Maliphant: Challenging the Hierarchy of Creation

Russell Maliphant’s ‘Vortex’ © Roswitha Chesher

A little while ago I attended a performance of ‘Vortex’ by the Russell Maliphant Dance Company. (Sadler’s Wells Theatre, London. Touring England until 29 June.) The piece represents choreographer Maliphant’s response to the work of abstract expressionist painter Jackson Pollock. 

‘I didn’t want to make a piece that was literally about Pollock, that said this is his life. ‘Vortex’ is more tangential than that. It’s about energy, paint, gravity, form, physicality.’

‘Vortex’ begins with a single dancer in front of a large canvas that glows gold at his touch. The canvas is then tilted and athletically scaled. It becomes a spinning stage on which a performance is played out; a screen onto which spiralling silhouettes are projected.

The team of five dancers twist and turn, roll and rotate - gracefully, elegantly, hypnotically. They skip around a metal bucket swinging from the ceiling. They pirouette alongside a beautifully billowing silk sheet. They sway under a cascade of falling sand, tracing circular patterns on the stage as it settles. And all the while lighting designer Ryan Joseph Stafford bathes them in ligneous stripes, radiant pools and flickering shadows.

It’s a compelling piece.

Russell Maliphant’s ‘Vortex’

‘Philosophically, personally, I like calm.’

Maliphant is known for creating fluid, smooth, circular movements, and in this context we are reminded of Pollock’s process and product: his bold, physical painting technique and his emotionally expressive, colourful canvases. 

In an interview after the show Maliphant offered a definition.

‘What is choreography? The interaction of the figure, the light, the movement and the space.’

I pondered this concise articulation for a moment, before I noticed that it didn’t include music. Maliphant had consciously omitted what many would imagine as a foundational component of dance. He explained that music was important to him, but it did not come first - changing the hierarchy of the creative process was central to his approach. 

I think that – curiously - creative people can sometimes be quite conservative in their outlook; somewhat set in their ways. Too often they are constrained by the inertia of their own assumptions; by the straitjacket of custom and convention. We would all benefit from occasionally reordering standard practices; challenging technical hierarchies; setting aside our methodological habits. 

Because if you want to change the product, you should try changing the process.


'Well, I've been afraid of changing,
Because I've built my life around you.
But time makes you bolder,
Even children get older,
And I'm getting older too.

Oh, take my love, take it down.
Climb a mountain and turn around.
And if you see my reflection in the snow-covered hills,
Well, the landslide will bring it down.’

Fleetwood Mac, 'Landslide' (S Nicks)

No. 420

The Band Wagon: You Can Teach an Old Dog New Tricks

The Band Wagon, From Left Cyd and Fred Astaire. Photo - Everett

‘The Band Wagon’ is a fine 1953 musical comedy, directed by Vincente Minnelli with songs by Schwartz and Dietz. Starring Fred Astaire and Cyd Charisse, it boasts great tunes and cracking dance routines. And it explores some important themes: the interaction between aging talent, timeless skills and contemporary relevance; between entertainment and art, populism and pretension.

The film begins with the auction of a top hat and cane that once belonged to Tony Hunter (Astaire), the star of now dated dance movies. No one is interested in making a bid. We join Tony on a train from Hollywood to New York where he overhears fellow passengers discuss him as a has-been. At Grand Central he is heartened to see a crowd of reporters, but they are there to greet Ava Gardner. He realises he’s all washed up.

'The party's over, the game is ended,
The dreams I dreamed went up in smoke.
They didn't pan out as I had intended,
I should know how to take a joke.’ 
‘By Myself’ (A Schwartz / H Dietz)

Nonetheless, Tony is welcomed at the station by his friends, songwriting duo Lester and Lily Marton. They have composed a light musical comedy that will make a perfect Broadway comeback for him. And they are excited to have caught the interest of avant garde theatre director Jeffrey Cordova.

When the team meet up with Cordova, he enthuses about the project. He proposes to bring together diverse performance traditions into something startlingly new; to create a radical reinterpretation of the Faust legend. 

To accommodate the director’s vision, the Martons rewrite their play as a dark, cutting edge musical drama. And Cordova signs up youthful ballerina Gaby Gerard (Charisse) as Tony’s partner.

Tony, however, is apprehensive about starring opposite a classically trained ballet dancer, and one so tall. And Gaby is nervous about working with a Hollywood legend. Their initial meeting goes badly.

Gaby: I'm a great admirer of yours too.
Tony: Oh, I didn't think you'd ever even heard of me.
Gaby: Heard of you? I used to see all your pictures when I was a little girl. And I'm still a fan. I recently went to see a revival of them at the museum.

The company embarks on rehearsals. But Tony, feeling he's being patronized by the creative team, storms out. 

'Let's get this straight. I am not Nijinsky. I am not Marlon Brando. I am Mrs Hunter's little boy, Tony, song and dance man.'

When Gaby’s attempt to patch things up with Tony goes awry, she bursts into tears. They decide to clear the air with an evening carriage ride and walk through Central Park.

'Where to?'
'Oh, leave it to the horse.'

Strolling under a full moon, they reach a clearing. They walk slowly, in step, without a word - he in a cream linen jacket with yellow shirt and tie, she in a simple white dress. She spins. He spins. They sway together - he with his hands behind his back, she with her hands by her sides. They rotate, skip, twist and turn. At first gently, thoughtfully. Gradually they become elegantly entwined, and as the swooning string music is punctuated by stabs of brass, the extensions become more dramatic, the embrace more intimate. He lifts her up and they look into each other’s eyes. They flutter gracefully up a set of steps and settle back into the carriage, hand in hand, without a word. 

This famous ‘Dancing in the Dark’ sequence establishes that Gaby and Tony make natural dance partners. They recommit to rehearsals with renewed vigour. 

However, the first out-of-town tryout of the show proves disastrous. It’s a hugely complicated production, with elaborate sets and muddled stage direction, and it degenerates into a farce. 

'You got more scenery in this show than there is in Yellowstone National Park!’

'I should have listened to my mother. She told me only to be in hit shows.’

At Tony’s insistence, the creative team convert the production back into the light comedy that the Martons had originally envisaged. At last it all comes together.

The show's centrepiece is a 12-minute dance tribute to pulp detective novels. ‘Girl Hunt’, a murder mystery in jazz’ relates a private eye’s adventures on the city’s mean streets. There’s a blonde in distress, who’s ‘as scared as a turkey in November,’ and a sinister brunette with ‘more curves than a scenic railway.’ There’s a gunfight in the subway and trilbied villains at a fashion show; an emerald ring, exploding bottles and a murderous trumpet player. And it all climaxes in Dem Bones Café with Charisse in shimmering red dress and black evening gloves, all sensuous strut, long legs and high kicks.

‘She was bad. She was dangerous. I wouldn't trust her any farther than I could throw her. But... she was my kind of woman.’

After the thrillingly successful Broadway opening, Gaby and Tony embrace in front of the entire cast and crew. 

'The show's a big hit, Tony... It's going to run for a long time. As far as I'm concerned, it's going to run forever.'

So what are we to make of the underlying themes of  ‘The Band Wagon’?

There’s no doubt the project had personal resonances for Astaire. He was 54 and had been indelibly associated with high society dance movies. He often worried about taller partners and had previously considered retirement.

At first the film seems to be an assertion of the enduring power of established craft in the face of contemporary trends and pretentious art-house conceits. But Tony’s ultimate success does not reside in him returning to the top-hat-and-tails tropes of yesteryear. Rather he forges a new, more inventive form of popular entertainment, based on a natural partnership with a star from another discipline.

It suggests that traditional skills can remain relevant - not by grafting them onto the latest fad or fashion - but by investing them with new vigour, input and imagination.

As the cast declare in a final reprise of the show’s big hit: ‘That’s entertainment!’

'Everything that happens in life
Can happen in a show.
You can make 'em laugh,
You can make 'em cry,
Anything can go.’
’That’s Entertainment’ (A Schwartz, H Dietz)

No.414

The Syncopated Business: The Breathtaking Genius of the Nicholas Brothers

The Nicholas Brothers were two of the greatest dancers of the 20th century. Self taught in the black vaudeville theatres of Philadelphia, they combined rhythmic tap with acrobatic tumbling and balletic grace. They performed breath-taking leaps, spine-tingling vaults, heart-stopping flips, skips and spins. They made jazz and swing music visible. They were style, charm and elegance personified - pure unadulterated joy.

Fayard and Harold Nicholas were born in 1914 and 1921 respectively. They grew up in Philadelphia where their parents led the orchestra at the Standard Theater, their mother at the piano and father on drums.

When Fayard was a baby, his mum would take him to the theatre in a bassinet.

‘She would set me right beside the piano… as she was playing and my dad was playing and the rest of the orchestra. So that’s how I got rhythm.’

Fayard became an avid student of the vaudeville acts that he saw at the Standard. Using the small family apartment as his studio, he set about teaching his younger brother Harold the dance steps he had observed on stage.

‘I was showing him a step and he was having trouble getting this step. And I said “Listen, we’ll do it tomorrow. I see you’re having a little trouble now.” He said, ”No. No. I want to do it now.”’

Their father also took an active interest in their developing talent and gave Fayard some valuable advice.

‘Son, what you’re doing, it’s great. I like it. But don’t do what the other dancers do. Do your own thing… Listen. When you’re performing, don’t look at your feet. Look at that audience - because you’re entertaining them, not yourself.’

Fayard and Harold put their father’s guidance into practice, performing at the Standard as the Nicholas Brothers. Soon they were dancing in theatres around Philadelphia, Chicago, New York and Baltimore. 

'We were tap-dancers, but we put more style into it, more bodywork instead of just footwork.’

In 1932, when Fayard was 18 and Harold was 11, the Nicholas Brothers were signed as a featured act at Harlem's Cotton Club, appearing onstage alongside the likes of Cab Calloway and Duke Ellington. 

In pristine tuxedos and with brilliantined hair, the Nicholas Brothers spin and skip, twist and turn, slip and slide. Fearless and joyful, they dance on tables and up walls; summersault and do the splits. Their bodies float, their arms fly - with effortless elegance. They’re all high jumps and wide kicks. They levitate. Their act is punctuated with comic flourishes. They click their fingers, clap and adjust their bow ties. Holding a handkerchief between both hands, they skip straight over it. It’s physical poetry. 

In 1936 producer Samuel Goldwyn commissioned the brothers to appear in ‘Kid Millions’, which became the first in a series of Hollywood movies. In 1940 Fayard and Harold moved to LA and for several decades they divided their time between films, clubs and concerts, Broadway, television and tours of Latin America, Africa, and Europe.

Fayard: We did vaudeville, we did nightclubs, we did movies, we did television. We have done everything in show business except opera.
Harold: Did you ever want to do opera?
Fayard: Oh, yes, I’d do a tap dance in opera and sing ‘O Sole Mio.’
Harold: A tap dance in opera?

Inevitably the Nicholas Brothers’ careers were constrained by the racism of the times. At the Cotton Club they performed in front of entirely white audiences and they would only be invited to join the clientele after the show because they were so young. Their appearances in movies were also limited to short isolated sections of so-called ‘flash dancing.’ They were never given character parts and were rarely allowed to sing.

'They weren't writing dialogue for blacks unless they were chauffeurs, maids or something like that... We were never written into the script. They just didn't know how.'  

The actor and dancer Maurice Hines sums up the injustice:

‘Imagine what the Nicholas Brothers could have done if they had the opportunity. Oh, it’s frightening. But maybe that’s why they weren’t given the opportunity.’

The Nicholas Brothers’ most celebrated dance sequence is in the finale of the 1943 movie ‘Stormy Weather’ (which starred that other legendary dancer Bill Robinson, Bojangles). 

Cab Calloway has been performing ‘Jumpin' Jive’ with his orchestra. Fayard and Harold, dressed in immaculate tails, leap up onto a table, exchange a few phrases with Calloway and take over. They swing with the rhythm, skip exuberantly across the orchestra's music stands and strut on top of a grand piano in call and response with the pianist. They leapfrog down an oversized flight of stairs, completing each step with a split. And they rise from each split without using their hands. 

Blimey. And it’s all filmed in one shot without cuts or edits. 

I read somewhere the Nicholas Brothers characterised as ‘syncopated dancers.’ Their dancing is not neat and uniform. Rather it is complex and asymmetric. They dance in and around the beat. They each retain their individuality.

I’m no music scholar, but I’ve always liked the idea of syncopation: the thought that dance music in particular gets its intoxicating swing from an interrupted rhythm, a broken regularity, an out-of-place stress or accent. On BBC Radio 3 recently the writer Tom Service described syncopation as the slight calculated violation of what would otherwise be a metronome’s mechanical beat.

Imagine a Syncopated Business: moving in time, in rhythm, as one - but propelled by deviation and displacement, gaining its essential groove from deliberate disruption of conventional patterns, from changes in stress and emphasis. That for me is the very definition of a successful creative organisation. 

The Nicholas Brothers had a 60-year career, performing on stage, in film and television well into the 1990s. Harold died in 2000 and then Fayard followed him in 2006. You can see a celebration of their remarkable talent in the 1992 documentary 'We Sing and We Dance.'

The film features a charming illustration of their very special relationship:

Fayard: I was speaking for both of us.
Harold: You have to speak for yourself… And then I speak for myself… But that doesn’t mean that we’re not still brothers.

'Lucky number.
Dreaming of lucky numbers.
Hoping that those lucky numbers will show for me,
Numbers gonna show for you and me.’
The Nicholas Brothers, 'Lucky Number’ (The Black Network)

No. 315

The Uncertain Leader: Crystal Pite and the ‘Doldrums of Doubt’

Isabella Gasparini, Solomon Golding, Joseph Sissons, Kristen McNally and Lukas Bjørneboe Brændsrød in Crystal Pite’s Flight Pattern. © Dave Morgan, courtesy the Royal Opera House

Crystal Pite creates dance for the modern world. She has choreographed touching and thought provoking pieces that respond to personal trauma, grief and addiction; to the science of swarm intelligence; to the tragedy of the refugee crisis. She deals in organic structures and fluid shapes; complex patterns and restless waves. She explores the forces, conflicts and tensions at play in our bodies, our relationships and the world beyond.

‘It’s just human beings striving and yearning and reaching and trying. That is what moves me when I watch people dance.’

In person Pite seems a quiet presence, gentle and softly spoken. She is very articulate, but also cautious and considered.

‘I don’t feel that speaking is my first language. Dance is my first language.’

In a recent BBC documentary (Behind the Scenes, Radio 4, 25 July 2017) Pite is interviewed in the midst of rehearsals for ‘Flight Pattern,’ her first collaboration with the Royal Ballet. She openly expresses her anxieties about the piece.

‘I can feel that I’m overwhelmed by this project right now. It’s ambitious and there’s very little time, and I’m not convinced about some of the choices that I’ve made, and I don’t know if things are going to work. And if they don’t work, I don’t think I’m going to have time to come up with a Plan B.’

Pite reassures herself that persistence, effort, action and creation will see her through what she calls ‘the doldrums of doubt.’

Crystal Pite portrait courtesy of Sadlers Wells

‘Keep pushing through, just keep making. Keep making, keep imagining, keep building, keep trying. Otherwise I’ll just freeze.’

Pite’s candour about her misgivings is rare and compelling in someone so successful. And yet her uncertainty comes in harness with a steely determination, and a clear conviction about her core idea and end objective.

‘I have such a clear plan for the eye of the audience…Not only do I choreograph what’s on stage. I also choreograph the viewer. I choreograph what I think they’re going to be looking at.’

Pite is the very model of a modern creative leader. She has complete confidence about where she wants to go. But she is also open about the doubts and uncertainties, opportunities and threats that present themselves along the way.

‘I have to be a leader and I have to be a creator. Being a leader requires that I know what I’m doing. I need to walk in here, into the studio, and know; and to be able to be clear and decisive and sure. And being a creator is really the opposite of that. I need to be in a state of not knowing. I need to remain open to possibilities and to allow myself to meander and to play.’

It struck me that Pite’s remarks do not pertain just to creative leadership; but to all forms of leadership in an age of change. In the past we wanted our leaders to be consistently certain, steadfast and strong. But in times of transformation complete conviction about the future can come across as arrogant, misguided or delusional. When all around us is in flux, absolute certainty is absolutely impossible.

Of course, we need our leaders to be sure about the objectives we’re pursuing; the direction we’re headed. But we also need them to be more honest about their doubts and fears; more open to alternatives and opportunities; more responsive to events and circumstances.

‘Flight Pattern’ turned out to be an exceptional piece of modern dance. It was at once beautiful and sad; heartbreaking and inspiring. Its success must in part derive from its choreographer’s willingness to embrace her apprehensions and anxieties. Uncertain times call for uncertain leaders.

No. 143

Leadership: Are You a Gardener or a Mechanic?

Edward Watson and Mariela Nunez in Infra by Wayne McGregor

I recently attended a talk given by the British choreographer, Wayne McGregor, and the Finnish composer and conductor, Esa-Pekka Salonen. They’re currently working together on McGregor’s new ballet, Obsidian Tear (Royal Opera House, 28 May- 11 June).

McGregor’s style is angular and sharp; sinuous and curved; fast and physical. Though he has a clear personal vision of what he wants to achieve, he is also a collaborator. He partners variously with musicians, artists and writers; economists, anthropologists and neuroscientists; with anyone in fact that inspires his curiosity. He is also a theorist for whom dance is ‘physical thinking.’ He is as elegant and precise with words as he is with choreography.

‘I’m really passionate about creativity... I believe it can be taught and shared. And I think you can find things out about your own personal physical signature, your own cognitive habits, and use that as a point of departure to misbehave beautifully.’

Wayne McGregor, TEDGlobal 2012

McGregor suggests that ‘choreography is 80% psychology and 20% artistry.’ He likes to operate with and against the tensions that naturally exist between different dancers; to ‘notice and subvert hierarchy.’

‘It is as much about watching and noticing as it is about giving.’

Salonen seems of a similar mentality. In describing his approach to composition he says, ‘I’m more a gardener than a mechanic.’ He doesn’t simply arrange notes on a stave. A piece takes time and reflection. It is worked and reworked, accommodating new meditations and moods along the way.

I was quite struck by the picture of contemporary creative craft that McGregor and Salonen were painting. I liked the impression they gave of psychologically astute creative collaboration and sharing. And the notion of the leader as gardener rather than mechanic is a compelling one.

I think that many businesses today are run by Mechanic Leaders. They treat talent as an anonymous function, an asset, a cost; a resource to be maximised, an investment to be realised, a headcount to be reduced. They see companies as hierarchies, matrixes and ‘org’ charts; as circuit diagrams that are clean, logical and fixed; as ‘international business machines.’

Perhaps because of this perspective Mechanic Leaders have a strong sense of their own power and control, a sense of self worth that justifies to them their handsome remuneration packages.

In the classical music world Esa-Pekka Salonen has spoken out against the tradition of the egotistical, rock star conductor:

‘I hated the image of the omnipotent, God-like fucker who flies his private jet around the world and dates supermodels and so on.’

Esa-Pekka Salonen, FT, 5 December 2014

I’m sure we all recognise this personality type in the business community too.

For the Gardener Leader the talent within an organisation represents infinite potential and limitless possibility. It needs nurturing, encouragement, care and attention. The Gardener Leader is observant of strengths and weaknesses; sensitive to tensions and relationships; eager to experiment and explore. For them leadership is a dialogue rather than a monologue; a partnership rather than an act of authority. Consequently they are less autocratic and arrogant. For the Gardener Leader companies are organic cultures: interdependent, endlessly evolving communities.

Surely in the digital age we need our leaders to be more gardeners than mechanics. Surely we need leaders who can plant and nurture; tend and grow. Modern leadership is not about power; it’s about empowerment. It’s not about controlling; it’s about cultivating.

Surely the Head Gardener reaps the best harvest.

No. 81