(written from a Production point of view)
Hiro Koda (born 31 January 1974; age 50) is a stuntman, stunt coordinator, and director who performed stunts in Star Trek Into Darkness.
Koda has started his career in film and television in the 1990s. He was one of the regular stuntmen on the television series Power Rangers Zeo (1996-1997, with Mike Gunther) and in the spin-off series Power Rangers Turbo (1997-1998, with Yoshio Iizuka), Power Rangers Lost Galaxy (1999-2000, with Yoshio Iizuka), and Power Rangers Lightspeed Rescue (2000-2001, with Yoshio Iizuka). He was the main stunt double for actor Sammo Hung in the martial arts action series Martial Law (1998-2000, stunt coordinated by Jeff Cadiente) and worked as stunt coordinator and stunt actor in the short-lived comic adaptation Birds of Prey (2002-2003, starring Dina Meyer and Ian Abercrombie).
He received two Taurus World Stunt Award nominations; in 2002 in the category Best Fire Stunt for his stuntwork in The One, shared with David Wald and in 2012 in the category Best Fight for his work with Randall Archer in the action comedy The Green Hornet.
Between 2011 and 2013, Koda worked as stunt coordinator on Nickelodeon's Supah Ninjas with assistant stunt coordinator Henry Kingi, Jr. and co-star George Takei. This work earned him a Primetime Emmy Award in the category Outstanding Stunt Coordination for a Comedy Series or a Variety Program in 2013.
He earned for more Primetime Emmy Award nominations for Outstanding Stunt Coordination – 2014 for True Blood, 2016 for K.C. Undercover, and 2018 and 2019 for Cobra Kai. In 2020, Koda was part of the stunt crew who earned a Screen Actors Guild Award nomination in the category Outstanding Action Performance by a Stunt Ensemble in a Comedy or Drama Series for their work on the fantasy series Stranger Things.
Koda has doubled actors Dave Buzzotta in The Prophecy 3: The Ascent (2000), Tate Donovan in G-Men from Hell (2000, with Brian Hite), Mark Dacascos in the action thriller Instinct to Kill (2001, coordinated by James Lew and Michael J. Sarna), Jet Li in The One (2001), Donnie Yen in Blade II (2002, starring Wesley Snipes and Ron Perlman), Mike Myers in Austin Powers in Goldmember (2002), Tzi Ma in The Ladykillers (2004), Eddie Shin and Tim Kang in episodes of Ghost Whisperer (2006 and 2010), and Jay Chou in The Green Hornet (2011).
As stunt coordinator or fight coordinator, Koda has worked on projects such as the television series The Tonight Show with Jay Leno (1992), Son of the Beach (2000), Phil of the Future (2004), Threshold (2005, starring Brent Spiner), Project Greenlight (2005), Instant Def (2006), Make It or Break It (2009-2010), Wendy (2011), Dog with a Blog (2013-2014), True Blood (2012-2014), K.C. Undercover (2015-2016), Casual (2016), Girl Meets World (2016), Doubt (2017), Outcast (2016-2017), Law & Order True Crime (2017), NCIS: New Orleans (2017-2018, starring Scott Bakula and Zoe McLellan), Champaign ILL (2018), and Big Little Lies (2019), the television movie Strike Force (1995), Out in Fifty (1999), as assistant stunt coordinator on Daredevil (2003), The Hunted (2003), the video game Star Wars Galaxies: An Empire Divided (2003), Serenity (2005), Feast (2005, with Craig Baxley, Jr., Johnny C. Meier, Boni Yanagisawa, and Thom Williams), Pulse (2006), National Lampoon's TV: The Movie (2006), The Nines (2007), Baby (2007), The Collector (2009), Jack and the Beanstalk (2009), Chasing 3000 (2010), Children of the Corn: Genesis (2011), Bloodsucking Bastards (2015), and The Great Wall (2016).
As a stunt performer, he worked on episodes of Diagnosis: Murder, Nash Bridges, Sabrina the Teenage Witch, L.A. Heat (1999, with Todd Bryant), CSI: Crime Scene Investigation (2001), Fastlane, CSI: Miami, Without a Trace, Fear Factor, Fat Actress (2005, starring Kirstie Alley and coordinated by Chris Palermo), Numbers (2006), Criminal Minds (2006), The Unit (2006), My Name Is Earl (2007), Dexter (2008, coordinated by Wally Crowder), NCIS: Los Angeles (2010, with Brennan Dyson), Blue Bloods (2010), Chuck (2010), 24 (2010), Do Not Harm (2013), Revolution (2013, coordinated by Jeff Wolfe), Sons of Anarchy (2008-2013), The Mentalist (2013-2014), Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (2014, coordinated by Tanner Gill), Ray Donovan (2016, coordinated by Shauna Duggins), The Last Ship (2016-2018), and Black Monday (2019).
Film work include Beverly Hills Ninja (1997), Turbo: A Power Rangers Movie (1997), Red Corner (1997), Children of the Corn V: Fields of Terror (1998, coordinated by Kane Hodder), Lethal Weapon 4 (1998), Blade (1998), Bowfinger (1999), Fight Club (1999), Little Nicky (2000), The Mummy Returns (2001, with The Rock), Ghosts of Mars (2001), Kung Pow! Enter the Fist (2002), We Were Soldiers (2002), Windtalkers (2002), The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (2003), Kill Bill: Volume 1 (2003), Dawn of the Dead (2004), Van Helsing (2004), Constantine (2005), Bewitched (2005), Memoirs of a Geisha (2005), When a Stranger Calls (2006), Norbit (2007), Next (2007), Rush Hour 3 (2007), Meet the Spartans (2008), Avatar (2009), The Book of Eli (2010), Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows (2011), Battleship (2012), The Hangover Part III (2013), Jason Bourne (2016), the fantasy film The Dark Tower (2017, starring Idris Elba), Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle (2017, starring The Rock), and Bird Box (2018).
More recently, Koda worked as stunt coordinator on Cobra Kai (2018-2020), Stranger Things (2019-2021, starring Winona Ryder), The Outsider (2020), and Ozark (2020) and performed stunts in the adventure To Have and to Hold (2020, stunt coordination by Thom Williams).
Koda is married to fellow stuntwoman Jahnel Curfman.
External links[]
- HiroKoda.com – official site
- Hiro Koda at X (formerly Twitter)
- Hiro Koda at LinkedIn.com
- Hiro Koda at the Internet Movie Database
- Hiro Koda at 24 Wiki
- Hiro Koda at Marvel Cinematic Universe wiki