How Captain America trained for new adventure

The highly anticipated Captain America: The Winter Soldier from Marvel Studios continues the big screen adventures of Steve Rogers or Captain America. The story picks up from the cataclysmic events in New York with The Avengers and finds Steve Rogers living quietly in Washington, DC where he tries to adjust to the modern world.

When Marvel’s Captain America: The Winter Soldier opens, about two years have passed since the alien invasion of New York was repulsed by Nick Fury’s special team — The Avengers. The demand for protection of the world’s citizenry has reached a zenith. In response to the world’s justifiable fears, S.H.I.E.L.D. has expanded its presence to enhance the security of Earth.

Steve Rogers, aka Captain America, works for S.H.I.E.L.D. now and his red, white, and blue costume has been replaced by a suit that allows more stealth ability. The new suit is a darker blue with just a touch of red detail on the sides. The star on his chest is now silver instead of white. The new, subdued navy blue suit has a ballistic component, like Kevlar, that offers Captain America valuable extra protection. The suit is bulletproof and the mesh-like fabric also resists knife penetration. Captain America’s helmet no longer has ear coverings and is designed to fit in with the style of his stealth suit. It also has a communication device built into it.

Meet the new enemy

A colleague comes under attack and Rogers becomes embroiled in a web of intrigue and mystery that threatens to put the world at risk. Joining forces with Natasha Romanoff, aka Black Widow, Captain America struggles to expose the ever-widening conspiracy while fighting off assailants sent to silence him at every turn. When the full scope of the villainous plot is revealed, Captain America and Black Widow enlist the help of a new ally, the Falcon. However, they soon find themselves up against an unexpected and formidable new enemy — the Winter Soldier.

Based on the ever-popular Marvel comic book series, first published in 1941, Marvel’s Captain America: The Winter Soldier stars Chris Evans as the iconic super hero character Steve Rogers/Captain America with Scarlett Johansson as Natasha Romanoff/Black Widow.

For Chris Evans, the grounded and gritty tone of the script played to the strength and sensibilities of the title character. “Cap doesn’t fly; he doesn’t shoot lightning bolts,” informs Evans. “He punches and kicks, so with that type of combat, to make it cool you have the liberty to get grittier. It feels a little more voyeuristic, a little more documentary style, and it just has a rougher feel as opposed to most Super Hero films that tend to be a bit glossier.” 

Physical preparation for the fight scenes

On April 1, 2013, principal photography started on Marvel’s Captain America: The Winter Soldier, but for the actors in the film, the action began many weeks prior in preparation for the exciting elevator fight sequence shot in the first few days of production. The scene finds Steve Rogers being attacked in a very crowded elevator by several agents. The intense fight sequence would become a trailer moment and showcased the stunt and fight training that Chris Evans and all of his cast mates studied and learned in preparation for the film.

“It was very important to us that all of the actors trained rigorously for the film because we wanted the audience to see our actors executing the action in the film,” says Anthony Russo. “Audiences want to feel that energy and see a fluid fighting technique up on the screen.”

“These guys worked their butts off training for this film, training for months and training for these specific sequences, over and over,” relates Joe Russo. “Everything you see in the film, any time their faces are in camera those are the actors and they’re actually doing the things that they’re doing. We have a great stunt team that works with them and obviously we have to protect our actors, so for things that are too aggressive they’re replaced, but all that fighting in the film is our guys.”

Chris Evans’ desire to take Captain America’s fighting ability to the next level led him to expand the scope of his training for the film. “One of the things we all agreed on was stepping up Captain America’s fighting ability,” says Chris Evans. “In the first film, he had just achieved the strength, power, and prowess, but we didn’t get the chance to give him any training. In Marvel’s The Avengers, there were so many new characters, abilities, and relationships that needed to be established so you couldn’t afford much screen time individually to any one character. In this film though, we really get to show Cap advancing in his skills and stepping up the fighting techniques much more.”

Evans describes the fighting scenes in the film as having a more “acrobatic approach,” requiring Captain America to be able to move fluidly. “The Russos and I decided that I should start taking gymnastics training,” says Evans. “And it was really great and had a big impact when it came time to shoot fight sequences like the elevator fight.”

Director Joe Russo points to a big action scene on the ship, Lumerian Star, early in the film that highlights Captain America’s new, advanced skills: “You’ll also see in this sequence that Cap’s been training with modern techniques since The Avengers, like Krav Maga — real-world techniques developed to deal with enemy combatants in close quarters. One of our favorite moments from a character-defining standpoint, in terms of moving Cap employing modern techniques, is that he takes a knife from one pirate and throws it through the hand of another, because the second pirate is reaching for the alarm and it’s the only way Cap can stop him. Using your assailant’s weapon against him is a main tenant of Krav Maga.”

Anthony Russo informs that it was also important that Captain America figured out new ways to use his shield, in the spirit of being a modern warrior. “During WWII, a lot of folks fighting in the war had been on the streets of Brooklyn, or wherever they came from, just a few weeks earlier,” explains Anthony. “Very few soldiers were career soldiers. The same with Cap. He was transformed into a super soldier and then called into action before he had any significant training. He had a John Sullivan style of fighting, which was endearing in its simplicity. But now as the decades have progressed, and we’ve turned warfare into a science, Cap has a lot more tools at his disposal to turn him into a modern warrior. We wanted to be very inventive in conceiving new ways for him to use the shield.  Conceiving new fighting techniques. We went through months of staging fights and shooting them and thinking about what excited us about them.”

Mixed martial arts training

Stunt coordinator Thomas Robinson Harper explains the styles of fighting used in the sequence and the film. “The fighting techniques that we used in this are a mixture of Parkour, Brazilian Ju Jitzu, karate and boxing,” says Harper.  “So it’s truly a mixed martial arts that we had Chris training for because part of bringing the character into modern day is that Steve Rogers has studied and mastered these modern fighting styles and techniques. It’s very hard to integrate all those fighting styles and techniques together because one generally doesn’t work with another, but we figured out a way to make it flow and show that he has learned these things, and that’s how he has to fight in a modern world.”

Harper also brought in some of the best fight specialists in the business, including Chris Carnel and James Young, to help train and choreograph the visually dynamic fight sequences throughout the film. “The first fight sequence we shot was the elevator fight, which included Brock Rumlow and 10 guys in a crowded elevator with Captain America, and the challenge was how much choreography could we squeeze into a very small space,” explains fight coordinator Chris Carnel. “We built in some great gags as we let Cap use his hands and feet a little bit in close quarters with the idea being that these guys know what they’re doing and have a plan when they come in the elevator, so Cap is on the defensive first and foremost.”

“Once Captain America gets a little bit of room he can do a lot of damage very quickly and that’s when it gets to be a really fun fight,” adds Jeet Kune Do fighting expert James Young. “The scene is definitely the most chaotic fight I’ve done and it’s pretty incredible.”

For Harper and his fight coordinators, getting the cast ready for the fight sequences was made easier by the fact that they had actors to work with who were willing to put in the time and effort to learn.

“Chris Evans picks up fight choreography faster than anyone I’ve ever seen,” adds Chris Carnel.  “Watching him do a full-on fight while maintaining the character qualities of Captain America was really impressive and we were absolutely blown away.”

The stunt team’s fight training also included Sebastian Stan who enjoyed his Winter Soldier fight training immensely. “I really got into the fight training as it was important for me to feel comfortable with that dimension of the character,” says Sebastian Stan.  “When you start training, it really feels like Cowboys and Indians that you played when you were six or seven years old. It actually took me a while to stop making sound effects noises when I was getting hit.”

For Scarlett Johansson, her role as Black Widow in the film involves a lot of running, wirework, and rappelling. “A lot of the fighting that I do is basically reaction stuff like taking punches, throwing punches, that kind of thing, and then I leave it up to my stunt double, Heidi Moneymaker, to bounce 20 feet in the air and do four cartwheels.”

Georges St-Pierre recalls the day he found out he was going to be in the film. “I got the call about being in the film just before my last fight and I was so excited to do the movie that it was hard for me to focus on the fight,” says St-Pierre. “My character is a French mercenary who is an expert in the martial arts and is also an Olympic weightlifting champion. He doesn’t have any superpowers, but he’s a very strong and acrobatic guy who gives a little hell to Captain America.”

Georges St-Pierre continues, “I rehearsed every day for weeks with the stunt team and they were really great mentors for me.  Without them I wouldn’t have been able to learn so much so fast.  It was a lot of fun and it made me feel like a kid again. I’m very excited and I want to put 100% effort into it and be as good a villain as I can be.”

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Opening across the Philippines tomorrow, March 26, Captain America: The Winter Soldier is distributed by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures International through Columbia Pictures.

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