RC-Annie - Professional and Corporate Fight Performances and Training

WHO IS RC?

Who is RC? Press Room Stage Article

RC WORK

 

Rc-Annie was established in 2005 by Ruth Cooper-Brown and Rachel Bown-Williams.
We choreograph dramatic violence for Film and Theatre, teach combat and provide fight artists.

 

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	Rachel C Bown-Williams Rachel began Karate at 8 years of age. Training as an Actress at Rose Bruford College, she discovered Stage Combat and began her journey to becoming a BADC qualified teacher from there. Rachel now works as a BADC Teacher and as a Fight Director. She is a fellow of the Winston Churchill Memorial Foundation, which allowed her to travel to the United States, meeting and working with many of America's foremost fight professionals. Rachel's work takes her overseas, which she greatly enjoys. Her work has been influenced by a number of amazing practitioners; Tony Wolf, who designed fighting styles for The Lord of the Rings movie trilogy,  Richard Ryan and J Allen Suddeth to name but a few. "....it is so important to me that I work with as many artists as possible. They add to our palette colouring our work and influencing our style and thought"
	Ruth Cooper-Brown Ruth first began her fighting career when she was 21, having trained as an actress, she performed on a regular basis in Historical Entertainment. This experience introduced her to a new and exciting world of performance fight through a realm of knockabout, illusion and circus side show. Ruth enjoys the creative process of problem solving and the sheer variety and vibrancy of Dramatic Violence, particularly that of film.  Having worked in both Theatre and Film as a technician, film projectionist and an actress, she regularly draws on her past experience to inform and influence her present work as a BADC Fight Teacher, Fight Director and Chair of the BADC committee.
	Lyndall Grant Lyndall first encountered stage combat during her actors’ training at the London ArtsEd School of Acting.  With a background in dance and high-level sports, including international gymnastics, stage combat brought together her interest in physical performance, intuition and acting. Lyndall currently leads RC-Annie’s performance ensemble, HORDE, which explores the wide potential for stage combat in arts and entertainment. She is also developing work as a Fight Choreographer, and is nearing the end of her Stage Combat Teacher’s training with the BADC.

      

 

PRESS ROOM

RECENT REVIEWS

This is the final production for the Unicorn's ensemble and more than ever is demanded of Samantha Adams, John Cockerill, Julie Hewlett, Liam Lane, Eric Nzaramba and Amaka Okafor, playing as many as four parts each, changes signified through different costumes and, of course, skilled acting. Their sword-fighting is utterly convincing, their comic lines timed to perfection and their scenes of love gained and lost powerful enough to provoke audible gasps in an audience - young and not so young - transfixed for two hours of drama that cumlinates three years' work characterised by a spirit of "All for one and one for all!" 
Broadwayworld.com (April 2011)

 

Congratulations to fight directors, Rachel Bown-Williams and Ruth Cooper-Brown for working visual wonders with all those fencing bouts, and to the cast for making them look so convincing in this entertaining show.
Susan Elkin, The Stage (8 April 2011)

Bouncy, boisterous and brutal, this is children’s theatre at its best. Rosamunde Hutt’s lively production is full of swash and buckle, without glossing over the darker side of the story which gives it its heart. If you can ignore the slight incongruity of people in high-vis vests suddenly drawing their rapiers – which is easy given the impressive energy displayed by the whole ensemble – the fight scenes steal the show: fight directors Rachel Bown-Williams and Ruth Cooper-Brown have done a fine job. Up, down and every which way around Christopher Fauld’s split-level set, the fights gallop about which the requisite spectacular rescues and near misses.
Review by Eleanor Turney, A Younger Theatre (April 2011)

 

Rosamunde Hutt's The Three Musketeers is packed with swashbuckling. The many vigorous sword fights, arranged by Rachel Bown-Williams and Ruth Cooper Brown, like the politics of the French court and the religious conflict that form the background to the plot, place it firmly in the seventeenth century but Christopher Fauld's multilayered scaffold set of shining metal provides a blank background.
Howard Loxton, The British theatre guide (April 2011)

 

R & R Rampage in Banff and New York

      

 

On the first evening we were given a well being chat about ‘THE ALTITUDE’ and the "DANGEROUS WILDLIFE" R +R looked at one another nonplussed, having not considered for a moment that at 4540 ft we might need to moderate our normal behavior. We were warned not to over exercise, eat healthily, not to drink coffee, moderate our drinking and to stay away from the wildlife! Shame that earlier that day we had: after a full breakfast with the usual gallon or so of coffee, found the gym and proceeded to worked our poor bodies into aches that would last all week, fell down the side of a mountain, bought every bit of tourist tat we could as we walked too much around Banff, got lost, found a waterfall, had an extremely close and, we thought, friendly encounter with some of the big wildlife, climbed back up a mountain and polished off the day with several beers! – ops!

 

And so it began. We taught 5 workshops, were honoured to meet soooo many brilliant fight peeps: Ian Rose, JP Fournier, Kent Allen, Laryssa Yanchak, David Boushey, Casey Kaleba, Meghan Cooke, Jacques Cappelle, John C Davis, Steaphen Fick, Robert G. Goodwin, Jared Kirby, John Lennox, Iain Rose, Matt Richardson, Siobhan Richardson, Kyle Rowling and Rick Skene. We learn soo much that we can’t possibly remember it all. So Banff started on a high, became amazing and ended with Daniel Ford Beavis on fire- what more can you ask for?

 

  

R+R with, in order of appearance, Jacque Chapelle, Kyle Rowling, John Lennox & Scott Witt

 

New York started with sleep, sleep, sleep, having not managed to master the art of sleeping in Banff then we did our usual of walking ourselves stupid, drinking at every opportunity (hard to believe Ruth didn’t used to drink!) and panicking about teaching in the BIG APPLE. Thankfully we were rescued by Jared Kirby inviting us to his class on the Friday night and then unbelievably introducing us to Maestro Martinez and we took part in his class - wow. So that took a big bite out of the Big Apple, Galway, Ray and Mike of Combat Inc made us very welcome we had two memorable afternoons teaching in their company. We followed this with our adhesion to our advice about a healthy lifestyle abroad by ending it with Combat Inc and a few beers, of course!

 

  

Photos from our workshops with Combat Inc in New York City

 

RACHEL’S USA RAMPAGE

      

 

Wow. I've had a fantastic 10 weeks in North America. I was completely overwhelmed by the generosity extended to me from the people I was visiting. The practitioners I met opened their homes, classes, rehearsal rooms and minds to me, I am eternally grateful to  everyone I met i North America especially Allen Suddeth, Lloyd Caldwell, Dan Levinson and the guys at Rapier Wit, John Lennox, Michelle Ladd, Dale Girard, Bob Goodwin David Woolley, Babes with Blades, Dom and Jess Green and Richard Gilbert. I have learnt so much and can't wait to incorporate this into my own work and development. I have many ideas of things I want to explore I will be using the fighting form classes on a Monday night to start this process.
Come and play see below for details.

 

THE STAGE

Recently Ruth was asked to create a guide for the use of Theatrical Handguns for the Stage Management Association which then led to them writing an article for The Stage Newspaper featuring Rc-Annie.
To read the article click on the following link below

 

Stage Handgun Article