I can’t say enough good things about my alma mater: Rapier Wit studio in downtown Toronto. FDC Fight Master Daniel Levinson runs the longest-running independent stage combat school in Canada. After taking a one-semester stage combat course in university, I was looking for more opportunities to learn stage combat, and I was so fortunate to […]
PlayFighting is not play-fighting. Yes, we play fighting: pretend combat. But play fighting is not play-fighting: combat amusement. Well, it is for entertainment, but not for the performers; for the audience. Although staging combat is fun… stage combat is an essential skill for any actor, stage or screen. Because every play is fighting. Drama is […]
We’ll start with news items curated by Major WES VON PAPINEÄU. Wes was in town last week, I hope you had a chance to engage him in his always insightful conversation, and read his blog posts about swords and combat pulled from headlines around the world: http://www.academieduello.com/news-blog/author/wesvonpapineau/ Custom Swords for a Play For authentic fight […]
This week, we have three trailers of upcoming films that will hopefully have some great fight scenes. Let’s take a look at each of these trailers, and analyze what we can expect. Hercules: The Legend Begins Progenitors The obvious comparison will be to previous Hercules movies and the actors who have played the demi-god. Why […]
Injuries happen on all sorts of entertainment projects. Don’t be lulled into complacency because a big budget does not mean “safe”. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zysi46Huszg Here I’m quoting directly from the Wikipedia article pulled on 25 September, 2013: Five people have been injured while working on Spider-Man. After two stunt doubles were injured during various flying sequences in […]
There was a recent study Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences on how people evaluate musical performances in contests shows that hearing the audio matters less than viewing the musician perform, even compared with a no-audio video. Check out the summary at Scientific American’s 60-Second Science Blog Condition 1: audio only (compare the music […]
David McCormick shares recent news and upcoming events: Hamlet David worked this summer with Bard on the Beach on Hamlet. The show has received excellent reviews, and there’s still time to see it. David is credited as the Fight Consultant, under the auspices of Fight Director Nic Harrison, and received a Canada Council grant to […]