Tell about yourself and story!
Well, I’ve been a Martial Artist since 5 years old, and my path into stunts started around 13.
By then I knew for sure I wanted to do something with Martial Arts. I wanted to make a living doing what I loved the most, but didn’t know how.
My path pretty much formed it’s self when I stumbled across a movie called “Jet Li Unleashed” and was hooked from the very opening scene. I wasn’t sure how it was going to happen, but I knew I was going to do exactly that one day.
I was so mesmerized that I decided to do some research about the history of Martial Arts, and films. Still with no knowledge of how to get there, I ended up creating a few choreographed performances for school shows and barmitzvas.
But at some point I gravitated towards thinking maybe being a pro fighter would help me get there. I competed for a solid ten years in karate, kickboxing, and jujitsu.
I taught in my school almost seven days a week, and when I wasn’t doing that I traveled the country with my team to train and compete. But a big part of me knew I didn’t actually enjoy hurting people, I loved performing!
As fate would have it, I ended up attracting a few friends that were interested in film making in high school. Then some more in college, until eventually we had a few years of experimenting with content under our belts and started to get noticed online.
This is when my career really started to snow ball as I built relationships through working with as many people as possible. I went on backstage.com and got a small indie gig on a Star Wars film back in 2017.
Then I met someone there who invited me to a slightly bigger project that ended up premiering in a film festival. And finally the film festival lead to me meeting my first stunt team who would recruit me back in two thousand and eighteen, and the rest is history.
We started a series on YouTube called “Power Rangers Unworthy” which grew to be one of the biggest fan series on YouTube, still to this day.
I continued to work with more and more experienced performers above my level, continued grinding to get sag credits on indie sag sets and background roles until I was able to join the union in twenty nineteen.
Then eventually I branched off into my own stunt team/production group, now called “Unworthyproductions”.
Now we train in a program I run out of my martial arts school called “Film Fighting Association”, creating content for YouTube and working on varying levels of film projects as a team.
Our ultimate goal is to become our own production company one day.
What inspired you to become a stunt person?
One hundred percent, the movie “Jet Li Unleashed” started my fascination. From there I continued to be inspired by films by Scott Adkins, and Donnie Yen.
As well as other stunt men and women in the community who I’ve been lucky to meet and train with. They’ve become my constant sources of inspiration and motivation.
What is your greatest skill as a stunt performer, is there a story behind it?
Fighting and falling would probably be my speciality over all.
I’ve spent the most time mastering my movements in several styles of martial arts.
And although I still have plenty I can improve on, I’ve grown a skill and passion for creating fight choreography over the years.
What is the best part about being a stunt performer?
For me it’s getting to create in cool places with great people.
Whether that means bringing the directors vision to life on a job, or starting from scratch creating my own story with my team.
Performing and creating, with people I enjoy.
What advice would you give other stunt people?
My advice as a young performer if I could give any to the current community, or even the next generation would be, to do what you love because you love it.
Don’t let anything else get in the way.
Anything else you would like to tell the community about?
Just that I believe it’s amazing how we’re beginning to connect on new levels in this community.
I believe if you look back just ten or twenty years ago, this community was very small and out of reach for so many people who would be great for the industry.
Now we’re communicating on a bigger scale, and allowing opportunities for all those individuals who were born to do this.
Follow Eric On Instagram!
@epicericfuchs