Canada’s Kuperman brothers are trained dancers, but they tapped into their martial arts skills to choreograph key scenes in the Tony Award-nominated musical reimagining of “The Outsiders.” Rick and Jeff Kuperman’s debut work on Broadway is up for best choreography at the 77th Tony Awards on Sunday. The production, adapted from the classic 1967 S.
E. Hinton novel and the 1983 Francis Ford Coppola film, is among the leading nominees with a total of 12 nods, including best direction and best musical. “The Outsiders,” a coming-of-age drama that follows the rivalry of two gangs in Tulsa, Okla.
, challenged the Kupermans to come up with authentic portrayals of violence on stage. Both brothers have three-degree black belts in Kenpo, an American style of karate, which informed how they choreographed the climatic rumble between the feuding Greasers and Socs. “We only really experience violence in our life in TV and film and the tools those mediums have to make that violence feel visceral and impactful are different than the suite of tools theatre-makers have,” Rick Kuperman said in an interview from New York.
“I think the study of martial arts really unlocked for us a vocabulary that allows real force to be redirected on stage, as opposed to a kind of fake game of force.” The Kupermans grew up in the Toronto area, got their early dance training in Richmond Hill, Ont., and have been working together professionally for 13 years – typically on large projects such as A.