The police each fired a 6mm starter pistol with the tiny acorn blanks in them.
We were performing in a municipal arts center so this is how the chain of custody worked: The prop firearms were stored in a cabinet in the operations directors office (who is a gun guy, BTW). Each night, I would ask him for the prop firearms and he would release them to my custody. I would then keep them at my side until intermission. At intermission I loaded them and placed them in hidden areas on the set where they would retrieved by the actors. These areas were visible such that I would have known if anyone other than the actors that were trained to use them had made a grab for them. Right before curtain call, the prop firearms were handed to me personally and I then unloaded and cleaned them after every performance and then returned them to manager's office.
Another procedure that was strictly followed was one of calling out "loading prop firearms" before I loaded them and "unloading prop firearms" before unload them. This way if one accidentally went off people would know that an accident has happened with the prop and that a live gun has not been fired.
The actors that fired the prop firearms received training on their proper use from our weapons guy and had ample opportunity to fire test rounds in the space so that they were able to get familiar with the sound and feel of the experience.
Also, notice that I never referred to any of the prop firearms as a "gun". You never, ever say "gun" in a theatre unless it's in the script or someone has a real gun! Always refer to it as a prop firearm.
Before you do any of this, make sure you talk with the management of the theatre and check to see if any permitting is necessary. In the particular suburb of the Twin Cities where we were performing, none of this was required. Your experience may vary!
I guess we did it incorrectly.
I was following the advice of my professional weaponry people and had the sign-off from the building management and security people.
If you fear that my post will inspire people to use live stage firearms unsafely, please remove it.
If you want to use a weapon like this for a show (or a sword for that matter), the ONLY place to go is here: http://weaponsofchoice.com/
My feeling has always been that the person getting shot at should have every opportunity to ensure the firearm is not going to kill them.
There are plenty of prop firearms out there that fire blank loads. I worked with three of them last fall for a production of "Blood Brothers". We were working in an alley configuration in a black box that seats about 100. The room itself was 50x50 with a 24 foot ceiling. We needed one larger pistol-style prop firearm that Mickey would fire at Eddy and then two other matching prop firearms that the police would fire at Mickey.
After consulting with a couple of fight/weaponry guys and testing about 10 different prop firearms in the space what we finally settled on was this:
Mickey's prop firearm would be a replica .38 pistol that was designed and sold as a live stage prop. These prop firearms have solid barrels and an orange cap at the end of the barrel to signify that they are indeed props. In this firearm we fired 1/2 load blanks.
The police each fired a 6mm starter pistol with the tiny acorn blanks in them.
We were performing in a municipal arts center so this is how the chain of custody worked: The prop firearms were stored in a cabinet in the operations directors office (who is a gun guy, BTW). Each night, I would ask him for the prop firearms and he would release them to my custody. I would then keep them at my side until intermission. At intermission I loaded them and placed them in hidden areas on the set where they would retrieved by the actors. These areas were visible such that I would have known if anyone other than the actors that were trained to use them had made a grab for them. Right before curtain call, the prop firearms were handed to me personally and I then unloaded and cleaned them after every performance and then returned them to manager's office.
Another procedure that was strictly followed was one of calling out "loading prop firearms" before I loaded them and "unloading prop firearms" before unload them. This way if one accidentally went off people would know that an accident has happened with the prop and that a live gun has not been fired.
The actors that fired the prop firearms received training on their proper use from our weapons guy and had ample opportunity to fire test rounds in the space so that they were able to get familiar with the sound and feel of the experience.
Also, notice that I never referred to any of the prop firearms as a "gun". You never, ever say "gun" in a theatre unless it's in the script or someone has a real gun! Always refer to it as a prop firearm.
Before you do any of this, make sure you talk with the management of the theatre and check to see if any permitting is necessary. In the particular suburb of the Twin Cities where we were performing, none of this was required. Your experience may vary!
Ended up with a .22 calibre blank in place of the primer in the shotgun shell. Even then, the sheet of white flame coming at me across the stage was about four feet wide.
The guy getting shot at gets to pull the trigger first.
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