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| Posted by Evan McKie
So I just saw this debacle.
At first sight, I was actually quite taken with the odd but exceptional beauty of a picture like this; the girl and the audience have just suddenly been cast into total vulnerability together for a short, but bittersweet, second… Then, naturally, I did the ‘’awe, poor girl…'’ thing aswell as the ‘’whatever, bitch probably stole the show, good for her!'’ thing and THEN……….like a girl taking a dreaded dive onto a cold Lagerfeld runway, my life flashed before my eyes… And when I say ‘my life’ I mean my somewhat peppered ‘performing life’ measured solely on the trips and stumbles that I have taken. (& mmm mmm let me tell you….) 
The truth is (and I hope ‘la lovely with the pretty pattern pantyhose’ knows this too,) that a stumble or fumble or even tumble like that can totally ‘make’ a show for many-a-spectator and turn the victim into the toast (or at least ‘talk’) of the town faster than it actually took to take the sudden spill. About a month ago, I had the pleasure of seeing ‘’History Boys'’ on Broadway and though the show was great in itself, I now find myself recounting one of the character’s funny and VERY unscripted mishaps (he suddenly slipped off a chair, slid under the table and hit his head on it on the way back up!!) just as much as I discuss the actual play. Bad of me, maybe, but seeing that brilliant cast being thrown into an instant fit of red-faced semi-contained giggling while obviously and painfully/hilariously trying to remain ‘in character’ was priceless! A performance whithin a performance! Spontaneous impromptu entertainement…for free!
Providing that nobody gets majorly hurt, a fall onstage usually turns out to be short and quite funny in retrospect. For a performer it can be quite an experience/rush/high/low though, to have an unexpected blunder like this and from my personal experience it can be sorta hard to come to terms with the fumble-factor. I used to think to myself, ‘’what the %&$§ was that out there, Evan? Misha or Sylvie or some other trade-master that I admire the crap out of would have never have let that kind of nonsense occur!..not in a trillion years!!!'’ I was sad… but as I was watching TV I saw a vintage clip of this….
Hmmmm…. ok so wait, the almighty QUEEN NAOMI? Taking an unplanned descent to what could have been a very abrupt crash landing onto a Vivienne Westwood carpeted catwalk? This is the same woman that has been globally revered (certainly not for her behaviour) but for her practically perfect prowl!!!!! Ms. Campbell, not Miss Shambles!!…but then I saw that she was smiling at whichpoint she picked up that pink boa and worked the rest of that runway so fiercely that I’m surprised those shoes didn’t tear up the carpet! Lesson learned. 
OK– so if someone like 
can have a bit of scratch at the floor while on the job then that means that someone as seemingly pulled-together and paramount as 
may have also been faced with a similarly inconvenient circumstance, or two, in her day. THAT means that there may be a slight chance that even ol’ 
might not have been able to avoid the odd toss up from time to time. I feel relieved.
So, I have kind of come to the conclusion that, even though as dancers we spend so much of our lives perfecting and rehearsing and refining, it’s ok to be a fumbling idiot every once in a blue moon!! Infact, I would like to take this opportunity to extend an invitation to all of you to share and describe (in vivid detail, no less) one of those ’special’ instances when you realized that even though you are a WINGER, that didn’t mean you could fly. Just relax and let it all come pouring out so that we can laugh…ahem… ‘with’ you. I have a feeling that there are some J U I C Y stories to be told here. DO NOT HOLD BACK! You’ll feel better after! I promise.
LAGERFELD SS 07. Paris. October 4.
(If the scattered links throughout are messed again then I will try my best to shape them up ASAP.)
