The Sounds of Violence: Vocal Training in Stage Combat

The Sounds of Violence: Vocal Training in Stage Combat* Bonnie N. Raphael Part I: The Real Thing Introduction The most compelling stage fights are exciting to audiences not only visually, but aurally and kinesthetically as well. The illusion of "the real thing" is best achieved when not only the look of the staged fight, but the music of that fight (the held and released breaths, the running steps, the clang of metal, the voluntary and "involuntary" vocal sounds, the lines of dialogue, the responses to injury) combine to produce a vivid and visceral impression. Too often, a show's director or actors will not fully appreciate the value of complementing a visually-compelling fight with equally important vocal components. This is where the contributions of an imaginative vocal coach or fight director can help make an impressive but not fully-realized fight into a compelling confrontation between characters which will more completely serve the dramatic needs of the play. Believability In a fully-realized fight, each actor's vocal choices are specific to character, to period, to the particular weapon being used, to the degree of expertise which the character (as opposed to the actor playing that character) has with that particular weapon, to the environment in which the fight takes place, to competing sounds around the fight, and to other given circumstances as well. Each actor has a number of vocal variables at his or her disposal which will define these choices: 1) pitch—the location of particular sounds on the musical scale; 2) loudness—the perceived intensity of the sounds; 3) rhythm—the length, tempos and regularity or unpredictability with which sounds or lines of dialogue occur; Thisarticle is an adaptation of a series of three articles published in TIw Fight Master XII 1-3(1989) The material was developed duringa workshop series taught in 1988 for the National Workshop of the Society of Amencan Fight Directors The author gratefully acknowledges the contributions ofDavid Leong,DrewFracher,J R.Beardsley, Erik Frednckson, David Boushey, Dan Carter and Linda McCoIlum of the Society of American Fight Directors. 73 74 Bonnie N. Raphael 4) quality—the cleanness or roughness of the sounds or words, the particular color or timbre of each actor's voice; 5) intelligibility—how understandable any dialogue is; and 6) actual sounds or words being uttered—scripted, improvised, whispered, screamed. The two most important ingredients in achieving believable fight-related sound are the location of the primary impulse for both movement and sound and the imaginative use of rhythm as an independent variable. In addition, if injury is sustained by any characters involved in a fight, then the effect of each injury on both the breathing and the sound of each voice must be considered. Finding and keeping the breath low in the body, at the actor's center, fosters not only integrated movement, but believable sound. When the actor's delivery or reception of any blow is executed by the appendages but does not originate in that center, then he or she will not have a spontaneous impulse to make sound. If, on the other hand, both sound and movement emanate from the same aggressive or defensive impulse and if that impulse originates in the actor's center, then the voice will respond spontaneously and will not have to be added on later because the music of the fight is "off." Originating each impulse from center needs to be rehearsed even when the combatants are just marking the fight; whenever the movement is limited to arms and legs and heads and centered breathing is not behind it, any urge to make sound will not be organic and whatever sounds are produced may appear phony and unconvincing. Once the impulse to make sound is present, then the director, the voice coach, and /or the fight director can help the actors to shape the sound in a way which best reflects character and circumstance. Changes in rhythm, unpredictability—in the breathing, in the movement, in the use of sounds, in the delivery of lines—can make an essential difference between a fight that sounds staged and one which appears both spontaneous and dangerous. A generalized or nonspecific, predictable use...