Miscellaneous > General Discussion

How to hold a gun

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Kuildeous:
Pretty solid. Thanks. Especially about the athletic pose. I've been delivering the lines without having the actual props, so I can already see some changes that need to be made, especially when I have the props in hand.

I really wish the playwright didn't have the character hold a gun and a bat. It makes sense that either one would require both hands, and this would be so awkward.

Holstering the gun makes sense, and the script calls for a gun belt, but I'm not sure he would have a gun belt over his pajamas. I suppose it could go in the pocket of his robe, as long as the safety is on. Fortunately, the gun gets lost when I leave the stage, but there's a lot of dialogue before that happens, including handing someone a handkerchief and starting for the phone.

I feel like this could have all been done easily without involving a gun, but it's not my script. There are no shots fired. The situation is that he lives in a bad neighborhood (in his mind; he's a bit racist), so he's afraid that the cry for help is a trick to get him to open the door. Once he does open the door, he's a bit startled at how desperately the victim rushes into the room but otherwise realizes that she's not a threat. The director suggested briefly that he could put the gun down on the table, but we concluded that if he's still uncertain about her intentions, he wouldn't leave her near a loaded gun.

DG:
See if the script creates tension from your character almost shooting the innocent victim. If that's the intent then you'll need to be pointing the gun at her even if it's not entirely realistic.

Dylan32:
If a person were to be opening a door expecting a trap like that and someone bursted through the door like that, they would almost certainly at least have the gun pointed at the person no matter who they are; if the person has any amount of training, their reactions would probably take over and end up shooting the person.  So at the very least, that tension of him almost but not shooting probably should be there if the goal is for any realism in his actions.  But I would also agree that I don't know of any reason anyone would ever grab both weapons like e pointed out.

To add to what Awaclus described, when walking and looking around, the arm with the gun should be bent up where it is in front of your chest with the barrel pointed at the ground in front of you (finger off the trigger, extended along the side of the barrel), so that when you aim, you aren't having to raise your arm from your side, but rather are just extending it straight in a line away from your body to the target like the gentleman in the picture, except the off hand will be holding a bat I guess.

When/if you aim, hold the gun with your wrist at a slight natural angle inward, like between 20-35 degrees from straight verticle.  Some might not do this or have likely never heard of this, but that is a more natural position to be able to lock your wrist in place to control the recoil better when having to shoot 1 handed.  This is a slight detail that probably 99% of people wouldn't catch in a movie though, because as long as your stance and basic gun safety is good, even most gun enthusiasts wouldn't pay that much attention to details like that in a movie.

Most importantly though, just don't hold it horizontally movie gangster style.  It's just wrong.

(link above is to a random concealed carry training website that just so happens to have the best pic of what I was describing that I could find)

edit: typo

Kuildeous:
I also took into consideration that when armed with a gun and a bat, the person would be likely to fire the gun when surprised by someone running in. The play has some good emotional bits in it, but I'm thinking the author has no idea how to deal with a potential home invasion. I couldn't believe it when I read that the script called for holding a bat and a gun.

Our next rehearsal is Saturday, but I pitched the idea that the character only has the bat. He mentions the gun when yelling at the person outside to leave. We're going to try it a couple of rehearsals where my character has no gun but is desperate to scare her. The rest of the cast agreed with my idea, and it also maintains the integrity of the script since we're still saying exactly what was written.

But yeah, if this playwright is still open to ideas, I'd tell him to ditch the gun. The bat is actually referenced again later, so that has to stay.

Thanks for all your advice. It validated my discomfort with how this scene was written.

Witherweaver:
I think the relevant question is whether the individual has training (like, has gone to a gun range).  Most gun owners would, I think.  Though writers like to have characters be a little excessive in their traits.. so if they're unprepared, then they're super unprepared.

If the owner had any kind of training, he'd hold the gun correctly (two hands) and eschew the bat.

Edit: A slight relevant thing.. when holding with two hands, you don't wrap your thumbs around each other. (The hammer (or whatever) can tear the skin when it recoils.) Rather, your dominant hand would be on top, it's thumb wrapped around the handle, and the other hand would fall below it (so it's thumb is lying under/aside the dominant one).

Well, that's what I learned from my one (really unenjoyable) trip to a gun range.

Another aside: I really don't like guns.  I've never touched one before I ended up at this thing with a group of people.  Everything about it felt wrong.

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