What Can Dance Do for Film?

This piece appears in the columns section of frieze 246, ‘Dance’

When I work on a film, I always ask myself: what is dance going to bring to it?

There was absolutely no indication about dance or choreography when I first read the script for Emilia Pérez (2024); however, all the music and dialogue was already written. I thought it would be challenging to bring dance into such a structured story. The director, Jacques Audiard, had no specific vision for this aspect of the film, and he had never worked with a choreographer. I think he hired me in part because I’ve worked in theatre and understand the actor-director relationship.

Jacques is constantly tweaking his scripts. Just when you think you’ve completed something, he’ll ask you to try something new. For him, the ideas only coalesce once the cameras are rolling. I told him, however, that choreographing several people is like steering a big ship: you cannot suddenly decide to make a U-turn; it takes a huge amount of time to synchronize so many people. I also wanted to make sure that the dance scenes felt necessary, not gratuitous. Only when we started diving into the material with a group of dancers were we able to experiment and understand how dance could help the film.

I come up with my best ideas when I’m working within certain constraints. My choreography is very much about transformation and adaptation: I’m always trying to bring dance out of its environment. That’s why I love collaborating with cinema and the visual arts. Dance is such a beautiful medium because you can use it to confront so many others. For Emilia Pérez, I wanted to find a way for the choreography to operate subtly and to avoid clichés of musical films. The dancers’ movements could be synchronized, but the dance was most manifest in the details.

For example, in the opening scene, where Rita [Zoe Saldaña] weaves through a public marketplace, you don’t realize initially that there’s choreography. But, after a couple minutes, it becomes clear that everything – even the way someone handles their shopping cart – has been planned to the millisecond. You can choreograph something – say, a finger wagging – and have three different layers of movement behind it. I work with that depth and play with illusion: how bodies enter and exit the frame; how their scale operates within it. It’s like a puzzle that’s building itself and, at a certain point, you understand the significance of the different pieces. I like how this kind of choreography requires the audience to complete the work. A film is a projection – not only in terms of the manipulation of light, but in how the audience perceives it. Cinema is all about what you project onto it and what it projects onto you: it’s a circle.

Doing any kind of performance is a collaborative process: I’m reliant on others for my work to be made. During filming, the Steadicam operator for Emilia Pérez, Sacha Naceri, became like a dancer; he sweated more than anybody on set so he could make those camera movements choreographic. Even the editor is a kind of second choreographer, deciding how a dance is framed and what makes it into the final cut. These people are not tools: they are humans who bring to each project their own moods, insecurities and amazing ideas. Collaborations are the best way to get out of your comfort zone because you’re required to attune yourself to someone else’s vision. I’ve learned so much from every artist I’ve collaborated with, Jacques included. In my creative partnerships, we challenge one another, going back and forth until we land on a result that feels right.

At times, it can be complex and frustrating. You can feel that you are stuck with a person, that you can’t get away from the dynamic. But I’ve never quit a collaboration because, if I had an instinct to work with someone, I need to understand where it could take us. It’s the thrill of the process. And, usually, if you’re working with the right intention, with your spirit in the right place, the results are going to be interesting. Every person is, anyway, the result of two people meeting.

As told to Marko Gluhaich

This article first appeared in frieze issue 246 with the headline ‘Moving Pictures’

Emilia Pérez is released in the UK on 25 October

_{Main image: Jacques Audiard, Emilia Pérez, 2024, film still. Courtesy: © Shanna Besson}