They wake up Friday mornings for the first class of the day, like most other college students. But they don't just sit in a lecture hall - and they definitely aren't nodding off.
The 14 students in the "Weapons and Words: Fighting for the Stage" advanced acting workshop class have spent their Fridays this semester dueling each other with a variety of different swords. There haven't been any injuries to report so far, and co-instructor and graduate student Kyna Hamill wants it to stay that way.
"Watch that height... you were at his eyeball," Hamill tells one of her swashbuckling students at a recent class.
The stage fighting class, which Hamill believes is the first - and possibly last - to be offered here, combines Hamill's experience in the craft with Artist-In-Residence Anthony Cornish's coaching in the dialogue of the fight scenes.
Hamill's experience in the field was one of the major reasons Cornish believes the class is being offered this semester. Hamill's specialty, in fact, is stage fighting. As a member of Fight Directors Canada, she recently worked as a teaching assistant in Alberta at an international fight workshop.
This semester's class is composed of two distinctive parts: the first, which wraps up this week, is the sword fight. After spring break, the students will tackle unmanned fighting.
"It's a lot more physical, and it's less rule-related," Hamill said of the unmanned style. The students' current swordfights, though, are extremely dependent on rules.
For example, there is an extensive glossary of the "vocabulary of swordwork," as Hamill puts it: a basis for learning how to perform everything from a "change of engagement" to an effective (and taunting) "invitation."
Learning the list of commands is essential to sword instruction. "If I tell someone they need to parry, they need to know what I'm talking about," Hamill explained.
Add this to the already ample task of convincingly playing out a scene with dialogue, and you've got a fairly advanced technique to pull off. "The difference between this and an acting class is [the students] have the choreography to balance as well," Cornish said.
Cornish also pointed out that while stage characters usually deal with simple, everyday props, "swords do provide a different situation."
There's not just one kind of sword, either - Hamill instructs students in broadsword (a "lower class" type of weapon), rapier, dagger, and small sword techniques. After the initial practice with the swords, students are paired up and assigned weapons based on the specific scene they must perform.
Finding target zones make up an important part of the learning process. These areas, which include the hips and shoulders, are the only body parts that actors aim for in stage fighting. In the heat of the fight, students need to remember the target areas to avoid injuries to the face and other vulnerable body parts.
Of course, after a scene or two of swordplay, there's probably going to be some sort of death involved... theatre death, that is. The plays range from Shakespearian to contemporary, and there's no dearth of tragedies to pick from. Hamill said that she actually held a special section on "kills" earlier in the semester. "It was a class on dying," she said, laughing.
To perform a convincing swordfight, students' moves need to appear unchoreographed. In actuality, though, they practice the fights to the last detail. "The whole process of fighting is muscle memory," Hamill said. "We know what's coming next, but we have to act like we don't."
To accomplish this, Hamill occasionally has the students act out their scenes in slow motion, which helps make their actions appear unanticipated.
The students will present their final sword scenes to Hamill and Cornish today. Though the dialogue, sword types, and general sequence of events basically remains unchanged in each scene, the students' intricate swordplay maneuvers are all their own. Another challenge is to match their sword techniques to the personality and skill level of the characters they must portray.
Despite their enthusiasm for sword work, students look forward to shifting the focus after break to unarmed combat. Phillips mentioned that environmental combat - which utilizes untraditional weapons, such as chairs, simply because they are in the immediate vicinity of the fight - will be included in future lesson plans.
The dueling students have nothing but praise for their faux-violent Friday morning course. Senior Matt Waterson was enthusiastic with his simple explanation. "It comes down to the fact that I'm a boy and I like to play with weapons," he said.
It's not just the boys having fun, though. Senior Caitlin Phillips, one of five girls in the class, is just as thrilled as her stage partner. "You get to beat people up for fun," she said.
