If are asking yourself this question, the answer is probably ‘yes’!

Any physical action inherently carries the risk of harm. In the performing arts, often we perform actions that have a higher risk of harm than your ‘everyday’ activities. Under work health and safety laws in Australia and the U.K., employers, employees and contractors need to do everything that is reasonable practicable to provide a safe workplace (this includes volunteer or unpaid work). If a cast or crew member is at risk of harm by performing any action in your production, by definition this is not a safe workplace – which has significant legal implications.

A fight director or movement director’s job is to find creative ways of mitigating those physical risks while still maintaining artistic integrity.

However in addition to this, a they will greatly enhance your production by creating work that is inventive, impactful and exciting. A fight director will have creative solutions to choreography, accurate knowledge of technical elements, information on weaponry, advice for safety supports and the ability to integrate all of this with the cast and creatives’ choices. They will dramatically cut the time needed to set a piece of action, and they will keep cast and crew feeling safe and supported – which has huge ramifications for how well your production works overall.

So if in doubt, just ask!

No. Besides from helping you meet your legal health and safety obligations, fight and movement directors vastly decrease the amount of time it takes to choreograph movement or physical conflict, and increase the quality of work that is produced.

This frees rehearsal time for other scenes.

It also invests the cast and crew feeling safe and supported, which has a huge impact on how productively the company functions across a project.

It minimises the risk of injury, so there are reduced costs from lost time, medical appointments or even recasts.

It value-adds to your production, giving impactful PR opportunities and greater audience impact.

However we understand that in this industry even the best of intentions can’t stretch the budget out past a finite level. Luckily, there are always training fight directors and movement directors who can come on board for their own professional development – so you can chat together about a fair arrangement that values everyone.

Either way, do start up a conversation about you need.

A fight director is a highly-experienced practitioner who choreographs and directs moments of dramatic combat or physical risk, so that they are safe, effective and meet the creative needs of the project.

In doing this, a fight director integrates an in-depth knowledge of biomechanics, fighting styles, weapons, movement, dramaturgy, illusion, teaching practice, consent-based practice, historical research, safe practice, and production techniques for theatre, film and motion capture. One of their key roles is assuming a role of safety supervisor in all of the work they create, so that a production can meet its legal work health and safety obligations.

As such, it generally takes around 5-10 years to become a fight director or fight choreographer.

It is not usually sufficient to just have experience in martial arts or fencing to fulfil the role. A fight director needs to be knowledgable across a range of theatrical fighting styles and genres, and have a strong knowledge of how this is applied to tell a dramatic story. In most cases, dramatic combat has striking difference to real martial arts (pun intended).

A fight director for theatre needs to have trained in the performance of dramatic combat to an advanced or specialist level with a recognised national training association. This training covers technical and performance skills with a range or weapon systems and fighting styles, and in itself takes around 3-5 years. The practitioner then needs apply with one of these associations to train as a dramatic combat teacher and/or fight director. This usually involves at least 2-3 years of an apprenticeship or mentorship with an experienced practitioner. In most cases the training also involves assessment tasks such as essays, assessed workshops, journals and assignments. Usually the process of becoming a fight director begins after a practitioner has successfully become a teacher, and has further requirements that must be met (taking a further few years).

It is highly recommended that a fight director has a thorough knowledge of performance techniques, and in many cases fight directors are performers themselves.

To work as a fight choreographer in film and television, in many countries it is common to enter this through their stunt certification processes.

Working as a fight director is exciting and joyful work, and brings immense satisfaction. However it does also carry a large weight of responsibility. We heartily encourage you to dive into training – just prepare yourself for the level of commitment it takes.

This depends somewhat on the country in which you wish to work. In Australia most mocap roles are cast through standard casting routes. This also happens in the U.K. and U.S., however in these countries there are also large mocap studios who have a regular list of performers they use. Some regions also have specialist mocap actor agencies.

The best thing to do is research the area you want to work in – find out who is creating the work you would like to do, and then how they cast their performers.

Getting mocap training and having showreel footage is a huge help when promoting your skills to a project. It is also useful to keep up any of your specialist physical skills, and training in as many movement forms as you have capacity to do so.

Yes and no. Mostly no. In some cases a production will have time and resources (money) to arrange additional movement or fight training for performers. However, mostly not.

Part of fight director or movement director’s skill is to create the best possible work they can with whoever is cast in the role. Yes, if someone is inexperienced, they will still create an effective scene and give you the knowledge to perform this safely over the course of the project. However if an actor has no prior training in stage combat, the creative choices we can make are far more limited than with experienced performers.

A good comparison is asking a complete beginner pianist to play Für Elise. They can be coached to perform an adapted, simple-but-recognisable version of the music. However the more satisfying version with more depth, nuance and expression will be beyond them – and the audience will be less impacted.

There is a lot of cerebral and physical information to take on board in a relatively short space of time for fight and movement performance. Many actors find this stressful. Having prior training greatly reduces this stress, and vastly cuts the amount of time it takes to create and rehearse the scenes – opening up time for other rehearsal.

Finally, the more training you have, the safer you and your scene partners are.

Having dramatic combat and movement training allows you to effectively do your job, tell the story you want to tell, and enjoy your work throughout the whole production.

There is always training going on – get on it!