Rhythm, not speed, is key when it comes to a good dramatic row

Date Published: 24-May-2012

 WHEN it comes to preparing actors for fighting on stage Malcolm Ranson has a tip for nudging them in the right direction.

“It’s not about speed,” he says. “It’s about rhythm and intention. Ask my wife!”

And having worked as fight director for over 50 productions in top English theatre companies, including the Royal Shakespeare Company, not to mention on Broadway shows such as Cyrano the Musical, Les Liaisons Dangereuses and Les Miserables, Malcolm’s advice is working!

Now UK based Malcolm is in Galway working as Fight Director with Druid on their forthcoming production of DruidMurphy.

This project sees the company performing three of the Tuam writer’s finest plays – Conversations on a Homecoming, A Whistle in the Dark and Famine.

Malcolm, who’s working on A Whistle in the Dark and Famine, can thank his mother for his unusual career.

“I learned to fence from the age of 12 or 13 and my slightly upwardly mobile mother didn’t want me to go down the steel mines like my dad,” he explains. Malcolm was involved in acting by the time he left school and pursued this in college, where he studied Music and Drama, doing a diploma to become a teacher. Although he quickly realised teaching wasn’t for him, he finished it and taught for a few years.

After his mother died, he decided to follow his dream of working in theatre, sending CVs to companies all over England.

Eventually he got a job in Sheffield as an Acting Assistant Stage Manager, which involved being a Jack of all trades. You could be moving props one minute and acting in a piece the next. Because Malcolm knew “which end of a sword to hold” he was asked to choreograph some fight scenes and eventually ended up at the National Theatre doing that job.

His acting background helps him in his work as a Fight Director, because he realises the importance of understanding the characters in a play and how actors interpret those characters.

Generally fights have to be character driven and situation driven, he explains on a break from working on Famine at the Town Hall Theatre.

There is mayhem on stage, as the community in Famine turn against central character, John Connor who had been their traditional leader.

After the fighting scenes, Malcolm gives notes to the actors and has a brief discussion with the project’s Director, Garry Hynes.

He compares his role to being like a detective’s in that he has to read a play, then analyse what a director wants and how the actors portray the various characters. There’s always room for interpretation and just because a fight is written into a play in a certain way doesn’t mean that it always has to be performed in that way.

“It’s a question of finding the right fight for the right production. It depends on the actors and director.”

For more see this week’s Tribune.