Episodes

In this bonus episode, we look at set safety and whether the historically ‘cowboy’ culture of film sets truly permits a culture of safety. All through our first season, guests from various television and film departments repeatedly raised concerns about set safety. We dove into issues ranging from stunts, rigging, child performers, general safety, and firearms. One common thread that appeared again and again was the fact that one must always be willing to voice concerns over safety and in so doi...

In the season one finale of Film Fights with Friends, Steve and Paul sit down to review the best moments from their first 25 shows. The plan suddenly changes when episode 2 guest Joshua Todd James (screenwriter - Take Cover, Pound of Flesh) returns to crash the party and turn the spotlight on our hosts. Joshua assumes the host chair and probes our co-hosts with a revealing interview you won’t want to miss! FILM FIGHTS WITH FRIENDS Do you listen to our show as an audio podcast? Give video a try....

Military historian and weapons and armor expert Scott Boyett joins Film Fights with Friends for a comparative analysis of three films, depicting different time periods, from historic, tactical, technical, and theatrical perspectives. On the dissecting table are LAST OF THE MOHICANS (1992), WAY OF THE GUN (2000), and MOSUL (2019). Scott is a consultant for the film, television, and gaming industries. He grew up in a family of antique arms and armor dealers and mentored under one of the world’s p...

As a stunt double for Taryn Manning in the slasher horror film BLOODLINE KILLER (2024), Kristen Murphy joined an incredible stunt team to brought some complicated fights to the screen. Kristen is a professional dancer turned stunt performer. She began working in TV and film at a young age, since being signed for commercial dance at 18 years old. A native New Yorker, born and raised in Long Island, Kristen was fortunate enough to be trained by some amazingly talented professionals at "Fivestar Sp...

Actor turned Comedian turned Stuntman turned Circus Rigger turned Stunt Rigger. Born in Ortonville, Michigan, in 1971. A former school wrestling champion, Brett has since trained in swordplay, film fighting, knife throwing, bullwhip, and as an escape artist. Throughout his career, Brett has earned a plastic bone that holds his left eye in place and has fractured his femur, the largest bone in the body, completely in half. In college, Brett was a dramatic actor, performing in over a dozen Shakesp...

Rocco Nisivoccia Jr. is a Director, Producer, and Production Manager who, after film school, landed his first Production Assistant gig on Spider-Man 2 (2004) with one of the most creative pitches we have ever heard. Working his way up in the industry working through Locations (Emergence, The Sopranos, Daredevil, Jessica Jones) and Production Management (Wu-Tang: An American Saga), he directed and produced his first feature, Aliens vs. Zombies, in 2017. A rabid football fan, Rocco landed a dream ...

Larry Rosenthal is a SAG/AFTRA award winner and four-time nominated stunt coordinator/performer. He won for Best Stunt Ensemble on the television show 24, starring Kiefer Sutherland. He has been stunt performing for over 25 years and coordinating for 15. Among his coordinating credits are Austin & Ally (Disney), Pretty Freaking Scary (Disney), and Warped (Nickelodeon). Stunt coordinating young performers can be a challenging undertaking, which Larry breaks down in great detail in this interview....

Critics universally panned Wayne Kramer’s box office flop Running Scared (2006). Top critics on Rotton Tomatoes rate the film at bleak 27% while fans give the film a superior 79% rating. On IMDB, it is Kramer’s highest-rated film, with a respectable 7.3 stars. With standout performances by Paul Walker (The Fast and the Furious), Vera Farmiga (Up In the Air, The Departed), then unknown Cameron Bright (the Twilight Saga), and Chazz Palminteri (A Bronx Tale), Kramer’s gritty screenplay is brought t...

Singaporean actor, director, martial artist, stuntman and fight choreographer Sunny Pang has appeared is such films as The Night Comes for Us (2018), Buffalo Boys (2018), Diamond Dogs (2017), The Collector (2012), Exiled: The Chosen Ones (2024), and the upcoming Havoc; written and directed by Gareth Evans and starring Tom Hardy, Timothy Olyphant and Forest Whitaker. Sunny’s career in action film spans over 20 years. He is the founder of the Ronin Action Team. In this interview we break down the...

Preston Thomas is a lifelong martial artist and cinephile. Film Jitsu is his second feature film as a director and his first documentary. It is about the crossover between the worlds of martial arts, grappling, filmmaking, and stunts. The project’s journey has taken Preston from 87 North in Los Angeles to Breakfall Studios in New York City. He’s interviewed and trained with martial artists and stunt performers at every stage of their careers, from ambitious young hustlers making action short fil...

Paul and Steve dive into the listener mailbag to answer the question, “What is your favorite movie with terrible action and a terrible movie with great action?” On the dissection table are classic action films Ong Bak: Thai Warrior (2003); Star Wars Episode 1: Phantom Menace (1999); and two Burt Reynolds films - Heat (1986) and Shamus (1973). Which film was which? In a surprising twist, Steve and Paul also go head-to-head over the iconic Big Trouble in Little China (1986). MENTIONS Shamus IMDB:...

Happy Anderson is an actor with an extensive body of work in television and film. On the feature film side, Happy co-starred opposite Will Smith and Edgar Ramirez in David Ayer's Bright (Netflix), opposite Robert DeNiro in Taylor Hackford's The Comedian (Sony Pictures), opposite Sandra Bullock in Suzanne Bier's Birdbox (Netflix), opposite Julia Roberts and Clive Owen in Tony Gilroy's Duplicity (Universal) and again opposite Will Smith and Martin Lawrence in Bad Boys For Life (Sony Pictures). Hap...

Cliff Moylan was born and raised in Dorchester, Massachusetts, to an Irish father from County Clare and an Irish-American mother from County Detroit. He is best known for his portrayal of real-life hero Sergeant John MacLellan in the Peter Berg directed film Patriots Day (2017). Longtime friends Steve and Paul sit with Cliff to break down his experience playing Sergeant MacLellan, the epic Watertown shoot-out scene, and his experience working on the film. Cliff has also worked with acclaimed dir...

Originally from New Orleans, Andy Young is a Film & TV editor based in Los Angeles who specializes in comedy. He has experience in both animation & live-action projects working for studios like Warner Bros, Netflix, and HBO. His work has premiered at major film festivals like SXSW, won Webby Awards, and earned +850 million views online. As a writer for Moviemaker Magazine, Andy has interviewed such filmmakers as The Duplass Brothers, Richard Linklater, Edgar Wright, Frank Oz, James Gunn, Joseph ...

Steve and Paul sit down with Cinder Chou (Writer/Director) and Kerry Lacy (actor) about their feature film Artist Unknown. Cinder Chou is a Taiwanese American writer, director, and producer originally from the oft-maligned state of New Jersey and currently resides in Brooklyn. An early love for comic books turned into a passion for visual storytelling. Her work explores themes of otherness through a comedic and surreal style. Cinder’s early career as a production coordinator (The Big Sick, Jack...

Jasper Joyner is a Michigan-born stunt performer who has shared the screen with action legends such as Scott Atkins and Ray Park. Since 2014, Jasper has been Michael Jai White’s stunt double, working on such productions as Accident Man (2018), Never Back Down: No Surrender (2016), As Good As Dead (2022), The Commando (2022), Falcon Rising (2014), Chain of Command (2015), and more. Jasper, Paul, and Steve break down some of his most epic fight scenes, delve into some of the challenges of working ...

Our first Star Trek episode! Sonequa Martin-Green's fight double Sherry Rene, beams up to the Fights With Friends studio to chat with us redshirts! Our interview with Sherry Rene begins with a breakdown of the ‘Burnham vs Burnham’ fight from season 5, episode 4 of Star Trek Discovery. Star Trek has a long history of characters having to face themselves on different timelines and parallel universes when faced with mimicking entities and other anomalies of space and time. Michael Burnham, captain...

Steve and Paul share stories from their lives as stunt performers and discuss some insights regarding shooting fights for fun, training and on professional jobs. They dive deep into the development of the ‘Kenton vs Anton’ fight from Season 1, episode 2 of Alex Garland’s DEVS (2020), where Steve stunt doubled Zach Grenier. Beyond simply fight building they talk about training and doubling actors, hustling for work, injuries, rigging and their attempt to shoot a shot-for-shot remake of the epic ‘...

David S. Tuttman is a Cinematographer and Director whose works include The Endgame (Director), Prodigal Son (Director), Damages (Director), The Following (Cinematographer), Blindspot (Director of Photography), Law & Order (Director of Photography) and Wu-Tang: An American Saga (Director of Photography). We begin our discussion with a breakdown of the epic homage to John Woo’s The Killer (1989) in episode 7 of the 2nd season of Wu-Tang: An American Saga. Our discussion then takes us through the i...

American Werewolf in London (1981) and Brotherhood of the Wolf (2001) are two iconic films that have some surprising threads of connective tissue between them and other classic movies. Paul and Steve show their film fanboy sides as they dissect these classics, play six degrees of separation between the films, reveal lesser-known easter eggs, and play with actual props from the film. Grab a beer, sit back, and nerd out! MENTIONS American Werewolf in London trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

Jay Adams is Detroit area stunt performer who has appeared on Ray Donovan, The Outsiders, Banshee and many more productions. In 2014, after a serious injury, he left his career as a professional wrestler and moved into the film industry. Our discussion begins with an epic fight on the Dream On episode of Ray Donovan (S6 Ep9) and progresses into his career, making it in the stunt business, challenges of working in film and some future productions we will see him in! Jay R Adams (Stunt Performer)...

Doc Duhame is a stunt performer, actor, and stunt coordinator of seasons 6 & 7 of Ray Donovan and the Ray Donovan Movie. Our discussion begins with a deep dive into coordinating fights on Ray Donovan and branches off into discussing the industry and his long career. Originally from Long Island, New York, Doc moved to Los Angeles in 1979 to pursue a career in Television and Film. Three months later he was performing stunts at the Western Stunt Show at Universal Studios and being ushered into the ...

Hugh Fitzgerald is a Los Angeles-based actor, writer, BJJ Black Belt, and fight trainer at the legendary 87 Eleven Action Design and 87 North. Nearly 20 years ago, a struggling New York-based theater actor, Hugh, had a chance meeting with David Mamet that would literally change his life. That meeting opened doors he never could have imagined and paved the way for a transformative career in the film industry. His foray into this world was Mamet’s love story to BJJ and the Martial Arts—Redbelt—whi...

Calvin Ahn is a New York-based actor and stunt performer who has appeared in Fallout, Wu-Tang: An American Saga, Lovecraft Country, The Defenders, John Wick Chapter 2, and in one of the most noted shows in the martial arts space, Cobra Kai – as Chozen’s stunt double for the epic re-match with Daniel LaRusso! We begin this episode of Fights With Friends by breaking down this fight scene with Calvin and springboarding into a fascinating discussion about stunts, his career, and his life as a perfor...