I’ve been working on the script for “All Good Men”. All Good Men is my name for the adaptation of Dylan Thomas’s fimscript The Doctor and the Devils into a dance/theater event.
The characters are very complex. Because the story deals with societal acceptance issues, I’m considering re-accenting parts of the story. There are some interesting parallels between the main storyline – people who are killed so that their bodies can be sold as cadavers to medical schools – and sex work. One of the main characters – who gets killed – is actually a tavern-girl/hooker. The killers are motivated in part by need, and in part by greed. I’m thinking about bodies, bodies for sale, and how that will work in as part of the production.
I’m thinking of highlighting that issue in one of the dances.
So I’ve been working on the text, figuring out where the dances might go, and what the dance might be performed to. I know that some of the dances are going to be performed to the read script. But at least at one point, music will overwhelm the read text, and dance will occur to music. I’m thinking about using this beatles song at a place where development occurs between three sets of characters, in subsequent scenes.
I heard the song on the radio the other day and thought it might work well for this. I don’t want to be too simplistic in creating my images for the audience. But it’s a nice song, and can be used both directly and ironically. I might use it.
Only really bad art is about pain. Let me re-phrase that. (La Guernica is brilliant.)
Art shouldn’t be painful to create. However, as The Roots (music group) say:
Tell you one lesson I’ve learned,
If you want to reach something in life,
You aint’ gonna get it unless
You give a little bit of sacrifice
Sometimes before you smile you got to cry,
You need a heart that’s filled with music,
If you use it you can fly.
It is very difficult to dance really hard day after day, for hours. I’ve never been in a full time company, but you can’t be in the world (of dance) for long without seeing that part of the job is managing the body’s issues. My last post concerned Trey McIntyre. In preparing the post I came across a video of a former Washington Ballet ballerina named Michelle Jimenez. Michelle had danced Trey’s work, and I couldn’t help but post the video cause I thought it was neat. It belongs more properly here, though, so I’m moving it. You can see Michelle dancing in the last post.
I enjoyed the video in part because working with the body is my daily life as a dancer. But I think what she said applies not just to all athletes, but to each of us. Every day we deal with a new body, and new mind.
In 2005 I wrote the piece below titled “Pain and the Dancer”. It was published in Bourgeon.
Pain and the Dancer
Brianne Bland (of Washington Ballet) first noticed the pain in her foot in August. It continued through day after day of rehearsals, and two different long runs of performances, in which she starred. At the conclusion of the run of Giselle – in which she played Giselle – she went to the doctor. Brianne had three broken bones in her foot. It was November.
While dancing with Le Jeune Ballet De Paris Jonathan Jordan starred in a tour crossing five countries. The two broken bones in his ankle, which hurt before the tour started, were diagnosed during his layoff. Penny Saunders danced with a torn meniscus in her knee while dancing with Momix in Europe. For thirteen months.
This article is not about the frailty of feet. Or knees. Or the difficulties of staying healthy. This article is about the necessary acceptance of intense pain. These dancers took months to address their concerns not out of denial, but because working with pain is necessary, and commonplace.
In the February 1st, 2005 Washington Post article on NFL all-time rushing leader
Emmitt Smiths retirement, the man who will now be the active rushing leader in the NFL stated that success such as Emmitt has had, such as he – Curtis Martin – has had, only comes with pain. He states that everyone gets injured and it is the ability to manage and overcome injury that creates greatness.
Pain develops a person in a certain way. I worked as an Emergency Medical Technician for six years, and was struck by the varied responses to intense, sudden pain. There are those who become hysterical, and those who become calm. What makes a person have one reaction instead of another is difficult to say. It seems clear, however, that significant dance artists respond with calm.
Being a great performer requires a personal intensity that is unusual in those who
have not undergone great struggles. Cheryl Crow once croaked “what mercy sadness
brings.” It is in this vein that the generosity of performance built through pain can be
understood. Empathy with those in pain, empathy with strong emotion of every sort, is a
defining characteristic of a great dancer.
A friend once noted that to be a really good dancer one must enjoy failure, and
pain. Failure as it is through doing what one cannot do that one reaches the outer limits of the possible. Pain because it is the anvil upon which is forged the body, and thus the person, who can create significant performance. Nietzsche argued that “a species, a type, originates and grows firm and strong in a long struggle with essentially constant but unfavorable conditions.” And so it is that the dancers of today carry on in the tradition of the dancers of the last two hundred years. In pain.
R. Betmann 7/2005
Post-note: Since publication of this piece, Curtis Martin began the 2006-2007 NFL season running well. However, in mid-October he was forced to sit out for the remainder of the season due to recurring knee troubles. On July 27th, 2007, prior to the start of the 2007-2008 season, Curtis Martin quietly retired.
I’m fond of saying that you can’t teach someone to dance. They teach themselves. You give exercises and ideas, but in the end they learn or don’t learn on their own.
Helping dancers learn how to listen to their bodies while pushing limits safely is an important role that good teachers play for their students.
On the third season of The Muppet Show, Rudolf Nureyev was a guest star…..
There’s something trenchant in his difficulties with the ‘large ballerina’.
Many readers will remember the issue of the Bolshoi dancer who was fired a few years ago for being too big. For those unfamiliar, first few lines from Chicago Sun posted below, and more here.
MOSCOW — A top ballerina threatened Thursday to sue the Bolshoi Theater over her firing and accused it of spreading lies that her dance partners found her too heavy to lift.
Anastasia Volochkova alleged the Bolshoi violated Russian labor law by announcing this week that her dismissal was retroactive to June 30. She said that her lawyers were preparing a suit.
Physics is a part of the world, and the reality is that more weight is harder to lift. This leads to abuses on both employer and employee sides of the equation. Hard to figure out how to stop it though.
On the other side: does anyone in the audience really care if a lift is high as can be? I’ve noticed that bad choreography frequently tries to hide itself under as little clothing as possible. Sex – and by that I mean lithe young bodies – sells tickets, and companies afraid that they can’t (or won’t) sell tickets based on talent reliably fall back on flexibility, strength, and ‘beauty’.
I noticed – and others have noticed – that as non-traditional companies get more successful and grow past their founding members – Bill T. Jones, for instance – ‘unique’ dancers are replaced by more ‘traditional’ bodies. It’s gotta be a wrench for the directors of the companies. Frequently original repertory involves very unique movement. So to keep old rep and make new stuff….. many companies seem unable to fight the gravity toward easier-to-use bodies.