Category: Dance

Angela Scanlon is the sixth celebrity contestant confirmed for the brand new series of Strictly Come Dancing.

Angela Scanlon is a TV presenter.

Angela Scanlon is an Irish Television presenter for the BBC and RTÉ. She hosts the hugely-successful interior design show Your Home Made Perfect on BBC Two. Angela is the only woman in the UK and Ireland to have their own Saturday night chat show with Ask Me Anything on RTÉ One.

Last year, Angela published her first book Joyrider, part empowering guide and part memoir, all about the importance of bringing gratitude into everyday life. Starting off as a stylist, she worked in fashion TV in Ireland, before beginning her UK career as the new presenter of Robot Wars along with documentaries for the BBC.

Angela Scanlon said: “I’m terrified, I’m excited and I have so many questions. Will they make me tan? How itchy are sequins?! Do they do flesh coloured sports bras? Well – there’s only one way to find out, right!? Now I’m panicking a bit… but also secretly thrilled about the prospect of all that glitter. Let’s go!”

Zara McDermott is the seventh celebrity contestant confirmed for the brand new series of Strictly Come Dancing. The multi-award-winning entertainment show, produced by BBC Studios, will return to BBC One and BBC iPlayer for its new series this autumn, once again bringing glitter, glamour and glorious dancing to homes across the nation.

Zara McDermott is a broadcaster and content creator.

Zara was a government policy advisor, working for the Department of Energy and Climate Change and Department of Education before appearing on Love Island in 2018.

One of Zara’s biggest passions is making documentaries that inspire conversation and educate young people on hard hitting issues, she has fronted five successful BBC films so far:Revenge Porn, Uncovering Rape Culture, Disordered Eating, and Gaia: A Death on Dancing Ledge. Her other broadcasting work includes presenting  the entertainment show Love In The Flesh on BBC Three.  

Zara’s work for young people has been recognised on several occasions; she was invited to Clarence House by the Duchess of Cornwall and Refuge charity and worked with the Duchess on a visit to a SARC (Sexual Assault Referral Centre). Alongside this, she has worked with the government and the Home Office on several campaigns to end violence against women and girls, most notably fronting a campaign that changed the law for victims of digital abuse. Zara is also an ambassador for the ‘Shaping Us’ campaign for the Centre of Early Childhood, which was launched by Her Royal Highness The Princess of Wales.

Zara McDermott said: “I am so excited to be joining the world of Strictly! I grew up watching it every year with my nan and she was the biggest Strictly fan. We would dance around the house and I have such fond memories of that time in my life. I even remember the first ever series, and being mesmerised by all the beautiful dresses! I can’t wait to throw myself into this experience and start training. It’s going to be incredible.”

We’re a little bit late with this, but there’s still time to recap on our favourite performances of 2019. We had a good year, with San Francisco Ballet and the Bolshoi in London and ABT, The Royal Ballet and the Mariinsky in California. We were lucky to catch many noteworthy role debuts and watch young dancers develop and form new partnerships. If you saw any of the shows below, let us know if you agree – and feel free to tell us about your own picks!

Linda’s Picks:

1) Ivan Putrov’s ballet gala, Against the Stream 

I admit that I had given up on ballet galas before coming across this one. Why? Galas usually mean dancers that cancel at short notice, higher ticket prices and random programming. However, Against the Stream lived up to its name. Not only did Putrov manage to deliver on a solid cast (incl. New York City Ballet’s Maria Kowroski and Tyler Angle) and a repertory that is not often seen in London (think MacMillan’s Images of Love), but we could feel he had really handpicked ballets to fit within the evening’s theme: works by choreographers who challenged the status quo.

2) Francesca Hayward and Cesar Corrales in Romeo and Juliet 

I know that MacMillan’s Romeo and Juliet gets revived every other year at the Royal Ballet. However, evenings like this one – when Cesar Corrales debuted as Romeo to Francesca Hayward’s vivid Juliet in May 2019 – are rare. I was entirely transported, there was a sense you were seeing the characters come alive, transcending dance. They were so moving I was shattered to pieces. I also remember the supporting cast being superb: Matthew Ball’s Tybalt was brooding and menacing, while Marcelino Sambé’s Mercutio and James Hay’s Benvolio were best in class.

3) Natalia Osipova and Jonathan Goddard in Arthur Pita’s The Mother 

This was as home run from everyone involved. In a production that can be described as “Guillermo del Toro’s imagination meets dance theatre”, Osipova was free to hone in on her gothic exuberance. Goddard plays death, or the many faces of death, and he is creepy, scary and yet, he’s also stylish. It works. The Mother is a unique creation, rich in metaphor and outstanding in every way. But it’s not a staging for the faint of heart.

Jonathan Goddard and Natalia Osipova in Arthur Pita’s The Mother. Photo © Kenny Mathieson

4) Ekaterina Krysanova and David Motta Soares in The Bolshoi’s Don Quixote 

Not long before the Bolshoi’s visit to London, I had chatted with Emilia and our friend Laura Cappelle about Don Q being overrated. Too much filler, not much substance. After my first Don Q of this tour, I was eating my hat. I now have no doubt that the Bolshoi does Don Q better than anyone. They have the panache, they understand this is not about depth, but about performance and pleasing the crowds. The three casts I saw were tremendous, but a highlight for me was David Motta Soares, the young Brazilian soloist, who was a charming Basilio and who coped very well with all the technical difficulties of the role (including those one-handed lifts). Krysanova was exuberant as Kitri and the adoring London audience showed its appreciation.

Margarita Shrayner and David Motta Soares in Don Quixote. Photo: © Elena Fetisova.

5) The Royal Ballet in Enigma Variations

No one is more surprised than me, since I had always considered Ashton’s Enigma Variations to be boring and twee. I didn’t get its appeal at all. But this revival was a true revelation, I was extremely moved by the ballet. Okay, technically not much happens: the composer Edward Elgar is at home in Worcestershire and invites some of his friends over. He awaits a message from London. The ballet is a series of vignettes for each of these characters, and we understand their stories through the steps. It’s a ballet about feelings, longing and the everyday. I honestly can’t imagine any other company doing justice to this work. Although both casts I saw were superb, Gary Avis debuting as Elgar and Laura Morera’s touching Lady Elgar were a highlight.

Artists of the Royal Ballet in Enigma Variations. Photo @ Tristram Kenton, courtesy of ROH

Emilia’s Picks:

1) ABT’s Harlequinade in Costa Mesa

My ballet year started off strong with the San Francisco Ballet Gala (which returns this week to officially kick off ballet season in the city, yay!) and a trip to Costa Mesa to catch Alexei Ratmansky’s Harlequinade. I’m not going to lie, this is not my favourite Ratmansky work. If we take his recent full-length narrative output, I much prefer the bonkers-surreal Whipped Cream. But there’s still plenty to admire in Harlequinade: the choreography is delightful, steps are pretty and suitably tricky, Robert Perdziola has designed some of the most gorgeous costumes out there (in particular, the long dresses and lark tutus from the second act), and I could not have asked for better dancers than Daniil Simkin and Skylar Brandt in the lead roles. As a huge fan of ABT and its artist-in-residence, this is a natural highlight.

ABT’s Christine Shevchenko and Thomas Forster in Harlequinade. Photo © Rosalie O’Connor

2) San Francisco Ballet in Ratmansky’s Shostakovich Trilogy

In this interview with SFB’s principal dancer Ulrik Birkkjaer, we discussed some aspects of Ratmansky’s ambitious Shostakovich Trilogy. How many choreographers have been able to successfully package so many facets of a complex composer and of his troubled times into a single evening’s programme? I continue to find this trilogy one of the most fascinating “abstract” ballets to watch. There’s always a new layer to get into, a new theme to dissect. This time for me, it was all about the opposite couples in Symphony No. 9. who represent conformism and fear of repression, or like Ulrik put it: “[the] couple that doesn’t work in that society, and that is trying to either find a way out or is just not functioning”. Oh, there’s also the glorious music. 

Mathilde Froustey, Sasha de Sola, Yuan Yuan Tan and Ulrik Birkkjaer in Alexei Ratmansky’s Chamber Symphony. Photo: © Erik Tomasson

3) Merce Cunningham Movie

As I mentioned in my review, this movie was shot in 18 days, with limited funding. But it’s an amazing sensorial experience in 3D that honours Merce Cunningham’s genius as a choreographer and as artistic director. The spatial thinking, the high aesthetics and the beauty of balletic line are all celebrated in many memorable dance sequences. The movie has a wide appeal: you don’t need to know anything about the American visionary choreographer in order to understand it and enjoy it. Cunningham in 3D is pure escapism through art. 

Cunningham in 3D: the Summerspace sequence. Photo © Mko Malkshasyan

4) Mariinsky on tour

The Mariinsky’s visit to Zellerbach Hall in October was a ballet lover’s dream. It is a shame the company isn’t a yearly fixture in the Bay, but they made it count by treating us to 3 amazing casts (my favorite pair of the run? Definitely Ekaterina Kondaurova and Andrei Yermakov) and a solid programme, with La Bayadère on the bill. The glorious vision that is a Kingdom of Shades with 32 ballet dancers – as opposed to the 24 we get in the Royal Ballet / ABT production by Makarova - is an experience to cherish. And while I acknowledge there are problematic themes in La Bayadère, it has slowly become one of my favorite full length ballets, due to the two amazing lead ballerina roles it presents.

Viktoria Tereshkina and Vladimir Shklyarov in the Mariinsky Ballet’s La Bayadère. Photo: © Natasha Razina

5) We celebrated ten years! 

Although we didn’t have an official celebration, The Ballet Bag turned 10 in May, can you believe it? It was a busy time for us with our day jobs, and we didn’t manage to get together and plan something special. We didn’t even manage to update this site, despite planning it for months. It doesn’t matter. We continue to enjoy watching all these ballets and we want to keep sharing the performances we find truly special with you all. I often talk to people who enjoy dance — and who even used to do ballet at some point in their lives. And I am puzzled when I find that some have never heard of the great companies, of the great dancers of today and even the great choreographers. Sure, they have heard of Paris Opera Ballet and of the Bolshoi, but how can they not know how fab Danish National Ballet is? Not know about Justin Peck and his pop ballets in sneakers? How can any Brazilian dance lover not know about the ballerina Carla Körbes, and just how special she was during her acclaimed career with PNB? This is a place where we can tell some of these stories, and where people can (re)connect with this strange, ephemeral yet living-and-breathing art form.

Today I want to bring you something a little different through the Ballet Business series.

Sadie Aldis is a Canadian college student with, among other things, a YouTube channel, which she’s been running since 2016.

on her 21st birthday, Aldis released the video below, which I’m sharing with you because the 21 life lessons she wants you to know transcend genres. The subjects she talks about, including useful ways to approach challenges, accepting that life is hard & turning that into a positive, and how you think about yourself and others are succinctly wrapped up in a watchable 15 minutes.

I think all young dancers, students and young adults in ballet will find something valuable here. Enjoy, and if it helped you, let me know in the comments.

When asked whether the version of ballet that he and his alumni teach could be called “Morris technique” in the way people speak of Cecchetti, Vaganova and Balanchine techniques, Morris said, “yes, though I learned lots from certain other ballet teachers. I teach above all to prevent injury and to help everyone work with music.”

And is there a Morris style, as there are Graham and Cunningham and Taylor styles? Yes, Morris said: “Everything in my work derives from music. I don’t want 180-degree turnout, which, even if it were possible, just leads to injury. But I do want intimate and constant connection to music.”

A Morris classroom also becomes — as ballet at its best has been since the Italian Renaissance — a society, in which musicality, alignment, courtesy and mutual awareness are prime virtues. Humanity, too: Morris, an invariably entertaining talker, speaks exuberantly to his dancers, between exercises — about what’s on television, about an unmissable Broadway show (and about the long lines for the ladies room in Broadway theaters), about New York traffic gridlock, about Olive Oyl. But this spiel isn’t just a one-way Morris event: He wants his dancers to be people with lives and interests, not just dance executants, and he enjoys their repartee.

While teaching, Morris walks around the room, giving advice and corrections. Aaron Loux, who performed with the group until 2022, said in a video interview from Seattle. “I felt that for each dancer he would have a different set of objectives he wanted them to develop.” (For Loux, the biggest challenge was his hands, he said. “Mark was pointing out a blind spot.”)

Sam Black, who became a full-time Morris dancer in 2005 and is now the company director sharing the teaching assignments, will give his stage farewell during the Joyce season. In an interview at the Mark Morris Dance Center in Brooklyn in July, he recalled how he used to stretch his arms too straight upward in certain positions. Morris would say, “You only have three joints in your arm. You have to make a curve with only three joints. That takes imagination.”

When Robbie’s Barbie is trying to escape from executives who want to put her back in her box, she runs through the offices with breathtaking strength as if gulping up freedom with each step. It echoes other films Gerwig has been involved in: the scene in Noah Baumbach’s “Frances Ha” in which her Frances sprints down Manhattan streets, and the quicksilver way Saoirse Ronan’s Jo races through “Little Women,” which Gerwig directed.

In “Barbie,” physicality is important. Gerwig cast dancers to play the multiple Kens and Barbies, and they give the scenes a readiness, an urgency. “They had to have not only the dance ability, but be able to hold themselves and know how to act,” White said. “Quite specific things at crucial moments other than the dance that they had to do.”

In the other big dance number, the Barbie party scene, the choreography is shown at first mainly in close-ups — shot from within to create the sensation that the viewer is on the dance floor. Except for the moment when Robbie’s Barbie wonders aloud if anyone ever thinks about dying, it’s all clueless innocence.

“I really wanted to find movements that were fairly simple but kind of liberating and good fun,” White said. “One of Greta’s favorite moves was just swinging arms, like swimming backward. It felt so free and silly, but somehow when you’ve got 40 women doing it at the same time, it’s quite empowering.”

An arm swing makes sense: A Barbie doll’s arm can swing, but it can’t bend. Soon, though, the ordinary rules about Barbie’s range of motion start to dissolve. One of the film’s most obvious connections to dance, and dancers, is the most understated: When Robbie’s Barbie — whose ever-growing vulnerability melts through the plastic of her former self, allowing her to move with more plastique — has thoughts of death, she starts to change. Her morning wave to her Barbie friends becomes more of a wag; her feet, to her horror, fall flat. Her body, out of her control, is defying her. What dancer hasn’t experienced that?

It’s so clear that Gerwig, here and throughout her work, understands movement. She studied dance; she uses the body in big and subtle ways. As White put it: “She loves dance. I think she probably would have stayed in our rehearsals the whole time if she could.”

On a cold, proper “winter blues” afternoon in London, I phoned Alina Cojocaru to chat about her upcoming show at Sadler’s Wells. She was putting on the finishing touches for the programme and we spoke about her ideas. By the time we had finished our chat, she had truly brightened up my day. Focused on collaborations and featuring short films which look at her life and career, the evening seems less like a ballet gala and more like an extremely personal project, and if anyone has the artistic sensibility to pull off something like that, it’s Alina. I can’t wait to see how it all comes together:

TBB: You have organised lots of galas before, on behalf of Hospices of Hope, and the Dream Project in Japan, for instance. How did this project come about and how does it compare to your previous ones?

Alina Cojocaru: Yes, I have had that experience. However, this is a different project, as I am taking care of all aspects of producing a programme: from music rights to choosing the repertory, to fundraising and finances. It’s a lot to do, as it requires opening and registering a company, building a team of technical producers, accountants, etc. So I am discovering these different aspects as I go along. The other interesting side to this programme at Sadler’s Wells is being able to showcase new works, and that adds a lot more. But what has been really great is getting to meet people, to build relationships and get some business knowledge, and all other aspects of our work.

TBB: What messages do you want to get across and what was the driving force behind the repertory?

AC: This programme took a lot of thinking. I’ve seen similar events and there is always the question: what do I want to say or what can I bring that is unique and different, so it can be appealing? It comes together by a process of elimination and by questioning myself and the choices I make, and I took it piece by piece, slowly building it. And the main reason behind it? As I mentioned, I really like collaborating with people and especially with choreographers. I was very interested in doing something new and having a mix, together with a piece I had not performed here that I really love (Marguerite & Armand), so this is how the repertory slowly came about. One of the pieces we went along with is Tim Rushton’s Reminiscence. He had started this work on Johan and me around 12 years ago, and we created part of it and somehow our lives and journeys took us in different directions and we had never quite finished it. We felt like this would be a beautiful thing to bring to life. Plus, it’s a chance to have Johan on stage with me. It seems like the right piece and the right place.

I also wanted variety and to try something new. To interact with someone I had never worked with, and see how it would play out. This led me to Brazilian choreographer Juliano Nunes. He has created a piece for us, Journey, a trio in which he is also dancing, so I am really excited: it is different when you have the choreographer on stage with you.

Alina Cojocaru and Johan Kobborg. Photo: © Morgan Norman

TBB: You recently debuted in Johan’s new production of Romeo and Juliet (in Verona). How has your partnership changed at this stage in your careers?

AC: It is a time in Johan’s career where he is involved in many different projects and I am still dancing and also involved in different projects. It is beautiful for me to see how complementary these are. We work in the same art form, just from slightly different aspects. I think there is so much that I am learning from Johan and his experience, and from our conversations about what we are doing. I love it that we are able to say what we think, and share honest advice and opinions, especially when you are talking with someone who knows you so well. And I am very much looking forward to meeting him again on stage after all this time apart. One of the other pieces in the programme is his Les Lutins, which is a wonderful piece.

TBB: We heard the programme will include a couple of short films by Kim Brandstrup. Can you tell us about them?

AC: Kim had a dream to make a film that he eventually called Faces, which premiered at the Linbury Theatre when it reopened. I loved it and found very interesting, with its combination of dancing and the more intimate close-ups of dancers, and I thought it worked.

TBB: It certainly worked for us! It is great to see the emotion on the dancers faces, beyond what they can convey through their movement…

AC: …yes I think it works really well, and it adds something different. Here, we are going to focus on the sections where I appear, since that film is a bit too long. The other film we are editing at the moment – and which I really wanted to do, as it is very special for me – is on the theme of meetings, of celebrating connections. It brought me back to how ballet started for me, all the way back in Kiev, working with the teachers that I had, which I was very lucky to have. The idea is to celebrate them, so we went to Kiev to film and we were there for a couple of days. Some of my teachers are still working, and for me it was a very emotional journey: from the moment I entered the school, little to nothing has changed. It was quite surprising really. So that is what I am currently working on, choosing the right moments and making them interesting for people who don’t know much about me or my teachers.

Alina Cojocaru and Johan Kobborg. Photo: © Morgan Norman

TBB: How did your former teachers react to the whole experience?

AC: Well, I think they were thinking they were going to be talking about me and that it would be like a documentary when, in fact, we were interested in having them on camera, their faces, their emotions just being there. But of course we filmed everything. We filmed them talking, we filmed them meeting us. We have some amazing material and hopefully some day it can become something longer, but for now we are trying to extract moments which can complement Faces.

TBB: The final ballet in the evening is Ashton’s Marguerite and Armand which you are performing alongside ENB’s Francesco Gabriele Frola. Why did you choose this particular piece?

AC: I think M&A has everything we are looking for in this programme. It is one act. It is a story ballet, and it is something I have never performed in London. I love Ashton’s work. My first years in ballet as a professional were spent dancing his pieces, and this is one I didn’t get to perform. But most of all, I just love the story. It has a life and I simply had to perform it here, so why wait!

TBB: You describe all the work that has gone into putting this programme together, and you have had to balance that with your work as a Lead Principal with ENB and a Guest Principal Dancer in Hamburg. How?

AC: To be honest, the key word here is “time”. In the sense of the desire to experience as much as possible, and to try to explore beyond what you have and what makes you feel comfortable. Somehow for me, being comfortable feels like I am not doing enough, that I am not growing, and I guess this might come from our training as dancers. Always trying something new, pushing yourself, a new class or a different teacher.

In our careers, all these encounters and collaborations are what make us grow. The same in life. So it is the right time to do more and pursue these opportunities. I have great support at home with Johan. At the same time, there is not enough “time” in a day, and that is a challenge. To be able to push in rehearsals and class, and be able to have the time to explore possibilities to work with choreographers, and decide who and why and when. And also with the projects we have in Japan, and being a mum. There are so many aspects to the day, daily life, that as everyone else, we just wish we had more time to make it happen and to enjoy it.

I guess being the dancers that we are, constantly trying to improve ourselves daily, the push to “do the best we can” inevitably becomes part of our lives. So it ends up being in the blood: to be the best mum I can be, to be the best wife I can be, etc. I don’t think it is a bad thing, and in a way this drive has helped me in my journey ahead. But to answer your question, I would also regret it if I didn’t do it. Considering everything that goes into it, I’d rather live with that knowledge and the result of that journey, instead of living with the regret of not having tried.

Alina Cojocaru. Photo: © Morgan Norman

Catch Alina Cojocaru at Sadler’s Wells from 20 to 23 February, 2020. For tickets and further information, visit the Sadler’s Wells website.