On Friday morning Year 8 took part in a drama workshop delivered by Mark and Neil who run the Squire Stage Combat Company. They spent the morning exploring the skills of hand-to-hand stage combat and sword fighting. Both Mark and Neil work as stuntmen and fight directors in film, television and onstage. Mark has just finished filming the second series of Power of the Ring for Amazon and he spoke to the pupils about filming epic battle sequences whilst dressed as an ‘Orc’ in full costume and prosthetics.

The pupils learnt about the control and precision required to create an effective stage fight and they will be able to put these skills to use in future drama work. At the end of the session Mark and Neil demonstrated a short fight sequence for the pupils to show them what a dramatically effective scene can be created by experts in this field. It was excellent and looked frighteningly real. Our morning was fast physical and fun and even though some pupils were brutally killed in the swordplay scenes, at the end of the session, everyone got to their feet and lived to fight another day.