Macbeth: Fight choreography

Something we don't get to talk about too often here at Dragon is fight choreography. Between Macbeth which opens this week, and our next play, Shoggoths On The Veldt, which is ALREADY in fight training a bit earlier than usual, we get to do it a lot this season. They use the word choreography to describe it for a reason - any bit of violence, be it a sword fight, a hanging, or even a simple shove gets choreographed like dance movement. The movements are drilled with your partner over and over and over again. The simple rule of thumb is that for one minute of performance fight time you work NO LESS than TEN HOURS for the fight. That seems extreme but the reason is simple - safety, for both your actors and your audience members. When you have combat happening mere feet away from the audience it's got to be safe. And it's got to look good, which is easier said than done.

This video gives you a general idea of the work that goes into throwing a simple punch.

Two things to keep in mind with this video: 1. they're talking camera angle but it's a bit harder in live theatre, especially with a rounded stage like ours and 2. they have the luxury of adding sound effects in "post production" with foley artists. When you do this in a live theatre, you have to figure out a way to also make the effect of a slap or punch live. There's a technique called knapping that's often used. Knapping goes something like this:

Macbeth has a whole lot of fighting, especially towards the end. So not only do the actors, Tasi and Max have to recite a bunch of Shakseaprea, they also have to do a several minute dance that involves remembering angles, a lot of physical acting, and making murder actually incredibly safe but look brutal. No problem right?

And wait til you see what's coming in for Shoggoths... it's gonna get CRAZY (and it's why we've started combat training a good month early)!

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A new one for us. #shoggothsontheveldt for @dragon_theatre. Sounds like it will be a wild show with #cthulhu #katar #khopesh #leeenfield...

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