Kyle Kellams: TheatreSquared’s 20th season is officially underway with tonight’s opening of Ken Ludwig’s The Three Musketeers. Alexandre Dumas’ adventure is staged with wit, a new character — Sabine, D’Artagnan’s sister — and all the swashbuckling a fan of the story can want. To get that swashbuckling correct. T2 is enlisting Rick Sordelet as director and his son Christian Kelly-Sordelet as fight director. They are also the creators of Sordelet Incorporated, a combat company with thousands of stage and screen credits.
Rick and Christian came to the Anthony and Susan Hui News Studio this week. Christian says he didn’t always think he’d become a fight director and choreographer like his father.
Christian Kelly-Sordelet: Not really. It was never exactly the plan. It just kind of happened one decision at a time. Obviously it was really fun going to work with him starting at a really young age and was a really great environment, being in the theatrical environment where everybody just kind of treats you like an adult. I really enjoyed it and always really enjoyed... I wanted to get into directing. Camera operating was really what I was attracted to, but I was always doing the family biz and martial arts, started doing stunt kid work at a really early age, like 12 or 13, and then more seriously at 17. It was something I was doing to pay the bills, to get into the business, to make more connections, and then it just became what I did full time pretty quickly.
I was going to be in the camera department for Law and Order: SVU. I did the production assistant thing for a long time and then got to camera loader. I was still always working with my dad, but he had an injury to his Achilles, and so then I gave my walking papers and started doing this full time.
Kellams: The Three Musketeers. I have yet to see the production as we’re recording. This seems to lend itself to the art of combat and swordplay. Is it as advertised?
Rick Sordelet: Absolutely. We were really lucky to have a relationship with Ken Ludwig, who is one of America’s most prolific playwrights and also one of America’s nicest guys. He’s steeped in art and history, and he has such a love for the classics. When he created this version of The Three Musketeers and added a sister named Sabine, which is really fun and works really well, we were a natural fit to come in as director and fight director and to work with Ken very much on this production. His Three Musketeers has five sword fights in the first 30 minutes. We deliver the action, there’s no doubt about it.
Kellams: So as director and fight director, I imagine what you want to do is have these scenes be part of the narrative and not something that seems incongruous, like “oh, wow, that was amazing, now let’s get back to the show.”
Rick Sordelet: Directing this piece and having Christian be the fight director, it’s awesome because we both understand what it’s like to be a fight director and to work with a director. Now that I’m able to be a director who has been a fight director, I know what Christian goes through. I try to give him as much time as he needs to develop the fights organically, and he’s done a tremendous job of creating that seamless arc.
There’s no “oh, there’s the fight scene, now we’re back to the play.” It unfolds into a fight because we can’t talk anymore. We’ve gotten to the point where we have to draw swords and fight, and the swords become our language. Christian’s been tremendous with that.
Kellams: Christian, are you working with actors who’ve had swords in their hands before?
Christian Kelly-Sordelet: Mostly, yeah. Two of the three musketeers have done these roles previously. In the last production we did for New Jersey Shakespeare, we didn’t recycle any of the same movements, though it might have been tempting. It’s just not our style. We always like to come in and build it fresh, moment to moment, making sure it’s custom-fit to the narrative.
It was great having so many people we’ve worked with in the past. Obviously my younger brother playing D’Artagnan has been really fantastic. I think he’s one of the best theatrical sword fighters on the planet, and he proves that in this production. He mostly choreographed his own work, which is incredibly impressive when you see how much of it he had to do for himself.
We also have the person playing Milady, the villain, who has a pretty incredible fight at the end. She’s also worked with us before and used to be a professional fighter for a while, so there are some fun things we could do with that.
Kellams: I’ve always thought musicals would be one more layer — you’ve got to have an actor who can also sing, perhaps dance as well. With something like Ken Ludwig’s Three Musketeers, there’s that extra element. What does that mean for a director?
Rick Sordelet: It’s a really wise parallel to say musical theatre or a show like Three Musketeers that has a lot of fighting in it. The fights, in a way, are a lot like a musical number. There’s so much emotion that you can’t talk about it anymore, and so you break into song or you break into fight.
Christian and I — I’m going to toot our horn here — won the Drama Desk Award for the best choreography in Pirates on Broadway. That was a musical based on The Pirates of Penzance, where they had to sing, dance, and sword fight. Christian and I spent a considerable amount of time first creating a foundation. We trained them for a long time. Christian took that same philosophy here. He was able to get everybody, no matter what their training was, up to a certain speed before we started to work on choreography. That was deeply appreciated because then he was able to take everybody’s expertise to the vocabulary as they knew it and build it into the fight.
Though he’s mentioned that Colin had a great deal to do with setting the fight, part of the fight director’s job is knowing when you have that kind of a situation, and then you get to shape it. Christian has done a tremendous job shaping the fights into the storytelling. The arc is nice and smooth. You don’t know it’s a sword fight until it is a sword fight.
Kellams: How about the story itself? Fun to direct?
Rick Sordelet: Oh my gosh. Everybody has an intrinsic idea of what The Three Musketeers is. In the same way, if you say Romeo and Juliet or Frankenstein, you go, “oh yeah, I know that story.” We all kind of know The Three Musketeers.
The challenge for us is not to let the musketeers themselves become a cookie cutter, interchangeable. Ken has done a great job of fleshing out three distinct people who are the musketeers. Then you see how all of them are investing into D’Artagnan from a fatherly point of view. They each want to imbue a sense of their own selves into the making of a musketeer.
Ken also took dramatic license by adding Sabine, D’Artagnan’s little sister, into it. You get another fun layer that speaks to our current culture. It says here’s not just something about men and boys, but also about a young woman and how her journey parallels D’Artagnan’s. She’s being sent to a convent, because at that time it was one of the few places a young lady could go to get an education. Otherwise, you’re married at 13 and birthing babies from 14 on, because you need kids to work the farm. Her parents wanted more for their daughter, and that tells you something about how progressive mom and dad are.
Kellams: You’re mentioning the paternal approach to D’Artagnan. Is that somewhat meta for you as you’re working with two of your sons on this?
Rick Sordelet: It is the greatest privilege of my life right now to be a father and to be working with your two sons — one as an actor and the other as the fight director. Christian is literally my right arm. I could never have done this show without him. This is our third time directing this show, and it’s our third time working together in this collaboration. It’s my favorite so far.
Each time it gets better. I look at Christian, I look at his expertise, and he’s my favorite fight director. I wish I was as good as he is when I was his age, but he’s amazing. When I watch the work, I can’t help but be proud as a father. But I’m also proud as an artist and a director because our team is doing a great job, and neither one of my sons would be on this project if they couldn’t have met the criteria 110 percent.
I’m probably harder on them than anybody else, because we have a shorthand. That shorthand really translates into working harder and better. And it’s a privilege. You rarely have an opportunity in life where you get to have this kind of situation where you are in a position of all of us working together.
Kellams: Christian, when you walk into a theater for the first time where you know you’re going to have combat scenes staged, are you taking inventory, like, “oh, this stage is a little different than the last one”?
Christian Kelly-Sordelet: One hundred percent. In this particular stage, we’ve got a thrust, so right away I want to get a sense of what all of our audience members’ perspectives are going to be and what’s intimate. This is probably the most intimate theater I’ve ever worked in. Every single seat feels like you’re right there.
It’s one of my favorite theaters to work in, not just because they’ve made the experience so pleasant, but because I really enjoy the design of the theater, the facilities, and the staff. They’ve made it a really lovely experience and incredibly supportive.
Every theater is a little different, but this one has a lot of benefits. Because it’s all swordfights, we don’t have to create the same illusions as with punches or kicks. That enables us to really bring the swordfights right to the audience in a fun way.
Kellams: What is it about swordfights?
Rick Sordelet: I truly believe it’s in our DNA. Somewhere along the line, every kid picks up a stick and whacks their brother with it. As we were evolving, that stick became another part of us, and eventually a sword. Rome ruled the world for almost 2,000 years with the gladius. That was the state-of-the-art weapon. It can’t help but be in our DNA when it comes to our myths and storytelling.
Swords equate power. Power is something humans are constantly looking at. Translate that into a lightsaber, and now you’ve got Star Wars. Hollywood helped bring sword fighting to the forefront because it’s such an important medium for storytelling.
Christian Kelly-Sordelet: Martially speaking, I’ve studied martial arts my entire life. I did competitive fencing from when I was 12 until I was 18 and was ranked in the top 40 in the world. There’s something about it — when people pick up a sword and move at maximum speed, it feels like flying.
Within about six to nine hours of training, you can get to a point where it becomes second nature. It’s an extension of your body, and you can move so much faster to creatively solve problems or hit targets. Other martial arts take years to express fluently. With sword fighting, it’s approachable for anybody.
Kellams: I have one last question. Is there a better way to fall than others to fall?
Christian Kelly-Sordelet: Yeah, absolutely. We like to say there are four conceptual rules for falling safely.
- Get your mass as low to the ground as possible before you commit to the fall. Center of gravity is in your hips. Booty to the floor.
- If it bumps, it bruises. If you hear or feel impact, it’s not sustainable for eight shows a week. Fall silently, place the muscly parts, avoid the knuckle parts.
- Exhale on impact. As soon as your butt hits the ground, big breath out. Let that energy move.
- Your head should be the last thing to hit. Keep your chin tucked until your shoulders hit.
If you do those things, you’re falling as safely as possible.
Kellams: Well, I can’t wait to see the show. I don’t want to say break a leg — that seems not appropriate here. Have a great production.
Rick and Christian Sordelet: Thank you.
Rick Sordelet is the director of TheatreSquared’s production of Ken Ludwig’s The Three Musketeers, and Christian Kelly-Sordelet is the fight director. Opening night is tonight, and the production runs through Sept. 7. Our conversation took place this week at the Carver Center for Public Radio.
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