Summer Film


August 26th was a very hot day in Greenwich, CT. A day that most people stayed inside with the AC cranked on HIGH! I, on the other hand, was outside all day with my veteran dancer, Annie Heinemann, shooting footage for our next film short. Along with multiple costume changes, were multiple site-specific locations — each where creative ideas poured out, as the camera merely caught the action. It felt like a grab-and-go filmmaking day. A variety pack of sorts, that started with a tapestry of footage from a cemetery; moving on to a beautifully landscaped park, with an arched bridge over a babbling brook; and then, on to grounds of Greenwich Academy, where a raw dock jutted out into a pond with a vigorous fountain; and culminated with indoor shots grabbed in the darkness of a bathroom of the lower school.

Little story boarding was going on to connect all the dots, but Annie was ready, willing, and able to pull off everything as spontaneously as I. She’s equipped with technique, style, and panache, allowing my job to be easy! With so much footage in the can, I now have the task of rummaging through all of it to create a film that I hope will dive deep into the psyche of that hot, summer day!

It’s Easy to Drown Again

In 2018 I choreographed a solo based on the idea of just how delicate human nature is, and how easy it is to drown in life. In all actuality, the piece originally was inspired by a client of mine that had attempted suicide. I was thrown by her actions, and could only guess that beneath the surface of her life, there was some deep, dark stuff lurking about. Thankfully, she recovered and with time, is now fully thriving. That was her. And now, we revisit the same theme again, only this time it focuses on one of my sisters. The barnacles attached to her sinking ship created waves in her life that caused her to attempt suicide 2 weeks ago, and now I am revisiting It’s Easy to Drown, yet again. Her stay in the hospital got me to thinking about the piece again, and how the process of making it was quite therapeutic. As I hit rewind, I am reminded that in the continuum of life, there are no guarantees… only the awareness that every day is a gift!

Above photo by Whitney Brown