The MSU Stage Combat Blog: A Fresh Start to Stage Combat

Stage combat was one of the more exciting aspects of theatre that I have had the great pleasure of studying occasionally here and there. However, when I had learned previous before being in the MSU Denver show of “Kiss me Kate,” I realized I had been learning some bad habits. After one session of stage combat during “Kiss me Kate”, with Jenn Zuko, I was embarrassed to admit, even to myself, that I had practiced dangerous stage combat. I knew that in my career of theatre, I would eventually need to correct the wrongs of what I had learned in the past from not so qualified drama teachers, with learning from a more qualified instructor.

While reading the first two chapters in “Stage Combat,” written by Jenn Zuko Boughn, I was amazed to find out how many injuries can occur from doing “dangerous” stage combat. Something as simple as a loose nail tearing the eyelid and our own adrenaline can cause the victim in the scene to bite a lip or a tongue. As far-fetched as some of these injuries may seem, they are very much possible at any moment if you try to authenticate a fight scene. I find it very interesting that while learning in class for the first time that the victim of the scene is in complete control. From the audience, you wouldn’t think that because essentially we are setting up an illusion. However, if set up correctly, it looks real and it takes a lot to be in complete control, but if done correctly it would like the person being under attack is not in control.

From a professional stand point, it is very important to understand all of the dangers associated with any given physical activity. Before you should engage in stage combat, you should know what could happen if you don’t practice it the right way. Starting the class text off with a chapter in “Violence and Actor Safety” seemed like a no brainer. I have already learned stage combat a wrong way once, I wasn’t about to learn it the wrong way again. So I feel it is very important for every individual to know about the “what ifs” on the subject matter.

The next thing I read about was “Movement Awareness.” Let me just start off by saying “Nostalgia!” A lot of these activities took me back to my high school years in theatre class. My favorite exercises in high school theatre were the status walks. Interestingly enough, we do, unconsciously most of the time, practice status while we are out in public. I sometimes will practice status consciously while I’m walking around on campus. (I can’t tell you how many times I’ve almost ran into somebody because we both felt we had high status that neither of us had to move out of the way for each other). You can really learn a lot about other people just from watching their status.

There are many exercises for spatial awareness, I loved getting to read about a few ideas, not just because they were nostalgic, but because it is crazy how connected and applicable these exercises can be to any aspect of theatre and stage combat. Status can play a huge role in stage combat; it is status that can make a fight scene humorous or dramatic. In addition to that, it is important to be aware of the space around you especially during stage combat for safety reasons.

I think that safety and spatial awareness are the most appropriate things to learn first in a stage combat class so the reading was very beneficial in that sense. I highly recommend that each of these areas be explored before engaging in stage combat.

On a side note, the image that I have selected for this blog post is the “Willy Wonka” meme. I chose it because it basically says that just because you know stage combat, doesn’t mean you are a trained fighter. Your skills learned for on the stage don’t cross over to actual fighting. I also chose it because a lot of my friends from high school really thought they were the coolest because they could fake a fight outside during lunch time. That isn’t cool, I personally don’t think it is, and Willy Wonka isn’t amused either!