Transcript

Lou Cope talks to Cathy Marston

25 May 2020

Lou: Hi, Cathy, how are you doing?

Cathy: I'm very well. Thank you.

Lou: Thank you very, very much for joining us

Cathy: You're welcome. Thanks for inviting me.

Lou: Yeah, it's a privilege. So I believe that you are in Bern in Switzerland and I'm very jealous. Am I right to be? Are you in a beautiful environment?

Cathy: Right now. Yes. Well, I'm at home right now, the weather is gorgeous. Thankfully, and I've just gotten back from a beautiful walk by the river and if you're ever near Bern, I recommend it. It's just quite heavenly this morning. There was no one there. I was all on my own.

Lou: So you have mountains around you and you can see the mountains in the distance? Okay. Not a bad place to be.

Cathy: No

Lou: So I think that, a couple of things have been paused in your life. since we went into lockdown, what, what's the situation for you? You had a couple of shows just about to open, I think, is that right?

Cathy: Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, I'm counting my lucky stars because in February I premiered.. as in, got on stage, thankfully 'The Cellist' for , which was my first work, the main stage.

And I have to say, looking back now at the timeline of Corona, I mean, I think it was by the skin of our teeth that that happened, but it did. Yeah. And then shortly after that, I went to San Francisco. Where I had made last summer a new work for them that we should have premiered in March called Mrs. Robinson about Mrs. Robinson's perspective on the story of The Graduate. And sadly that didn't make it. And we were a week off premiere and suddenly Trump decided to cancel flights from Europe. And it seemed very obvious that I needed to get back straight away and anyway, the theater had closed. So that's on ice.

It's ready to go… when the company can get back on stage, it will be going again. And then I was supposed to be going, actually now to Germany to stage my ballet, The Suit, which I'd created a couple of years ago now for Ballet Black. And I was staging that in Karlsruhe. That's obviously postponed and I should have then been going to New York to restage Jane Eyre for American Ballet Theater, at The Met, that's clearly not happening right now. So all of that's definitely gone. And then next year is very, or next season is very, very much in flux right now. So I should be making a ballet on Of Mice and Men for the .

And that's set to premiere in the spring. We've just pushed the dates a little bit on that to try and give it a better chance of making it. And likewise for the Atlanta Ballet, I'm making a piece. And hopefully we're getting Mrs. Robinson back on, but all of that's in America and my eyes are constantly looking towards America to see how Corona's developing there.

Lou: Yeah.

Cathy: At the moment not great, but…

Lou: Gosh, gosh, what an extraordinary thing to be so busy. And so I imagine the momentum was like, ah, I've gotta do this, gotta do… Oh, okay. Stop!.

Cathy: Yeah. It was really disappointing. Cause of course, you know, the Royal Ballet commission was something I've wanted to do for 25 years and there was a huge momentum around it.

And then going straight onto , which is another incredible company that's really great, but you know. We’ll just have to hope that that, that momentum will regain the same strength at some point.

Lou: I'm sure it will, but you must be thinking, okay… so how am I now going to fit all of that into a smaller space of time afterwards when everything does hopefully kick back off again...

Cathy: Yeah, yeah. yeah, it's definitely a lot of chats with my husband sort of every other day... or not, not quite that frequently, but every time I get an email from one of the companies trying to sort of shift their dates and it's all getting jammed together and we're just accepting that right now.

Whereas I would have always said, okay, I'll go away for three weeks and then, and then come back because we’ve got two young kids. We might have a slightly trickier time for a period of six months or so, where as you say, everything's trying to squeeze in.

Lou: Yeah. But the other side of that is that you were home now with your kids.

Cathy: Exactly. Yeah. And that’s lovely. Yeah.

Lou: So, so right now, have you been busy sort of dealing with all of this or are you actually having some downtime and some family time?

Cathy: A bit of both. So I was obviously trying to deal with homeschool for a while. in Switzerland, the schools went back just over a week ago.

So today I'm on my own.

Lou: Oh my God! Very nice. Yeah. So you're going to work or are you going to rest?

Cathy: Both. mean, actually. .. As it happens it was only a week ago that a couple of, projects moved from the autumn to next spring. And that seems to have really released my shoulders somewhat because I was feeling quite a pressure, you know, am I going to be able to go and do this in September or not?

And now I know that I'm not like those, those two projects are going to be later, I feel quite a lot more air around me. Yeah. So yeah, I'm reading, I'm using the opportunity to read, to walk, to think, and, and do some work. I try to make myself write notes when I'm doing my readings, so that.. it's not all forgotten.

Lou: Okay. Okay. and, () sorry, I just got a message on my computer screen. I just got rid of,) have you been involved in any, turning things digital? Getting things out there for the market.

Cathy: Not exactly. I mean, I've done several interviews and there's several coming up. And the Royal ballet are going to be streaming The Cellist this week, which is really exciting.

It's very exciting that. and actually San Francisco Ballet are going to be streaming another piece that I made for them in 2018 called Snowblind. And so both of those are going out on the 29th of May. () () Wow.) Which I'm very happy about to be able to share those pieces. I haven't made any digital work so to speak.

And I have thought about it a fair bit and I found my mood to go really up and down with it. It's, you know, I'll have days where I feel very inspired and just want to create something and interact with dancers. And then days where it feels like, you know, I don't want to rush into this thing because I feel like I should, you know, there's, there's a lot of material out there at the moment…and I, I feel like I need to figure out. What would I do rather than what can one do?

Lou: Yeah. Finding your authentic place in that. Yeah. I think a lot of people are struggling with that. and of course, for some people it's perfect. It's what they do anyway. For some people it's quite a nice experiment and for other people it's just not true.

And, it's, you know, it would be fake and it would be for the sake of it.

And so yeah, takes a bit of courage maybe to not do that, I suppose, for some people.

Cathy: Yeah, I haven't made the decision either way. I just haven't done it yet because it feels not authentic yet, but that's not to say that the right thing won't come up, but I'm letting that brew a little bit.

Lou: I think another phenomenon of this whole thing is mood changes. You know, I've certainly for myself, I feel SO like focused and energetic and I'm brilliant at homeschooling and I've got all of this energy one day and the next bit, like, can we just watch another Frasier or can we just.. yeah…And actually the privilege is being able to go with that....and then just see what floats to the surface, I suppose. Yeah.

Okay. So I wanted to talk to you about a couple of things. I guess your creative journey, really, first of all, across your career, but also, through a process. And I was interested in, first of all across your career, your, the journey towards and away from narratives. ... so kind of the fall and rise of narrative. I know you've, you're quoted as saying that for ages, narrative ballet wasn't cool, but now you've got loads of offers, so, you know, it's all changed. And I wanted to ask you about that. What do you think dictates that? Why has that happened?

Cathy: Gosh, I wish I knew - that's a really good question.

I don't know. I mean, as, as I have said before, it's always been a passion of mine. I love books and I love storytelling. And I fought against being put in a specific box for many years. So as a choreographer, I think even until let's say 2012, 13, I was really regularly making both abstract work and narrative work.

And it was actually when I came to the end of my tenure as Director of Bern Ballet. that I started realising, well, the pieces that I had been making that I'd loved were all narrative, and maybe I should, maybe it was time that I just, sort of became okay about that. Like that's what I love doing.

And it.. I'm not sure if that entirely coordinated or coincided with the time that I felt narrative was becoming more in vogue once more. But it, it feels like that's been the case because at that point I did start getting a lot of offers and all of the commissions that I was being asked to do were for narrative pieces.

Sometimes people were asking me to do work on a specific story. And other times it was could you make a story piece for us? And I don't know what brought that about. I mean, we’d had quite a long time of being into abstract, so maybe it was just time.

Lou: Maybe it's just the zeitgeist, that's how it goes.

Cathy: I think one of the things that has helped was the large companies becoming aware that actually it's a good investment.

So for a long time, they were, the narrative ballets were the old existing pieces. And then there was the investment in let's say, for example, Christopher Wheeldon's, Alice, which is a huge show, big investment. And I think it was a co-production. I want to say with the Royal Ballet and the National Ballet of Canada, I'm not entirely sure about that off the top of my head, but it certainly paid off for everybody.

I mean, it's gone around the world now really. And I think audiences do respond to stories, told through movement and music and, and so with the companies realizing that, okay, it's a scary prospect investing so much of their time and finance, obviously in these large scale narrative works, actually they are going to pay off - that there's a good chance of them paying off.

And I think that's definitely, helped my case.

Lou: And also maybe you helped your case by doing it well! And so they are, people are understanding that actually a narrative ballet doesn't have to be a classic, you know, it can be contemporary. And that, yes, of course, audiences do like them, if they’re good.

So maybe there's a sort of growing trust in people, your ability to, to tell stories in a way that isn't, too explicit. When I work with choreographers mainly in contemporary dance, but also in ballet, I have often said that, (I'm sort of joking and I'm sort of), not that their worst fear is being explicit. Not being inaccessible, but being explicit! And of course, nobody wants to spoonfeed and signpost and we, we take great care over that. But it's almost like narrative, or even story, and definitely character, have been like dirty words and you should be ashamed if you're… you know, Do you recognize this

Cathy: Yeah. That has irritated me for a really long time. And like you say, no one wants to spoonfeed, but I think it's been greatly underestimated how difficult it is to be clear and actually express something, without ambiguity through dance and it's a skill and it's a craft and, and I have been working at it for a really long time by now.

And there, there are points when I think it actually is really brave to go for clarity. And particularly when I'm, you know, I research a lot. I take these stories. I really care about them. And I have usually something that I want to say, very specifically that I want to say about certain aspects of the story or character or relationship.

And while ambiguity is a wonderful and a very poetic tool, I want to use it deliberately, not just because I have no choice. So I want to have that as a tool, along with the tool that says, clearly, this is, this is what I'm trying to say. And yeah, I think, I think it has been greatly underestimated that side of choreography.

I think one of the other things that, that just came to my head when you were speaking, then was the influx of European theater into British theater, I think has helped. So I I'm really a product of these two different traditions, British theater…I grew up in the UK and my parents were English teachers. I sort of was brought up on costume drama and love it. And when I came to direct the Bern Ballet brought that with me.

In fact, I created a version of Ibsen’s Ghosts at The Royal Opera House. That was the production that got me, the job directing the Bern Ballet, and I was asked to bring that as one of the first productions here, and yet it was received terribly here. It was an absolute nightmare. Because the audiences and the critics here, were really not used to narrative dance. And they, they thought it was dusty and old fashioned and all of those nasty words. And it took a great deal of strength for me at that point, to not get defensive first off - to, to sort of find a way to listen to the criticism. But also listen to what myself, what was important to me. And it was a super challenge for me at that time, because I, I came to realize that while narrative and storytelling were really crucial to me and I absolutely would stand behind them no matter how fashionable or unfashionable that that pursuit might be. Actually I'd taken a lot for granted. Because of my British background. So for me to, to dress dancers in a sort of period, 1900 ish sort of way, because that's when the story is based, it didn't even occur to me that there was anything unconsidered about that. That was just natural.

Whereas, being here in Germany with what they call regietheater, so Director’s Theatre - all of those things become questioned. So as in, in the UK, the writer is the sort of person - the voice that you're serving, in Germany and sort of dramatic theater, it's the director's vision that counts.

And the question that the Swiss critics were asking was, well, you know, why.. where's the interpretation in this version of ghost? Well, to me, it was a ballet that, you know, there were, there were plenty of aspects to it that did feel as if I was putting my voice into Ibsen’s drama and yet the look of it, which is a very superficial thing to judge…But nevertheless important was it was not considered. I hadn't interpreted, I had gone for this sort of Munch-esque and it was a really good turning point for me to start thinking about. How.. Do I need all of these details to tell a story? Do we need to illustrate every aspect or can we strip away? Because actually what I really care about is how the bodies are expressing the emotion and the character traits of these different people in the story.

So it was a super challenge and I think I'm not the only person that does that. I think the more we see sort of European theater … the Young Vic, The Barbican and people start to realize that there are different ways to tell stories and it doesn't need to look like an old fashioned ballet to make a narrative ballet anymore.

Lou: Interesting. Isn't it? So the criticism kind of helped you reflect on what it is you had done and then sort of double down actually, and think now I am going to do this and what's more, I'm going to give myself permission to become a bit more of an auteur and really make it your work.

Cathy: Yeah.

Lou: How do you, I read that you, you talked about in terms of picking what it is you're going to adapt, or which story you're going to tell, that you.. enjoyed finding things that had a little extra ingredient ,kind of magic ingredient to, to play with. Can you give me examples of that? And, how do you know when, when you find that? You know, I read that in Lady Chatterley's Lover, it was coal or the snow and Snow Blind.. So when you're reading something, what makes you think, ah, this, this can be danced and this can be… this gives me space to apply my visuals and my concepts to it?

Cathy: Hmm. Funny enough. It's not usually that ingredient that draws me to make the ballet. It's usually the central story and themes. So very often the relationships. I was thinking about that today, actually, as I was walking along. It feels because I've been so drawn to reading news at the moment and the stories in the newspapers, and they're all about numbers and everything gets very generalized, you know, everyone, it's not really about the individual… And even when you see news stories that do try to sort of zoom in on individual stories, they feel very sort of tokenistic and slightly sickly. Like I almost don't want the BBC to be telling me about Mr. Blogs, who lives in wherever and, and his story. I kind of feel like that's the role of, of literature, of theater, of music, of dance to start to, to bring us into other people's specific shoes.

And it's usually that, that does draw me into a story. And then, if I'm drawn into that story, I'll start to look at the context. So in the case of Snow Blind is that it was the dilemma. It was actually the relationship between, Ethan Frome on the story. It's based on Edith Wharton’s novella Ethan Frome and this triangle, he with his wife, Zeena and the housemaid -for want of a better word, Mattie.

And it's a very simple story, you know, he's, he's in an unhappy marriage, falls in love with house- maid…. They run off together and, and, but it's got a twist at the end. They make a suicide pact. They, they, Ethan the Mattie realize they can't live with or without one another. And so they, they take the sledge ride, which they throw themselves into the elements. And in my ballet interpretation, the sledge ride became a sort of avalanche a snowstorm. They just threw themselves into this snowstorm, which I expressed to the group of dancers being that snowstorm. But they don't die. They don't manage to die. And of course, Zeena finds them at the end and they're broken. And I love this bit, this bit of the story where she had to… she finds them and she has to… or the three of them have to decide how they're going to continue life together because they have no choice. And it's this sort of great dependency and proximity and yet kind of love- hate situation. So that really drew me into the story.

And that was the reason I wanted to make that ballet. And the, at the same time, I was aware that I needed the group to give a context to that story of the three protagonists and okay…All you really need is - there's a little party scene… you need to see them in a social context for various moments in the, in the narrative. But I try to avoid just using the corps de ballet for those social party scenes or market scenes..

Lou: It’s too easy…

Cathy: It's yeah. Yeah. It just feels very illustrative. And so I look at what the other opportunities are, how can I use these dancers? All of whom can, you know, their colors, their expressive tools…

How can I add to the story of the protagonists? And in the case of Snow Blind I wanted them to be snow. And it seemed to me that snow has so many varying qualities from the sort of playful hypnotics slightly caressing your skin, sensual, and then it can be very biting and it can smother you and suffocate you and sort of make you stuck.

So I use those ideas to work with the group, to enhance the story in the middle. Yeah. That's how I usually work.

Lou: Okay. So actually you are… initially, it seems drawn by the theater elements. So the relationships and the emotional relationships and the characters, and then you find the, the landscape and the movement, as you explore that.

So I have a question about acting, really, in the ballet world. And in my experience, I've been a bit surprised by how some of the ballet companies that I've worked with, which have only done for the past couple of years. Well, let's say some ballet dancers don't seem to want to have conversations about emotion and character and that kind of thing…?

Others seem desperate for it and don't get it often enough and that, and have come to me and said, Oh my God, thank you… you know, it's each, since we've done anything like that, it’s so interesting. and I suppose… you know, in my genuine ignorance, I was surprised by how it didn't seem to be part of the training necessarily for some companies. I recognize, you know, companies are different. But, do you recognize that for a start? Do you think that ballet dancers sometimes don't have the training or the experience to access the emotional character landscape of a performance or not?

Cathy: That's a tricky one. So I've been lucky to work with companies who very many, several companies who are excellent at that background work. So I would sort of highlight specifically the Royal Ballet, , both of whom I've worked with in the last year or so. And they really are very, very good at that. And I don't think you'd find a single dancer in the company, those companies that would not be interested in those conversations. That said particularly the very large companies, the repertoire groups, like the Royal Ballet they’ll be working on four or five pieces at the same time.[ Yeah.] And that's very challenging for the young dancers, maybe English, isn't their first language they're hopping into the, you know, half hour rehearsal, an hour’s rehearsal. And then going back into a different style of movement language, adifferent story or no story.

So that's pretty hard. And I think any actor would find that as, as challenging. But I don't ..having gone through the whole experience of creating a narrative work with them now…they absolutely threw themselves into it by the end, even if it hadn't been there for every single dancer and every half hour rehearsal.

So that's great. Then there are companies... So, San Francisco Valley, let's say that snow blind. I created as part of their Unbound festival in 2018. They had 12 international choreographers, all making half hour pieces and they made, they sort of made this schedule over the summer. So every dancer in the company was in three or four works, and they premiered them all within a week. It's crazy, its huge. And it's so exciting. It was really fun and could have been very awkward with so many, you know, big choreographers. That was actually a joy. We had a wonderful time.

But my work was pretty much the only explicitly narrative work. And I think it was unusual for the company as well. And that was certainly more challenging because while the, the main trio got .. absolutely what I was after, you know, within a couple of days, it was clear that they were very invested in the characters that I was asking them to, to investigate. The group found it harder because I think that was a, you know, I was coming in saying, okay, we're making a story ballet.. one thing that they weren't really used to, although they've done big story ballets, and you are all going to be sometimes sort of village people or, you know, acquaintances of these three characters and other times you're going to be snow. And I want you to think about the different qualities of snow.

And so I went through this whole process with them because I am very collaborative in that way. And I think it took them… well, I mean the whole, the whole creative process was only three weeks. Maybe it took, you know, week and a half, two weeks for them to really understand what I was going on about.

And of course in that time they were also rehearsing other pieces. So yeah. It is a challenge. And then once I pieced it together, because I usually go into a studio at the beginning with a really clear plan on my laptop and in my head. But you know, as much as I share any of that and stick it on the wall, no one really understands it until you actually put the ballet together. Once they saw that and so how it ran and how the, the different groups scenes affected the pas de deux and so on, there was a huge, there was a big change, a big shift in understanding, and they were great. And actually this time making Mrs. Robinson was so much easier because they knew my process and what my values are. [Right.]

But I think it, it just takes, it takes a bit of time for the dancers to not only understand your movement language, but to understand what it is that your work is about..

Lou: and also what your expectations of them are. So to work collaboratively and expect them to be all throwing material and investing emotionally like, when you say, I don't know, they're with you for two hours, and then they go to somebody else and get their heads into a totally other, different way of working then that's, then that's difficult. Cathy: And not every choreographer, even making narrative work wants that. So I, as a dancer, I really wanted to work with Kim Brandstrup, because he was also creating narrative work and I wrote to him and told him that, and happily, he gave me a job! [Very nice!]

So I was with him for a couple of years and it was wonderful and very confusing to me because he, he didn't want to tell you who you were or what your character was. So it, there was one production that we made on a load of different Hans Christian Anderson stories. And we, the dancers, we didn't know who we were.

He was mixing, he had sort of made a plan and he knew how he was going to mix these, I can't remember - three or four different stories together - but for quite a long time in the creative process, you didn't know if you were being the little mermaid or the shadow or that, you know, whatever else the stories were.

And you just had to trust that he was asking you to do physically what he felt the story needed.. and that was really different for me. And I loved doing it. It's not at all how I work as a choreographer, but it was a good experience.

Lou: It's so interesting. Isn't it? So my, my journey is I came kind of from a contemporary theater world into dance. And when I first started, I couldn't believe how much that happened and I couldn't understand how little information the dancers had or indeed wanted sometimes… and how, even when it was being made collaboratively, the collaboration was with the body not the brain.

And of course this is not in all contexts, but these were the experiences that I had and I was going, Oh, right they do like this here? and again, sometimes I found that's what I could be FOR actually is - some people - in big shows- some people, some dancers who need a bit more information could come to me and go, what's this? Why am I doing..? Oh yeah. And how's it fit in? Ah yeah okay? And other dancers really didn't want that - really wanted to stay in the, you know, in the body really. And just, you know, do as asked, but obviously creating beautifully, but not, but not in that way. And I had to learn to understand that, and also to respect that because, because from a theater world, that's what you do. You know, you, you, you figure it all out and then you invest in it emotionally, really? I guess. So yeah, it was a really interesting part of the journey and I have, yeah, genuinely learned to not think one is better than the other. It's just, it's just that they're different. And they have different outcomes, I suppose. Yeah. Do you use theatre tasks, whatever that means, in the work or is it, or would you always go in through the body?

Cathy: I don't know what they would be. Give me an example of what might be a theatre task?

Lou: Oh God. Well, I mean, good question! So, so, you know, if, if I think if theater director was working on a show, they might start exploring the emotion, exploring the context of the emotion and, setting up tasks to, elicit feeling and thinking around an emotion.

And so, you know, I've worked with some contemporary dance choreographers who'll do that. And out of that comes movement rather than - let's explore this movement and see where, what they can brush up against emotion..

Cathy: Oh no its definitely the other way around. So the thing is that in the big companies that I've been working with recently, you don't have a lot of time. [Yeah.] You have to be quite efficient with what you've got. So I do a lot of work with, by myself or sometimes with the dramaturg in terms of the research. And I may have a document that I've nicknamed the master plan and in that plan, every character or group of characters has a tab and I’ll write any research that I found interesting about that character, any quotes, any film moments, and I'll slowly distill any of that research into lists of words. So depending how big the part is, they'll have at least one list of words. And obviously if let's say we're making Romeo and Juliet, Juliet's got a whole tonne of lists because her character develops throughout the course of the piece. And those words are usually adjectives, verbs, images. Sometimes they're taken directly from the novels. So Lawrence was great - he gave me loads of material with Lady Chatterley’s Lover, and sometimes they're more poetic and sometimes they're quite dry.

I'll usually try to define, you know, is this a vertical character? Are they, do they exist more on a horizontal plane? How do they walk? So I usually always start with a walk and that might change as we get on in the process, but that's a good place to start for me. And then with those lists of words, I'll spend the first few days or week and a bit, just creating material from those words, with the dancers. And depending on the dancers, the group, the company, I might give it to them as a task, so people might work more independently to create movement material, or I might really work with them one on one. But I'll create a vocabulary for all of the characters before we start putting any scene together so that when you come to putting those really tricky scenes, that maybe involve four or five in the case of queen Victoria, sometimes 16 different personalities in a room at the same time, interacting, it's impossible to give everyone steps to do so I need their help. And I don't want them to be doing all unison things because to me that makes no sense if you've got a whole lot of characters, they don't, people don't move in unison generally. So, so because they've got all this material by that point, they can contribute and I'll give direction to the scene. I tell people, okay, I want you to come on from here. And you have interaction with this character at here and they'll know what their feelings are about that character and they'll know their material, the way they walk, maybe a little dance phrase, they can start to make suggestions like that and I'll shape it.

Another thing, Kim Brandstrup - he's coming up or morning - he once said to me, and I found that very useful, that he found it much easier to work from a room that was moving than a room that was static. [That's nice.] And it's absolutely true if everyone's standing there waiting to be told what to do. It's so, yeah, blocking for me as a creator.

Whereas if people are just doing something, even if it's not what you really want, it's much easier to say, okay, can you do that low? Can you do it slower? Could you pause there or continue? You know..

Lou: So they're continually off offering and you'll, you know, you'll recognize it when it, when, what you're looking for appears.

Yeah. Yeah. That's very nice. Okay. So structurally then, as you said, you worked with dramaturgs. I know you worked with, Edward Kemp and as Uzma Hameed and probably others. How do you frame the work in terms of deciding what to include, what not to include and how to reveal, do you do that before or during?

Cathy: Oh, absolutely before Lou: Everything's done before.

Cathy: Yeah, pretty much. I mean, the work will reveal itself further in the actual making in the studio, but I go with a very clear idea into the studio and usually that's started in a conversation with the dramaturg. So Ed is someone that I've worked with almost 20 years. We've done very many productions together. And, we have conversations. So we'll, we'll talk about, I usually have the idea of the piece. And he'll ask why. And I tried to start articulating it and we know each other so well, now that I don't mind sounding a bit silly. And he'll ask me what I can already imagine. So there are usually scenes that I already have in my head that in the case of Snow Blind, seeing as we're using that as an example, it was that final scene, the trio. So you start with that and sometimes there's a bit more work to be done before.

So when the story is more complex, so let's take the example of Victoria. I was asked to create the ballet on queen Victoria by Northern Ballet. But beyond the title, and actually they said they did want it to be done in period, which is pretty obvious to me - I was very free to take any entrance point to that theme, and that was really hard. And it was the first time that it Uzma and I had worked together, so we were getting to know each other at the same time. And you know, there's so many perspectives on that story. And ultimately I just read until I find the one that seems to resonate personally, because I have to know that I am going to be able to stand in those shoes to make the piece. And until I feel comfortable with that, then I just need to keep looking.

And in the case of Victoria, it was finding this little bit of the story about her youngest child Princess Beatrice, and, and how she had sort of been her mother's companion throughout her whole life. And then at the end of her mother's life had written Victoria story. So she'd rewritten, Victoria’s very, very many diaries and I thought that it was so interesting to imagine a daughter who's, for their whole life stood next to their mother, and then how did they write that story? and actually edit that story quite considerably. So this, for some reason, that viewpoint resonated with me and I recognized, it sat with it for a month or two, and even though we kept coming up with other ideas, it was that one that was still sort of singing in the back of my head. And so once I found that entrance point, it's much easier. You just have to be, as they say, in German consequent, like you follow that journey and you find the scenario that way.

Lou: Yeah. And that sustains you through the whole journey then? [Yeah. Yeah.] Lovely.

Okay. I wanted to talk to you also about, the sector generally, really, which I know is a small term for a huge thing. But, 06.30 obviously you were the artistic director of Bern Ballet from 2007 to 2013. So you have a lot of organisational experience. And now as an independent, I guess, what are your reflections on the sector, perhaps pre COVID first of all. What concerns do you have about it? What issues do you think there are at the heart of it? Do you have any?

Cathy: Oh gosh, that's a big question.

Lou: Is it too big? So I'm, I'm thinking… I’ll be honest and say, I'm wondering about how you're feeling about the gender imbalance… in terms of female choreographers, female leaders, obviously lead roles for women is something that you're keen on. But also in my mind, I worry for the arts, but dance and ballet, in terms of access issues and diversity. And I wonder just how healthy you think it is as a sector and, and what perhaps what you fear for?

Cathy: I might just turn the question around a little bit. So obviously I'm a female choreographer and I am actually just a choreographer. It has been a theme throughout my career and I've just kept going and I'm very happy with the path that I've had so far. There is clearly a gender imbalance. I mean, that's just there. There's been plenty of people that have shown that with statistics and so on. And it's getting better. I think over the last five or six years, maybe, I think people are beginning to acknowledge it who were not acknowledging it before.

And that's a huge step because as soon as we start to say, okay, there is an imbalance and start to acknowledge that, you know, many people have said, it's not about, about whether someone's a man or a woman or whatever the racial identification might be or any other sort of identification. It's about talent and it's about quality.

And I really find that a frustrating argument because who is to judge that talent and quality… it's absolutely not the case that 95% of women are not talented choreographically, or whatever. It would just be wrong in my opinion, to assume that, and it's a question of people going out and looking for those voices.

And many of the gatekeepers have been for a long time, just sitting in their castle and expecting people to knock on the door. And for whatever reason, not everyone gets to that door. Anyway, I think it's beginning to change and I'm very grateful to the people that have done a lot of work to bring about that change.

It's hard for me to be the person doing it and be that advocate as well. You know, I'm trying to change by doing. It just doesn't feel comfortable for me to start kind of banging on that door and yelling about it. And at the same time saying, and it's, and by the way, it's me that you want to be employing, but it just doesn't feel right.

I just want to do a good job. So that's what I've been focusing on and it's been working. [Yeah. Okay.] So, it’s a team effort I think everyone's got their role to play and you know, it's one of the things that has been challenging of course, is having a family. I don't say that the men don't have that experience, that challenge as well. But certainly I know that it's something that women have difficulties with - how do you balance being a mum and being a creator who inevitably is on the road a lot? And I've just been trying to do it with the help of my husband and my family and friends. And, you know, and I think it's important to have role models.

I looked at a choreographer called Didy Veldman, who did it a few years before me. And that was really encouraging to see her, you know, forge through. And so I hope that I can be that role model to some younger women, and men. So that that's that.

One of the things that I struggled at the moment in terms of dance and the sector as you call it, is diversity in a wider sense. And this is, this is my personal struggle. So maybe it will help to answer the question. I want to tell stories and as much as I love stories from the 19th century, that fit quite well into ballet companies, those are only the only stories that I am interested in expressing and telling. And I’m getting a bit stuck because as soon as you move into the 20th century, then racial diversity and these themes become really much more of an issue because it's one thing… well, we know that there is a lack of diversity within many ballet companies around the world. We need more dancers of colour in ballet companies. Now I'm only in interacting with part of that story. There's, there's obviously layers to it, but if I want to tell a specific story that, not just, I don't mean in terms of how to cast roles.. because I think we're beyond the point where we have to cast, as we imagine.

So Rochester, I don't think people imagine Jane Eyre or Jane Eyre to be a dancer of color necessarily. And yet it's fine now I think to cast in any way those parts, but as soon as we encounter a story, a story where race is actually part of the story, then things get more sensitive.

Or disability, you know, equally that's a problem that I've encountered. So for example, with Lady Chatterley's Lover- Clifford - Lord Chatterley, Ladu Chatterley’s husband is in a wheelchair. He was wounded in the war and he can't move. Now in order for me to tell the story I needed to do flashback that this was just how it worked out. So I needed to anyway work with the dancer who was not in a wheelchair and also who could act or be that character in a wheelchair.

But I was really sensitive to the, you know, the problem of, of working with an able bodied dance in a wheelchair and when I started rehearsals, I shared this concern with the dancers and I said, you know, there are, there are reasons we've been through all of the options here. There are reasons that I feel I do want to work with a dancer who also can move without a wheelchair, but, I want to do it really properl and with sensitivity. And if any of you particularly want to investigate this character, or if any of you don't want to investigate this character, then please come and talk to me. And as it happened, one of the dancers stepfathers was paraplegic and came and said he really would love to do that part.

And another for another reason… And actually we ended up working really well on that role. And there was no, I didn't receive any feedback that was problematic at all. And I think it worked [Okay] but I'm conscious every time I approach another story that there, there are these difficulties with it about identity and diversity.

And, and the sorts of dances that you can find in a ballet company. And to me, this is problematic. I don't have the answer, but it's a problem.

Cathy: And it, you know, regardless of whether a story is about, for example race, where the story comes from and who tells the story, you know, who are the characters in that story is limited by who the dancers in the company are.

There are endless brilliant nonwhite stories to tell but it's difficult to have a bunch of white people tell them, you know, isn't it? So, so we're already shutting the door on so much interesting literature or, you know, so many interesting episodes in history, etc. So I guess ultimately it's up to the people who make the companies and who…

Cathy: Well it's more than that. It's the same as female choreographers, it’s right from the beginning. It's about nurturing the dancers...

Lou: The talent, and the opportunity. Cathy: So society right from the beginning. So it's going to take a long time. I don't expect to see it or change in the next five years, but I hope that we, we find a way to change things.

Lou: Well I hope so too. And, I wonder what COVID does to that? Because of course there was the fear that now we fall back on our ‘old favorites’ and the classics, and that's potentially cuts off a whole swathe of people, thinking, audiences… OR there's the opportunity to really reconfigure things now and, rethink scale and rethink what stories might be told. And so diversity also in terms of financial access, you know, whether people can afford to come to it. Do you have any hope, in this Covid environment for any, any sort of aspects of positive change?

Too soon, maybe?

Cathy: There's going to be a huge financial difficulty there. I mean, there's clearly a lot of fear. I, I actually am not sure if going back to the old favorites will be the recipe. I think being daring at this point has also got a really good chance of success. I think initially it'll have to, because we're not going to jump back into full opera houses with everybody sitting next to each other, looking at a proscenium arch ballet with 60 dancers, standing in very squashed lines on stage.

That's simply not going to happen. So I think there'll have to be some really inventive thinking, being done from all organizations and everyone's desperate to get back on stage and, and in theaters or in a, not even in a theater, actually, I think people are desperate to be performing and creating again.

And so I think at least initially there will be more experimental ideas coming out, whether we can hang on to them and not go back, as you say to the box office, the cash cows, as they like to say here, I don't know, but I get a feeling that there will be an appetite for new as well.

I mean, I was thinking about what I might hope from the comeback of theater. Cause it will come back… I feel like… And I'm speaking personally, I can be quite lazy audience member or even cynical. And I don't like to admit that, but I think I can be sometimes. So I'm lucky enough to … I often get invited to see performances from colleagues. And even when I'm not invited, if there's something that I feel I should see, I am a choreographer who gets around. I do like to see what's going on. And so I go and see a fair bit, especially when I'm travelling. And very often I sit back and I want to be impressed and there might even be something that kind of a little bit nasty in me that doesn't always want to, like, I want to be impressed… I want to like things, but I'm also not surprised if I don't, I don't like admitting that, but I think it might be..

Lou: It’s not uncommon I don’t think…

Cathy: Yeah. And now we are, the stakes are going to be so much higher, like any trip to the theater for either performer or audience member, at least for the next year or two… that's a real investment, not just at the ticket cost, but actually of your wellbeing, your health, you're investing because you know that the potential is there for you to feel really connected with people, with the universe, with your life, with whatever it does to you.

But at the same time, you might, you know, there's a risk, you might get sick and we're all suddenly really conscious of germ exchange. You know, even if it's not Covid, you know, you can just as easily now I'm very, I'm aware of any cold that I might catch. So I hope that it will make people when they go to the theater, myself included, really want to be there and sit forward and lean in and want to connect as best they possibly can with what is being presented and performed.

And maybe invest more before that visit. So this is something that I have done as long as I can remember, I try to make my process as open as possible. So when I was directing in Bern, we had open rehearsals every fortnight so that the audience members could come and see how the piece was developing.

I do a lot of this kind of thing. I talk, I like talking. I like sharing the insides of a ballet as much as the end of a ballet, the outsides of it. And I hope that well, I mean, we've, we're getting really good at digital, so hopefully companies will be very practiced by the end of Covid- how to make, the processes open at least online.

And I hope that it will make it audience members think, okay, well, I'm not only paying 50 quid or whatever it is for a ticket here, but I'm investing time and potentially my health in this event, I want to do it. It means something… that much to me, that I'm going to do it, but actually let's get the full value from it. Why don't I read up, read the program, read what it's about read the novel, watch the film, whatever, whatever it is before I go, so that it really gets me. Rather than I just sit back and think, well, it might flutter past me.

Lou: Try to make ourselves more available to it cause we're, for a while at least, not taking it for granted so much.

Cathy: Yeah. And think of the potential that dance has now. I mean, it's, I just hope that we go back to a society that touches each other again, literally. Although, you know, I'm not that fussed about shaking hands to be honest, but in general, I hope that people will continue to live in contact and hug one another. But... that is so much more meaningful with dance now. I mean, you know, all of the things that dance amplifies, normally, will be kind of screaming out loud right now. And that's exciting.

Lou: I have this image in my head of a, you know, a huge theater with little glass booths with people sitting audience members in glass booths, watching dancers touch each other. And how it's like, ‘Oh my God. It’s so beautiful!’ And you're right, it does just highlight the thing we took for granted.

But the thing that's beautiful at the heart of this is actually touch and proximity and exchange both between the dancers, but also of course, with the audience as well. [Yeah.] Yeah. So maybe dance of all the art forms might speak the loudest now, because that is the one thing we have been denied, is that sort of physical proximity.

Okay. Well, I'm just going to ask you a couple of quick fire questions from my little yellow envelope. I'm just gonna…we've just talked about that.

Is there anything you want to do in dance that you haven't done yet?

Cathy: There's tons of more stories I want to do

Lou: Anything other than that? Like, so stories that haven't been told, but also different genres or different contexts? Cathy: I mean all sorts of spaces, places. Yeah. It's usually.. I want to go everywhere and work with lots of people. I, you know, one of the highlights of my career has been working three times in Cuba. I absolutely love it.

Lou: Yeah. Everyone says that..

Cathy: But going to different places, working with different groups of people and inevitably being led by therefore into different stories and worlds and spaces. All of those things.

Lou: Okay. Theatre?

Cathy: As in to work with drama theatre rather than dance theatre? Yeah, absolutely. I love it. A big shout out… any directors..?!

Lou: You heard it here! I get 10% yeah?!

Is there anything you are rubbish at within your job?

Cathy: Within my job? I was going to say there’s hundreds of things!

Lou: What I mean by that is, you know, what do you shy away from that perhaps you shouldn't? Or what do you not enjoy? Perhaps well you've said you enjoy, enjoy conversations like this, but are there any elements that you avoid?

Cathy: Gosh!

Lou: You can say no!

Cathy: No, no. I like all of, I love, I love my job. I do. I really love all the different sides of it. There's I mean, maybe the thing that I'm least good at, and I get people to help me - is figuring out technical difficulties as in… so I love the creation of movement and I love coaching it and bringing out the dramatic qualities and all of those… to figure out sometimes how a precise lift works or to get a group of dancers all doing things together or in the right canon or figure out the pattern so that it actually works. I'm less good at that.

Lou: So they do that do they?

Cathy: Well, no. I just have to knuckle down and I've got assistants who – Jenny Tattersall is a long term assistant and she's brilliant at it. So if she's with me, I'm fine

Lou: She digs down into the detail..

Cathy: Yeah I usually work with the team around me..

Lou: Yeah. That's what I like about my job is that I'm there for all the interesting conversations and we'll have this, you know, amazing idea that's very detailed and complicated. And then I go away for a couple of days and come back and it's done and it's such a pleasure. I don't have to do any of the nitty gritty.

Is there a single person alive or not who you most want to ‘get’ or appreciate your work? Cathy: Oh gosh, you should have warned me about that.

Lou: I sometimes ask that of people I work with because I always give the example of somebody answered ‘Uncle Pete’, because uncle Pete… this person had a real Uncle Pete and they.. he was not involved in the dance world and he was basically uncertain and a little cynical maybe, but actually he came to see the work and loved it.

And then, you know, got it.

Cathy: I don't think I can answer that today.

Lou: Ok no problem.

And what, for a specific show or just your practice generally, what would failure be?

Cathy: …I guess it would be not managing to express what I was after. I mean, that's the long and the short of it. There's, there's definitely elements of failure. There's things, you know, if you, if you're working with a group and it doesn't click, you can feel the failure of that. If you get really dreadful critics across the board, that can feel like a failure.

Ultimately I suppose the worst feeling is when you just don't like what you've done. You don't think it's what you imagined it could be. [Yeah.]

Lou: I was very interested in what you said about getting people into your open rehearsals, because I'm a big fan of that. And I think that's of course, a brilliant way of opening up art forms to people.

When you do that, do you ask for feedback? Or….

Cathy: Yeah, sometimes. Depends on the context. Sometimes I'll surprise people and ask questions. I mean, I get a lot of feedback. I ask people for feedback, but the best feedback doesn't tend to come from people who were surprised by a question in an open rehearsal.

It's going to be from people …

Lou: who are in the work.

Cathy: Yeah. Yeah. I think so.

Thanks. Okay,

Lou: Cathy, thank you so much. It's such a pleasure talking, in a bit of depth with you about, about your processes. And so thanks for making the time and good luck with all the many projects that are going to be falling on your lap one sunny day soon.

Thanks for joining me.

Cathy: Thank you. Likewise, take care.