She got Keri Russell in fighting shape for ‘The Americans’

One of the tastiest audience lures in “The Americans” during its debut season has been watching Elizabeth Jennings, the 1980s-era suburban Russian spy played by Keri Russell, convincingly pulverize her adversaries. Turns out, there was another gal behind making that magic happen. She’s Avital Zeisler, 24, a self-defense and hand-to-hand combat expert who consults for private security agencies.

A native of Toronto, New York-based Zeisler is an in-demand trainer of Krav Maga (Krav Mah-GAH), a system of self-defense developed in Israel and used by that country’s defense forces. It’s this skill that fueled a call from the fight coordinator from “The Americans” to Zeisler shortly before the show’s pilot shoot last year.

“I was given a script so I could see the nature of the fight scenes, and I taught Keri the fundamentals of self-defense and realistic hand-to-hand combat to set the stage as the training got more complicated and advanced,” says Zeisler, who trained the star for about a month. “I wanted to make sure she was dynamic in all her movements – including maintaining her balance while engaging in critical strikes – so she could work easily with the show’s fight choreographer later on, and be in control of her movements on camera.”

Those strikes, critical in Krav Maga, involve both upper and lower combative moves that Zeisler ensured Keri could execute properly. “Above the waist, you have straight strikes, elbow strikes, upper cuts and eye gouges,” she says. “Below the waist, you have any movements you can use your lower body for, such as, push kicks, side kicks, round house kicks and kicks to the groin. Actually, we’re talking any area you need to kick.”

Probably about now you’re flashing back to the moment in the show when Russell’s Elizabeth explosively thrashed her and her husband Phillip’s (Matthew Rhys) handler Claudia (Margo Martindale). And all those other incidents when Elizabeth dismantled males who threatened her mission.

Threat figures big in Zeisler’s personal story which reads a bit like a Hollywood movie.

A survivor of sexual assault in her teens, Zeisler enrolled in her first Krav Maga class in Toronto and “picked it up pretty fast.” Through a series of recommendations from one Krav Maga instructor to another, she increased her proficiency. Then a top-ranked teacher arranged for her to go even higher and study at the source, in Israel. She was nineteen when she made that trip and hasn’t looked back.

At one point, Zeisler had dreamed of becoming a professional dancer – she started studying ballet when she was six and was a student at the National Ballet School of Canada. “But after Krav Maga became part of my life, my passion and interests definitely changed,” she says.

In addition to her work within the security industry, Zeisler – she’s also a fitness trainer credentialed by the American Council on Exercise (ACE) – teaches privately, with big changes afoot this summer. In June, she plans to offer more affordable group instruction in New York City to make Krav Maga more available to the public. Not surprisingly, she’s keen on empowering women. “I’ve modified traditional Krav Maga to cater to female defenders’ needs,” she says.

“When it comes to self-defense, you’re looking at milliseconds,” says Zeisler. “When you want to hit a target, you have to do it in the quickest and most efficient way. You don’t always have the luxury of a second chance.”

After watching Keri Russell’s maneuvers, we’re believers.