On Tuesday, November 28, the premiere of the dance show "History in the Hotel" took place at the Moscow Variety Theater. The general producer of the project was the world champion in Latin American dances, two-time winner of the TV program "Dancing with the Stars" Denis Tagintsev. The film was directed by the artistic director of the Vladimir Mayakovsky Theater Yegor Peregoudov.
"History in a Hotel" is an unprecedented project for Russia. 26 of the country's best dancers worked on the production, more than half of whom are world champions. Among them are such well-known artists in the dance community as Anna Melnikova, Daria Paley, Anton Karpov, Eldar Jafarov, Dina Akhmetgareeva and others.
As Denis Tagintsev noted in a conversation with RT, almost all the artists agreed to participate in the project at the first call. In addition to the uniqueness of the show, he believes that the reason for such universal readiness is the difficult situation in which many cultural figures of Russia, including dancers, have recently found themselves.
"Now dancing in Russia has a peculiar fate. It's hard for dancers to go abroad to tournaments and championships. Therefore, the dance becomes very local. And it is important for dancers and artists of this genre to at least somehow show their active creative component now... Probably, the right time and the right atmosphere created such a team," says Tagintsev.
- Rehearsal of the show "History in the Hotel"
- RIA Novosti
- © Maxim Blinov
Naturally, given the background of the project participants, one should not expect anything from them except the most complex choreography and its impeccable performance. And the expectations of even a dance-savvy spectator are fully justified: spectacular numbers unfold on the stage, which are mainly variations on the theme of the Latin American program of sports and ballroom dances. However, professionals in this field also enter the territory of their neighbors and try themselves in other directions: in group performances, you can see elements of folk dances, as well as vogue figures. No less memorable is the tango performed by Nikolai Pantyukhin and Dina Akhmetgareeva to one of the most recognizable compositions for this dance from the film "The Smell of a Woman", as well as a gentle and very effective acrobatic number.
"I am very impressed by the physical capabilities of the guys dancing on stage. There's a number in which Denis Tagantsev dances with Alexandra Akimova, and they do something that makes the scenery and everything else unimportant. An absolutely stunning dance, with the most complex pattern, spectacular supports and acrobatics - the dance of world champions, you can feel it very much. And when you see this, you understand why this show is being started," Yegor Peregoudov told RT.
Although a clear hierarchy was established during the preparation of the show — the main director is on the set, and the staging of the dances is directed by five choreographers, each of whom is responsible for something different — each of the artists had the opportunity to speak out and bring something of their own to the overall project.
"I feel like our show is one of the few places where people from the dance community come together and don't compete with each other. Everything is here for the sake of one process, so there are no conflicts or something like, 'I'll stand in the first line,'" Tagintsev said.
- Rehearsal of the show "History in the Hotel"
- RIA Novosti
- © Maxim Blinov
According to Yegor Peregoudov, who has extensive theatrical experience, but is not engaged in dance, all the difficulties that arose when collaborating with an unusual group for him, at the same time, are the advantages of this work.
"In the theater, of course, I can give more advice to the artist, and the artist, sometimes, tries to "get into" directing. And here there is a very clear distinction. I admire the professional capabilities of the dancers working on stage. They're masters, it's weird if I insist on other movements and drawings, there are choreographers for that, they definitely know it better than I do. And dancers and choreographers trust my directing: they have seen my performances, they understand that there are things that I see from the outside, for which I am responsible. And they follow me. So there are no conflicts or difficulties here," the director said.
Despite the abundance of dance numbers, "A Story at the Hotel" is not a typical musical. There is no dialogue at all, but there is both a cross-cutting plot that runs through the entire show, and separate lines for each number.
"I think this is a very correct format. Dance lives in everyone, regardless of whether a person knows how to dance or not. All the same, the inner impulse of the heart, soul and body, it says that we are born to move. Therefore, it seems to me that we need to stir up this feeling in people," Denis Tagintsev explained.
- Rehearsal of the show "History in the Hotel"
- RIA Novosti
- © Maxim Blinov
As the title of the production makes clear, the action takes place in a hotel. During the one-and-a-half-hour performance, the audience will learn about the difficult fate of a couple raising three children and dancing rock'n'roll in those rare moments when the youngest - the baby - is sleeping, follow the fantasies and adventures of a romantic maid, admire a whole team of male chefs dancing paso doble with knives while cooking the perfect steak for a movie star, see a bachelorette party and a wedding dance, as well as a beach party, an incendiary dance in a stuck elevator and much more. All these stories are in one way or another tied to love.
The plots are revealed exclusively through plasticity, choreography, the emotions of the artists, whose drive is enough to charge the entire hall, as well as music. At the same time, most of the characters, even in this format, go through some transformations in the course of the story, and in the wordless narration there is a place for irony and humor that are easy to read.
"A story told in the language of dance and a story in a drama theater have different laws. The first is corporeal, movements, choreography, and plasticity are important. The second one relies more on the artist, on psychology, emotions, it is more text-centric, tied to dramaturgy," explains Yegor Peregoudov.
The locations and costumes of the actors are bright, but, with rare exceptions, quite laconic, compared to those that can be seen in classic theatrical performances or musicals. But it should be understood that since dance is at the head of the show, many artistic decisions were made primarily for reasons of convenience.
- Rehearsal of the show "History in the Hotel"
- RIA Novosti
- © Maxim Blinov
Special attention should be paid to the musical accompaniment of the production. Numerous foreign hits are heard on the stage, including compositions from the films "Ghostbusters", "La La Land", "Dirty Dancing", Livin' La Vida Loca by Ricky Martin, Mamma Mia by ABBA, Beggin' Maneskin, and I Don't Want to Miss a Thing by Aerosmith, as well as Bella ciao, music for sirtaki and much more. In harmony with the rest of the elements of the show, all this looks so incendiary that it is simply impossible to tear yourself away from what is happening on stage, and if in the first act only some spectators loudly express their emotions from what they saw, then in the second they are joined by those who at first were discreetly silent.
Interestingly, "Story in a Hotel" was not conceived as a one-time project: the team has big plans for further joint work. According to Denis Tagintsev, Grand Dance Show is a brand.
"A Story in a Hotel" is the debut production of our company. Of course, we are not creating it in order to arrange buffets in December, celebrate the New Year and forget it like a bad dream. Of course, we want to skate for a year, we want a second season, we have big plans, we want to make an 18+ show, a children's production, a New Year's one," says the producer.
Working on the show, its authors were inspired by such world-famous projects as Cirque du Soleil and Burn the Floor, and their goal was to popularize dance in the country.
"I've been dancing all my life and since childhood, from the age of five, when I started training, I had some kind of mission, I wanted to discover something so that people would learn to dance. And then, at a conscious age, I realized that I wanted dancing to be at a new stage of its development, so that people would fall in love with dance. This, by the way, may have happened to me after the first season of Dancing with the Stars, when I saw the show component and realized that ordinary people, for example, employees of banks and employees in other fields, are also interested in dancing. And it seems to me that we need to surprise," says Tagintsev.
Time will tell whether "A Story in a Hotel" will lead people far away from them into the dances. However, a charge of positive emotions and a strong impulse in this direction are guaranteed to the audience: with each new number, it turns out to be more and more difficult to sit in the chair, and to the song from "The Mask", many will most likely remember the policemen who in the film hold the main character at gunpoint, but when he begins to sing and dance, they themselves cannot resist rhythmic movements, and will experience similar feelings.
The show will begin on December 13 in Moscow. In April, the ensemble is scheduled to tour in St. Petersburg, and in July — in Sochi. In addition, according to Denis Tagintsev, the organizers have plans to show the performance abroad.