More skin to skin approach in stage fighting

By Arttu Peltoniemi

Most stage fighting techniques are developed for the actors to be able to perform safely and following a work rhythm of two shows a day. This is awesome and also enables less qualified actors to do roles where violence is needed. As you may know, we in Hirdmenn have been seeking a bit of a different approach. A few years ago (2016) Joeli and I (Arttu) were developing a method of stage fighting where the audience could be around the performers. This requires hits to touch so that they look good from every angle. Our solution was to hit where it would not really hurt (like big muscles), to hit only the surface (like you hit a boxing bag so that there is a sound but nothing moves at all), and to hit with soft body parts to a well prepared head position that is ready to follow choreographed movement (like forearm muscles to the forehead). This combined with wrestling moves is what we trained and made a performance with.

These ideas were originally invented in the Servi Morituri project. We needed to perform gladiator fights to an audience that was 360° degrees around us. The helmets and armor needed to survive all eight performances, training sessions and video shoots... So we hit to the surface of the helmets, not through. The new thing was to do that same thing without any gear. We used old pugilists as a good model for the performance.  

It was presented in a small event to an even smaller audience. The stage was perhaps a bit too narrow... I think we did a descent job in portraying an amateur fight. Here you can see two videos of this fun and instructive project. 

The first video is a training session where the choreography is ready and we test the ideas mentioned above. The second is the actual performance. We did not organize anyone to shoot the performances or the training. Both videos are shot with a stationary phone camera. :D We hope you like them.

The training.


The performance


Please let us know what you think about our approach. We think it has a lot of potential when well rehearsed. It will solve problems in performing fights without weapons on a round stage, and in many parts of the performance it feels authentically violent.

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