BalletBoyz at the Roundhouse

Creating an all-male company just seemed like

the right thing to do.

We'd worked...

..as ballet dancers at the Royal Ballet,

where there's probably the same amount of girls as guys,

and typically you'll stand behind a woman,

you're making her look pretty,

that's the typical role of the male ballet dancer.

We danced with the Royal Ballet Company for 12 years before

starting our own company, BalletBoyz,

back in I think it was 2000.

Michael and I spent a lot of time dancing together.

The one thing we could be sure of is that we had each other,

so we had a repertoire that involved lots of male duets

and there was something about that kind of males dancing together

that really inspired choreographers and really appealed to an audience.

So when we started The Talent,

we thought that was something we should really continue to explore.

The Talent is made up of ten young male dancers.

Very different training to us, most of them in contemporary dance,

some, very little training.

One thing in common, I suppose, they all have this energy,

you want to watch them.

Just up on the shoulder, bring him down, put him down, run.

And we wanted to see if there was something that we could offer them,

the benefit of our experience, I suppose.

Once more?

We created an evening of dance and it just took off,

audiences loved them.

Certainly sold more tickets than Billy and I ever did.

APPLAUSE

Even now, five years into the project,

choreographers are still interested in working with these guys,

and just these guys.

For this show, we asked two choreographers,

Russell Maliphant and Liam Scarlett.

Both were trained at the Royal Ballet School,

both went on to dance in one of the Royal Ballet Companies,

but there's a significant difference

in the way in which they approach choreography.

So, you go.

Russell, his choreography is informed by everything

from sculpture to martial arts, Capoeira, yoga.

One more time.

Liam is from the very classical world,

which is very different.

Yeah.

Starting with a company you don't

know any of the dancers with is

always tricky so I think on day one,

it's getting to know people as people.

In the studio, you need to have a very safe haven to be able to

just do whatever you want and know you're not going to be laughed at.

I think the starting point for Fallen was probably...

..the boys.

They have that kind of energy.

There's enough of them, they can fill the space.

You know, they're like an orchestra.

I'm beyond excited for this.

It's the culmination of 14 years of hard work.

We created BalletBoyz back in 2000.

Right here at the Roundhouse was our opening performance.

We spent every penny we had kitting the place out.

It's taken us 14 years to get back but here we are, back again,

just as ambitious.

As you've probably heard or seen,

we've got the BBC Concert Orchestra here with Paul Murphy conducting,

and what's really unusual about that for us

is that we only ever dance to recordings.

Obviously, we're a very small company,

but to mark the success of this programme,

we've pushed the boat out and hired the BBC Concert Orchestra.

I just hope the boys can hold it together because

when you dance to a recording, it's exactly the same every night.

These boys have done 70, 80 shows of this all over the world

and it's in their body memory, they dance at that tempo.

Now...

..real human beings are playing real instruments and...

It has a different edge to it.

You know, the conductor can pull things out,

he can chop them short, he can speed up, he can slow down.

The boys have to react very quickly to that.

INTERVIEWER: So, Liam, can I just ask you what it's been like

working with the BalletBoyz?

It's been long. It's been a long process.

I think we started a year ago.

But it's been good.

I guess, for me, it's a different way of working.

It's really finding a different way of using males together

and I've definitely explored a lot more different partnering

ideas in the work, and the more I do with these guys,

the more it's going to cross over into other stuff.

It's funny, I think with my other work,

the women really drive the piece.

So with the absence of them, it was...

It was actually really nice to focus on, you know,

the beauty of the male physique and the sensitivity,

the physicality, the strength that goes into that.

The piece...

The piece is called Serpent.

We tried to get a fluidity of the body.

We wanted to go for that snakelike thing,

to have a real track from bottom to top in a very seamless way,

on top of that animalistic quality, to have something supple

and beautiful with more of a deadly attack underneath.

It took a while, but once you find that language

and build up on it, it gets quite exhilarating.

I think.

MUSIC: Europe After The Rain by Max Richter

MUSIC: The Twins (Prague) by Max Richter

That was beautiful, guys. Yeah, good.

This is good but I still think it can just lead a little bit more.

Almost keep it low so that there's not that moment

of there and then there.

I called it Serpent just because of the ambiguity that a snake has

and the...writhing and the unpredictability of it.

Intention-wise, any of this, think more like a cobra's hood than arms,

so that it has that,

so it doesn't...ever really stop.

There should be that constant movement and constant flow

and constant kind of...a sense of tension and possible attack

the whole time, even with the slow stuff...yeah.

I have a morbid phobia of snakes. I hate them, can't look at them.

But there's something that also intrigues me

because I don't understand them.

Sometimes there is just an unpredictability about them.

There is also something so sensual.

You know, they represent everything that is evil,

or they're personified as everything that's bad

but, yet again, they can be the most beautiful things.

MUSIC: Andras by Max Richter

Day one is always trying to start a conversation as you would

in kind of the outside world,

so that you don't go in and impose anything on them immediately.

It's trying to gain people's trust.

We were a little bit worried at first

because we knew that Liam

was from a classical background

and we hadn't had that before.

And I'm sure he wasn't used to working with contemporary dancers,

but when he came into the studio,

he set up this really good atmosphere and it was like he was one of us.

It was really easy to work for him and it was really, really good.

I'm always one to try and take them out of their comfort zones

a tiny bit but not to make them feel alienated,

and to push them in a different direction, to make them

think in a different way.

All the boys really stood up to that challenge

and they were very collaborative.

Especially with their duet work - they were so creative

and I think that comes from gaining people's trust.

You know, it's a vulnerable art form, what we do

and everyone kind of exposes themselves

a lot more than I think people realise.

So on day one, I kind of didn't really have any clue

what I was going to do.

It was the exhilarating buzz that you get with

going into a group of people and not knowing what

they're necessarily capable of or what their attributes are.

And then after day one, day two, you can really go

back into the studio and start kind of cultivating some sort of piece.

We had a day where we'd done a lot of leg work.

We just stood face-to-face,

and I always think that those combat movies or choreography

or just the intricacy of arm work

is sometimes neglected.

It's very hard to sustain something like that

and I really wanted to be able to do that,

and it took hours.

But, I mean, it's my favourite bit of the piece, definitely.

MUSIC: November by Max Richter

I like to be able to watch a different performance

every single time I watch it.

I like people to use whatever mood they're in that day

to amplify what they're doing,

and I think there's enough ambiguity within the piece

for the boys to be able to find those moments

where they can change it every night.

I like the freedom that Liam gave us

to take the choreography and make it really personal

so every night would be a different performance.

The step would be always the same,

but there would be something - small details could change.

For example, in my solo,

I was experiencing different qualities every night.

I think it grows with every performance that they do,

and they find something different where they can play off.

But I think it works, because you can honour what the steps are,

but then translate it for your own body as well.

Again, every person has that kind of moment where they can shine,

and I think they've really taken those moments and shone.

MUSIC: Embers by Max Richter

APPLAUSE

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Yeah, it's the first time working with a live orchestra on this scale,

it's something you can't really explain

until you actually do it with the audience there, and...

..and them going full whack, which makes us go full whack.

It's like...

Yeah, it's pretty amazing.

The orchestra were really excited by the whole project.

I had a few comments tonight's from players saying,

"Well, we weren't sure what to expect",

but as soon as they saw what was involved, they were all buzzing.

Absolutely terrific.

We've done Serpent about 70, 80 times now.

But it felt completely different with the live music.

Completely different atmosphere and energy.

The music is amazing. It gives you a lot.

It gives you a lot to perform with.

Some bits were a bit too fast or too slow,

so we had to speak about that, but it was good.

We really enjoyed.

With contemporary dance, like this programme tonight,

the music drives the dance.

I mean, classical dance, you're sort of locked into

the confines of choreography,

so it was a much more freeing experience in some ways.

Ladies and gentlemen,

would you please take your seats for this evening's performance...

Well, for the second half of the show,

we wanted something that would feel completely different.

That's why we asked Russell to make a piece using all ten dancers

that would have a kind of epic feel to it.

When he's creating the choreography in the studio,

you never know quite what he's going to come up with.

Taking bits from here, taking bits from there,

putting it in a new order, making it in reverse,

bit slower, bit faster, trying all different sorts of music

until he finds exactly the right combination.

Only up till the last minute do we actually see the shape of the show.

I think we've got the nuts and bolts of the vocabulary. Yeah. Good.

We were interested in the way he...

You know, he has the classical training,

but he has all this capoeira experience, yoga, t'ai chi,

we wanted to see how all of those things fused together

with our dancers.

See if there was something really spectacular that he could make.

This is a pretty challenging piece, I think,

in many... I think it needs to be.

To see ten guys doing that, you know,

kind of challenging work...

Yeah, that's what you want to... Who else is doing that?

I felt that when I was going to this project,

I always like to have things, tasks, in the bag to go in with.

And the initial task was doing certain vocabulary movements to get

a kind of flow and movement quality and a technique into the body

and then to play with moving from the one to the other

to another to another to see how they might piece together,

which was more about choreographic flow.

When we've got to that, things start to attach themselves

very naturally and sometimes really beautifully.

I think then it's worth kind of beginning to become aware of that.

I think that's one of the major challenges.

RHYTHMIC MUSIC PLAYS

MUSIC STOPS

I think there's a lot of heart in Armand's music

and also a lot of energy.

Some of it is big, orchestral music.

I think often I find I can't use that in my company with a duet.

You know, it needs, it kind of demands

a certain equality in energy to the music.

I thought that with these guys, you know,

they have that kind of energy.

There's enough of them, they can fill the space

so that orchestral music kind of equated to them.

But, I mean, I make mostly things for up to six people,

so to work for the size of BalletBoyz as it was in Fallen

was different for me.

EERIE MUSIC PLAYS

I don't want to be pigeonholed into anything except dance.

You know, is it contemporary? Mis it classical?

If we do an Arabesque, does that make it classical?

If we do an Aikido roll, is that contemporary?

I mean, strictly speaking, if you're working with a classical vocabulary,

1st position, 2nd position, 3rd position, 4th, 5th,

if we're working with all of those vocabulary,

I guess that you could say that it's a classical language,

even if you change the energy.

I think more about language.

I love line and line is really a part

of classical ballet and classical sculpture,

but I think it's something that I try and work with.

I was originally a classical dancer, so I was a little bit apprehensive

when I first made the move into contemporary dance.

I think it was just fear of the unknown, really.

It's a bit like being a football player

and then suddenly deciding you want to become a rugby player.

Working with Russell was a great experience.

He was the first contemporary choreographer I'd ever worked with.

He was really nurturing to work with him,

cos he's a really relaxed guy.

He takes the time to show you how it should be and then lets you grow

and evolve over time, which I found very helpful.

MID-TEMPO MUSIC PLAYS

MUSIC STOPS

THRUMMING SOUND

EERIE MUSIC BEGINS

I don't think there is a "should" in the way I want people to see it.

For me, I want it to be something like a dream.

It's hard to say what Fallen actually means,

just because Russell never really gives a narrative to the process.

It's strange, because a lot of people, when they come to see

the show tend to interpret it in so many different ways.

It could be that they think we're soldiers or even prisoners,

but when we were in the studio with Russell and he was creating

the work, he never gave it any narrative, as such.

You can have images that relate to something.

They might say something to you that is quite different to

the person who's sat next to you or on the other side.

So I don't want it to be so specific that it's only one thing.

EERIE MUSIC CONTINUES

CREAKING AND CLUNKING

I felt like quite a lot of the guys already have that element of trust.

They're willing to take a risk, knowing that they trust

the other partners to break their fall or catch them or...

I knew that I wanted to get into that material

where the men are higher.

I wasn't sure how that would be,

but I thought there's enough guys that we can have two men

holding or, you know, can climb - run up one and on to another.

So it was related to a falling, a literal falling.

As it happened, when it seemed...

When the piece seemed to reveal more of itself,

there is a kind of image, for me,

that relates to the fallen men from war.

APPLAUSE

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE CONTINUES