Choreographer Twyla Tharp choreographed a new dance specifically for Zoom during the COVID-19 pandemic while most people were advised to stay at home. Tharp, along with dancers Misty Copeland and Herman Cornejo discovered an unexpected technical challenge in trying to communicate virtually that made this project even more difficult.
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TRANSCRIPT
- Okay, Misty.
This is right on the beginning of your one.
And one, two, four.
Two.
(upbeat music playing) Great.
Four.
(upbeat music playing faster) And pull him across.
And take him around, and give him big push.
Good, thank you.
Okay, that's the idea.
I thought actually you were one count late, pulling him in.
- Okay.
- What I don't know is whether you guys got a time lag.
- Can we just count?
- Yes, totally.
One.
See?
Stop, stop.
My one is one one before your one.
No, I don't think it's us Misty.
I think it is the connection.
So, listen guys this technology will make us crazy, but you know what?
We'll fight our way through it.
There is a discipline to taking a more restricted arena, and learning lessons, and finding potential there.
Which is what the zoom is.
The zoom is very restricted.
(upbeat music playing) I've always been my best tool.
I work whenever, and however I need to, so that I've been able to evolve a lot of material on myself.
(upbeat music playing) Dances come from dancing.
I don't make a dance.
I dance.
And then something starts to make sense.
A dance will evolve if the idea is good enough.
(upbeat music playing) I try not to get emotional about the past.
Because you were so much younger, and the body was so much more malleable, and you just can't allow yourself to go back there and feel that.
So, you have to go back there and look at it for the lessons that you can use.