project 8
2007: Tony Hawk's Proving Ground
2009: Tony Hawk: Ride
2012: Tony Hawk's Pro Skater HD
2019: Ghost Recon Breakpoint - Jace Skell (Rodney's first and so far only non-skating acting role)
2020: Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1 + 2 - Remake of the first two Tony Hawk games
2022: Rodney Mullen's Skatrix - augmented reality app for iOS and Android; first non-Tony Hawk skating game with Mullen

Books

2000: The Mutt: How to Skateboard and Not Kill Yourself