I received to sit down down and discuss with actor, combatant and combat director Benedetto Robinson. Throughout his assorted profession, he has labored as an motion performer from Ohio to New Hampshire, and North Carolina to Georgia. He wrote and starred in Dracula: The Failings of Males, produced by Havoc Motion and returning to its second venue, The Atlanta Shakespeare Firm, this fall.
His work as combat director within the ASC’s Romeo and Juliet was a triumph of storytelling, and he was gracious sufficient to supply his experience and perception to these considering fight for movie and stage, combat choreography and what it means to be an actor combatant.
What drew you to stage fight? Give us a short historical past.
Once I was like fifteen, my mom was volunteering on the Kids’s Theatre of Maine they usually had this partnership with this theatre referred to as Acorn that specialised in Shakespeare and I began taking lessons with them as a result of I appreciated appearing lots. And one among their lessons was this rudimentary stage fight class…and I realized lots about myself, and lots about appearing and I kind of discovered the issues that I loved to do as a bodily human being…This was a great way to train that I didn’t hate or didn’t hate myself doing. I began there after which I didn’t do it for years.
In my junior yr of faculty, we needed to take a stage fight class. Each one among my classmates was like “Ugh, that is so dumb.” I cherished it. My trainer occurred to be an authorized trainer with the Society of American Struggle Administrators. I kind of apprenticed with this man, his title is Jeff Jones. He nonetheless lives and works exterior of Raleigh North Carolina. Via him, I received launched to what it’s to do that professionally.
Discuss being an actor combatant. What alternatives has it opened in your profession?
Earlier than I reply that straight, I’ll discuss somewhat bit about why it’s that I’ve determined to proceed doing this. As a result of we stay in a society now [where] plenty of our leisure comes from the consumption and digestion of dramatized violence. That is one thing that I realized from a really expensive pal of mine, Jake Guinn: it is extremely necessary that we take duty for the photographs of violence that we depict.
As a result of in a society like ours in Western society, which is concurrently so divorced from and so intricately certain up in violence, within the information and the media, I feel there’s a really actual hazard of treating violence as one thing that’s wonderful, that is ready to be, , trivialized. The violence in the true world is something however that…and so, the work of an actor combatant and combat choreographer is to responsibly current violence in a method that serves the story and serves, maybe the digestion and deconstruction of what we consider as entertaining violence. And take a look at the associated fee and results of that in a method that’s palatable as a result of it’s by way of theatre or movie, however is however treating it with the respect that it requires.
Now what that appears like within the day-to-day as a combat choreographer, as an actor who performs preventing is…typically you’ll be on a job and everybody within the room is like “properly, we don’t want a combat choreographer”…after which it turns into your job to advocate for the presence of 1. As a result of it may be, truly, actually harmful.
One of many worst accidents I’ve ever heard inform of occurred in a stage fight class the place they had been utilizing blunt swords…and these two younger actors had been doing their choreography in a short time…and their trainer was like “OK you guys have to decelerate and proceed to concentrate on the hazard of this” they usually had been like “Oh, it’s blunt, it’s not going to harm us”…they had been going quick and one actor slipped the tip of his blunt sword into the nostril of the opposite and pierced his mind.
He’s nonetheless alive. However that’s a extremely horrifying damage….and so, it’s necessary to remind each room that you just’re in that there’s a want for somebody to run this safely. And when the time comes, if you ought to be so lucky to be that particular person within the room, it turns into your duty to facilitate that security and to do it in a method that is still thrilling and in service to the story and respectful of the stakes of the violence. And that’s an advanced puzzle that I actually wish to try to remedy.
You lately choreographed fights for Romeo and Juliet. How did you employ fight to assist and assist the story?
So, it is a factor that I see lots…oftentimes I’ll see a interval piece…the place the motion of the story is halted and area is given for this third social gathering factor that’s the sword combat, that has nothing to do with the rest, that’s tremendous flashy and enjoyable–and that’s achieved and we return to the story. And I didn’t need to try this.
It comes right down to the title of combat director. I feel folks usually put plenty of emphasis on preventing and never plenty of emphasis on the director. To me, it’s simply as necessary for a combat director to learn and digest and grow to be intimately acquainted with the script and the story as an entire as it’s for the director, or an actor within the piece. The violence–it’s irresponsible to current violence that doesn’t have any bearing on the story.
In Romeo and Juliet, a few issues caught out to me. There’s this large combat at first…the place all these teenagers combat on the street with swords and no one will get harm, and it will get damaged up by the royalty, proper? You’ve received a bunch of individuals with deadly weapons not hurting one another…ain’t none of them need to be preventing and hurting one another. There’s received to be a component of posturing in that…So there’s this concept that this preventing is about social standing, till one thing shifts and it turns into one thing rather more severe and sinister.
What are some normal misconceptions about stage fight?
The most important one I run into within the room…is that, and I don’t know why that is, as a result of whenever you rehearse a play you are taking plenty of time to do a dance quantity…plenty of time to stage a scene, however in terms of combat choreography many administrators are like “OK, you’ve quarter-hour to do that entire prolonged sword combat.”
The period of time that you just’re given within the room to current one thing that must be actually actually sharp and well-rehearsed could be very very small.
I’d encourage people within the trade who will not be preventing professionals to liken the time that it takes to create an concerned piece of combat choreography to the time it takes to choreograph a really concerned, company-wide dance quantity.
The place would you wish to see the trade develop in terms of preventing chores?
I wish to see it transfer in a route that’s much less I hate to say self-serving and self-showcasing–I wish to see it transfer…extra into an area the place it’s cohesive with the storytelling of the piece…. Within the theatre, there’s a robust threat for it to grow to be about a person’s ego…The product inevitably suffers….We inform these tales to show a lens of reflection on the human expertise. And if that’s not the goal…then what are we doing right here?
What’s one thing you would like you had been informed earlier in your fight profession?
All the things is all the time a course of…no matter it’s you do there’s a degree in your schooling, often comparatively early the place you’re like… ‘I do know every part about this, I’m so good at this.’ And often, that’s the place you cease.
You must continue to learn. The minute that you just cease changing into a pupil…and begin changing into somebody who claims authority over it…that’s the minute you grow to be unsafe within the room. If you’re unable to maintain that learner’s spirit you’re going to harm somebody.
If [combat and choreo] is one thing that you just’re considering as an actor… it has opened many doorways for me in my profession as an actor. It’s a method right into a sure area of interest of what we do. As a result of it does require a skillset.
To search out out extra about Benedetto Robinson, go to his Instagram or try his web site at benedettorobinson.com
This text initially appeared on Casting Networks.
Wish to get your appearing profession began? Join or log in to Casting Frontier and begin auditioning right this moment!
You may additionally like:
Put up Views: 2
Written by Rachel Frawley