Staged Combat

I CONFIRM THAT THE WORK ATTACHED ASSESSMENT IS ALL MY OWN WORK AND DOES NOT INCLUDE ANY WORK COMPLETED BY ANYONE OTHER THAN MYSELF AND SOURCES HAVE BEEN APPROPRIATELY REFRENCED

NICOLAS TUFAILE FORSTMAN

Act 1, Scene 1

Scene and fight breakdown

Scene 1 is, and was, by far the hardest scene to choreograph the fight for since its the opening scene the the show, and since I have to involve everyone withing this scene.

The scene starts off with a man walking over to his seat to watch the show, however he is drunk and stumbles, once he stumbles on the steps we all come out of the wings and Theresa gives me (Sean) the ‘okay’ to grab him since hes the guy we’re after. I go right up to him and the audience, grab the back of his clothes and throw him down onto the middle of the stage, and then I punch him, a random tiger (Aidan) then punches him the same way I punched him and another random tiger (Saeem) pretends to help the man up when he punches the man in the gut and then in the face knocking him to the ground.

We then all proceed to kick him apart from Theresa and Margret who are just watching all of this go down. At first I didn’t make a Choreography since I wanted it to be more realistic and more mechanical, however upon further input from others, it looks too “messy” or “unorganized” so i decided to make an actual piece of choreography so it looks neater, and I have to say I am happy with the results.

kicking choreography

End of scene/fight breakdown

Then what happens next is the man starts to crawl away and we let him, but Polly pulls him back in for round 2 but only she kicks him, and in the face and breaks his teeth. This is all done so that the mans back is facing the audience, therefore the man (Ciaran) has a chance to use his hands to stop Polly’s feet real close to his face while at the same time makes a good sound for the audience to hear. At that point Polly wants to continue however we pull her back as to say ‘he’s had enough’. we all start stamping in celebration and transition into the next scene.

Scene blocking

Full scene/beat down

Final product

Act 1, Scene 5

There’s two different “Fights” in Scene 5. The reason I say “Fights” is because they are more of a one sided beat down/ slapping because the person who gets beat doesn’t fight back, in the first fight they do, but its more of a standing and ranking reason as to why they fight back and not because they want to.

First fight

The first fight is in-between Joe and George, Joe approaches George with the intent to talk to George about stop fighting the tigers and to leave the gang, (of course Joe doesn’t say this) but the reason he wants to do this is to try to get in Susan’s good graces and to show her that he is responsible and can be a good father to take care of the child. However things take a turn for the worse when George insults Joe so Joe knocks George to the ground and pins him down, but there’s other Prussia street members there and George is the leader of Prussia street and so he needs to act tough so no one gets any funny Ideas about over throwing him, and with Joe pinning him down in front of other gang members George responds to this by punching Joe hard on the face to assert authority and to show the other gang members not to mess with him.

The full sequence

Final product

Second fight

This fight happens towards the end of scene 5. After The Tigers and Prussia Street have a stare down and the Tigers scare Prussia Street away Jimmy has just previously disobeyed my orders and then after Prussia Street is gone he questions my decisions and leadership and disobeys my orders, so in turn I have to put him in his place and assert my authority over him, but of course i am the leader of the gang, so instead of dishing out his punishment myself I get the Tigers youngest member Polly to punish him in front of all the tigers I get her to slap him in my place since that will humiliate him even more.

The full sequence

Final product

Act 2, Scene 12

In this scene Jimmy tricks Margret and Polly into meeting him and Sean there, however Sean isn’t there, Margret realizes whats about to happen so she tries to get Polly to run away from them with her, Polly doesn’t listen so Margret runs away alone one of Jimmy’s mates grabs Polly and they try to strip Polly of her boy’s clothes but she escapes the guys hold on her and runs, she then ends up accidentally running into Thomas who is speechless and has no clue what to do and holds her there which gives Jimmy more than enough time to grab her and drag her off stage, strip her, and stuff her into a dress as payback for her slapping him.

Scene rehearsal + Feedback

The full sequence

Final product

Act 2, Scene 14

There are 3 separate sequences that I must choreograph in this scene.

Scene Breakdown

This scene is the big fight scene that everything has been leading to in between the Bengal Tigers and Prussia Street. The scene starts off with Polly on the floor sobbing and speechless after the events with Jimmy. Theresa and Thomas come in and comfort her, and then both me and Margret come in and when we do so does Jimmy and his followers (if he has any) we have a verbal fight about who is right and who should lead the tigers this escalates to the point that a physical fight between us is inevitable. Me and Jimmy both take our belts off in preparation to this fight, We swing snap our belts at each other, make some swings then I hit Jimmy on the face, he then does a massive swing than I barely dodge but the other Tigers on the sidelines are laughing and mocking Jimmy for his incompetence and not being able to hit me at all. Jimmy squares up to them, especially Thomas and then they all back off as I go to swing Jimmy doesn’t notice and gets hit hard across the face, Jimmy then fall to the floor with a bloodied face and the fight ends there with me asking him “Who leads the Tigers Jimmy?”.

Belt fight choreography

The next fight is in between Thomas, George and Joe.

As mine and Jimmy’s fight ends all of Prussia Street show up on the bridge and there’s simply too many of them for us to take on so we put on our best and toughest faces while slowly backing away. Thomas then suddenly steps out of our ranks and pulls out a knife everyone is shocked by the fact that Thomas has a knife, Thomas then proceeds to run, full speed at George with the knife. George stops Thomas from stabbing him but Thomas kicks George on the groin and slashes Joe who is trying to get past. after he slashes Joe he stabs George and leaves George for dead as he chases Joe.

As soon as Thomas starts to chase Joe after stabbing George me and Jimmy snap out of it and run to join in the fight. We notice a Prussia Street member trying to help up George, I push the Prussia Street member away from George knock him to the floor and start to punch him several times, I then pick him up and head but him. While I’m fighting him Jimmy is picking on a very Injured George punching him again and again until he’s out cold and on the verge of death.

Discussion and Ideas (Experimenting and creating)

The whole scene

Final product (The whole scene)