dance movie

     there is a new dance documentary coming out. i guess it's already out in new york but i couldn't find any showtimes in the la area. but at some point i will have to see this movie. here is the trailer:

     i love a good dance movie. i own a few on dvd and this looks like one i will buy in the near future. what's fun for me are the familiar faces. three of the choreographers that were interviewed in the trailer are people whose companies i have seen live. two of them i've seen in person. one actually talked to me. there are some pretty good stories behind the sightings so i will share them now.

     with merce cunningham i both saw his company perform several years ago and got to see him in person once before he died in 2009. when i was in new york in 2002 i decided to take a couple classes at his dance school. just some basic modern classes with some random teacher. one time, right in the middle of the class, the music suddenly stopped and everyone stopped dancing. and then from one corner of the room merce cunningham appeared with his assistant and he slowly walking across the dance floor into his private room where he liked to do all his creative thinking. i believe he was in his 80's at this point so he wasn't dancing anymore, but even getting to see him that close was pretty great for me. he was a legend in my world and i was honored to get to be in the same room as him.

     the times i saw mark morris were far more entertaining though. i've seen his company perform many times and i love it because he always uses humor. once i even remember him dancing in a very silly way in his show, which he doesn't normally do. i actually saw him in person twice while i was in new york. the first time was a dance class. i had already taken a couple classes at his school with random company members when i saw that he himself would be teaching a ballet class one weekend. so i came to see what it would be like. it was by far the most fun and eccentric ballet class i had ever taken. he truly is a silly person. most of the time he enjoyed giving all his directions in an overly dramatic way. he would use big arm gestures to get the point across while holding onto a baby blanket that was wrapped around his shoulders like a shawl and had a cowboys and indians print on it. it was good fun. it was kind of amazing to hear the corrections he would give people. and he did give me at least one correction, which was awesome.

     the other time is saw him is a lot more entertaining story while also being humiliating for me at the moment. it was new years eve. i had gotten a free ticket to a party at a bar with my roommate and her friends where the ticket included two drinks and a glass of champagne at midnight. i believe i had more drinks on top of that and i know my roommate had a couple more than me. it was the first time i got good and drunk. that first time i turned my head and felt my balance off was so weird. the party at the bar was a lot of fun and my roommate and i were dancing and falling on each other all night. afterwards there were three of us girls walking back to our little apartment: me, my roommate, and my roommate's ballet dancing friend amy. by this time i was feeling more sober but my roommate was feeling very sick and was close to throwing up. amy and i each took an arm and helped her walk home. on the way home amy would wish everyone who passed by a happy new year. which was fine except she was kind of aggressive about it and if they didn't say "happy new year" back she said it more aggressively till they did. it was as we were walking through gramercy park that i realized that mark morris was walking towards us. i was immediately shocked at the surprise and couldn't speak. he saw me, saw my sick roommate and had a look of "oh that poor girl" on his face, and then was yelled at by amy as she wished him a happy new year. this of course scared him and he very sheepishly wished one back and then crossed the street to get away from us. i yelled at amy, "do you have any idea who that is? that was mark morris!" to which she replied, "who?" and annoyed i yelled, "stupid ballet dancers!" i was so embarrassed that he saw me in that moment and that we were "those scary girls he saw on new years." much later on i was able to see the humor in the moment. the ridiculousness of the situation made it a fond memory for me later on. it's one of the moments that made my trip to new york special. i will never forget the time my friends and i scared the shit out of mark morris.