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| Natasha Badenov (Natasha McGinnis), Wen Lo Gai (Ryan McGowan) and Ding Bang, Abbot of the Jade Fender Temple (Ed McGinnis) |
The first task for the students of the Martial Arts Movie Stunt Class was character creation - a subject near and dear to my purportedly blackened and shriveled heart. So many possibilities! So many opportunities for parodies and paradoxes, outlandish exaggerations and wild and crazy combinations!
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| Chen Wang (Diana Ma) mixes it up with the catty fashionista, Macy Nordstrom (Mia Burdeau) |
This much freedom absolutely paralyzed some of my adult students. Despite explanations and prompts of simple ideas that could become the kernel of a character (animal! profession! parody!), some in the class were completely stymied. For our next movie-making class, I plan to have a good supply of one word idea cards to stimulate the creative juices of those more reticent students.
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| Grumpy Asian (Kuan Ma) is about to ruin Billy Joe Jimmy Bob Buckett's (Jesse Stephens) day. |
Unexpectedly, it was my youngest students that excelled at character creation. Still used to tapping their imagination without fear of ridicule, they created spectacularly detailed and original characters, which I then promptly hijacked and twisted, causing irreparable damage to their tender, young psyches.
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| Cyborg Samurai was the elaborate creation of young Jackson. |
Just kidding. I think.
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| The-Student-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named came up with this gloriously awesome character, Velvet the Cupcake Fairy. News Flash: Cupcakes are bad for your health. Very, very bad. |
Long story short, the character concepts varied greatly. From some I got as little as, “she likes to clean”. Others catalogued everything about their character, from fighting style and tag lines through languages and powers.
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| Dorothy Stender is absolutely priceless as the (almost) unstoppable Grumpy Tai-Tai. |
But, while I gave the students full rein to create their own characters for the movie, in the end, I was the one who would have to write the script. So, after the initial character genesis, I hunched over the wheel of creative control with white-knuckled hands and careened down the road like Mr. Toad, while my students pointed out directions and enthusiastically honked the horn.
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| Billy Joe Jimmy Bob Buckett (Jesse Stephens), Queen Rilo'a (Ellie Wilson), Neato (April Dawn Duncan) and Ooo Long (Lee Ann Haluska) |
I did my best to keep their original concepts intact, but in a necessarily short movie with 20+ “stars”, back story often went by the wayside, and details had to be tweaked, refined and brightened. Still, no one has complained. And I must confess, compared to the delayed gratification of my normal venue, it is great fun to hear the students giggle over their lines, quote each other’s characters, and ruin our takes with spontaneous guffaws.
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| Grumpy Asian (Kuan Ma) demonstrates to Queen Rilo'a (Ellie Wilson) the hazards of ignoring the "Keep Off the Grass" sign. |
Stay tuned as I feature each of the characters from this movie, and talk a bit about the original student concept and how each character evolved.
