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MATTHEW MURPHY |
Here are three of my favorite shots I took during Katherine Kramer’s “Stop, Look & Listen,” last month. I was quite fascinated with this dancer, Jo, and I crept up to the front of the stage during dress rehearsal so I could get some close ups. You can check out more of my photos here.
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MATTHEW MURPHY |
Of the things in my life that I am thankful for, my family outranks all else. From the time I was a child they have acted as a constant source of support for my artistic endeavors, but also a huge source of inspiration because of the work that they all create. There is a thoughtfulness to each of their contributions to their respective fields (Mom-tap dance; Sister-modern and tap dance; Dad-filmmaking/directing/acting) that pushes me to expand beyond my comfort zone and not be afraid of a challenge.
There can be a downside to being part of a family full of artists. But for every instance I become exasperated dissecting the relevance of a certain shot in a movie, there is another moment where I find the winding road our conversations take to be thrilling; and at all times I realize how fortunate I am to have them, and acknowledge the fact that I wouldn’t be where I am today were it not for their own artistic curiosity. Plus there’s the bonus of covering a variety of artistic fields over the course of our four-person unit; always an interesting viewpoint on each others’ work.
My dad and I had a chance to combine projects last week when I went to visit him at work. But this wasn’t another day at the office — unless you consider a huge open field down the Bitterroot valley (Montana) an office. By the time I arrived the sun was high and the summer heat was setting in, but that didn’t stop him, my friends Anya and Jes, and a small crew from beginning work on a new experimental dance film.
The morning light proved difficult to photograph in, but with such lovely subjects as my friends and the scenery, it was hard to get a bad shot.
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MATTHEW MURPHY |
Here are the first shots I took of Katherine Kramer’s fantastic new show, “Stop, Look and Listen,” which just finished several performances in Montana. The show was quite unlike anything I’d seen before, a wonderful fusion of tap and modern dance, with Latin music. The band, the dancers (including my fantastically talented sister) and the concept were all top notch, and there’s hints that a New York performance may be in the works. Wouldn’t you all (at least the New Yorkers out there) be lucky?! Hope you enjoy the photos as much as I enjoyed taking them. More to come.
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MATTHEW MURPHY |
Last night marked the official end of my four-year career with American Ballet Theatre. There were no balloons, no speeches, no tears, and ultimately no closure. Standing in the wings, watching my childhood idols Julie Kent and Ethan Stiefel dancing Giselle, I was reminded of how lucky I am to have worked alongside so many inspiring artists. But as the second act progressed, and the ghost-like wilis overtook the stage, I couldn’t help but feel like one myself.
Over the past year I have had moments of hope where my return to the company seemed almost within reach. Then, in March, the decision was made that I was going to step away from the company and devote my emotional and physical energy into healing; hoping was replaced with coping. That was long ago, and over the course of the subsequent months I have faced the emotional devastation of dealing with a chronic illness that ultimately pulled me away from the goal I worked toward since I was thirteen.
One of the words I have wrestled with most through this time is “closure.” As performer and a writer, I enjoy experiencing the arc of my movement or words when creation is complete. The art that I lose myself in, often wraps things up in a way that morphs my perception of the journeys we take.
I put much of my hope for a neatly tied bow in the end of the year party that typically occurs on the Friday before the final day of Met season. It is a time to celebrate the dancers’ hard work and acknowledge those who are leaving. Because of the nature of ABT’s schedule this year (which continues after Met with four weeks of tour), the party was eliminated. With its cancellation came a barrage of emotions.
It is one of many rituals dancers experience when parting ways with the company, in which I could not partake. I didn’t know my last show, a Romeo and Juliet in Chicago in April 2007, was going to be the final bow I took with the company. While some of these rituals may indeed be superficial, they are moments I wish I had the chance to experience.
In reality, my departure began shortly after that bow, when I was diagnosed with Epstein Barr Virus. Since then, I have drifted away from the friends that became my family during my time with the company. Yet my name still rested comfortably in the middle of the corps listing of the program. Its removal cuts the final strings that tied me to my first New York family.
I took a walk through the Met yesterday evening (essentially this family’s home), gathering my memories of my time as a member. As I wove through the maze, I wondered if it was the last time my ID would let me through the doors; if my dressing room spot would ever be mine again; if I would ever warm-up at the barres in the wings; if I would have another ‘first’ performance, entering the stage and feeling the orchestra sweep over me. These are all questions I can’t answer.
Walking around backstage, I began realizing that life, unlike the movement or words in whose arcs I trust, isn’t something that can be revised through rehearsals or drafts in order to come to a resolution. It is a constantly evolving creation that isn’t over until it’s over. It’s entirely possible that I will be back. And it’s entirely possible that I won’t. I guess that’s the beauty of not having closure; possibilities are endless.
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MATTHEW MURPHY |
(This photo doesn’t really have anything to do with the post, I just happen to like it.)
Quick question before getting down to business: does anyone remember the 1991 movie titled “Career Opportunities” starring Jennifer Connelly? Basically my childhood dream of getting stuck in Target overnight (minus the robbers) captured in an angst ridden teen movie. Anyone? Anyone?
On my list of most likely careers during my lifetime, “copy-editor” was near the bottom, somewhere between “lion tamer,” and “Wonder Woman”. My life as a professional dancer required me to communicate without speaking, and as much as there were right and wrong ways to execute steps, there was also flexibility to the form of expression. Let’s just say that copy-editing isn’t as kind.
I always kept a magazine or book in my dance bag (partly to keep up my reputation as an artistic connoisseur, partly out of genuine interest) but the complexities of the written word were never my primary focus when I was dancing full time. As I took writing jobs over the past year I started to pay more attention to smaller details like word choice, punctuation rules, and structure in an effort to refine my skills (and there’s a LONG way to go). What I didn’t realize was how quickly I would be thrown into the text vortex; a few months ago I took a job as the copy-editor for movmnt magazine (a delicious combination of dance, music, fashion and pop culture).
Unfortunately, my previous career had instilled the idea that there wasn’t one way to correctly punctuate a thought. Movement (which I now always want to spell as “movmnt,” since I typed it so much) is malleable, and in a sense so is the written word, but whereas a choreographer has the endless combinations of arms, legs, plies, contractions, extension, and more when creating a pause in movement, a writer has but a handful of tools: the comma, the semi-colon, the dash, and the period, among others.
What better way to become acquainted with my new friends in the punctuation world than to park myself at a teashop and devour equal parts Strawberry Green Tea and grammatical rules? If only I had been able to get the rules down as smoothly as the tea. By definition my task was to meticulously comb the text by checking its consistency and accuracy. I quickly learned that by practice it was as painstaking as combing through a child’s hair for lice.
I opened up document after document and went through a cycle of revisions for each piece hoping that immersion would breed confidence. First came an initial read through to check for overall consistency of voice, any glaring mistakes, and holes in the story. Then came the tidal wave of minor corrections that left many pieces looking as if they had been scribbled over with a kindergartener’s digital crayons. Like many, I was more capable of editing work that wasn’t my own, but I still struggled and tried to have faith in the process.
Despite my frustration that with punctuation there are correct and incorrect usages, each document I opened revealed the similarities between the structure of dance and the structure of writing. The process of copy-editing felt foreign, but I could rely more on my other career than I initially thought.
I started to notice that very little was said in some of the first drafts I got: thousands of words that painted a picture of the surface. It was then that I realized the abundance of empty sentences in both my own writing and the writing that I was editing. By buffing up a piece with five dollar words, a writer is doing the same things as a dancer who adds extra turns or beats to a combination in class when the technique is clearly missing; simplicity is an artist’s friend.
Also staring out at me like headlights on a dark road was the idea of transitions. There may be endless ways to string together steps, but a choreographer usually stumbles upon a way to transition from one to the other that feels most natural. The same goes with writing. Just as it is impossible for a dancer to go from one side of the stage to the other with a single jump, it is implausible to ask the reader to launch from one thought to another without giving the proper care to the space between.
My work as an editor gave me the chance to make sure that the pieces not only created scenery and lighting on the stage/page, but also moved the reader through them. I was amazed at how far the articles were able to come (with a little collaborating) from the first draft to the printed final — it was the same transformation as from the first rehearsal to the finished performance. And the fatigue editing caused was not dissimilar to the fatigue after completing a full-length ballet. Yet despite my weariness I felt closer to the written word than ever before.
Now everywhere I look there are opportunities for copy-editing. Wedding announcements, business cards (a friend of mine recently saw a doctor whose card read Doulgas Roberts), websites, this post — all chock full of errors I hope to notice with the ease that I used to spot improper lines in the corps de ballet. Unfortunately, one of the biggest comforts of live performance doesn’t translate to the printed word: the idea that mistakes are over once the curtain comes down. In publishing, my mistakes are printed for all to see. Here’s hoping I got it right.
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MATTHEW MURPHY |
During a bout of restlessness last night I turned on my computer and started scanning the NY Times. Being the dancer that I am, I bolted right for the Arts section and saw a picture of my best friend extraordinaire, David Hallberg, gracing the screen. After years of performing in NY I am used to seeing my friends pop up in reviews here and there, but nothing could have prepared me for the shower of praise chief NY Times Dance Critic Alastair Macaulay wrote for David.
While no dancer should go around basing their worth on a critic’s opinion, it never hurts to be shown a little love. And it’s been quite a day of love for David. All of his friends have been bounding around, beyond proud of all of David’s hard work and dedication to his art form. Of course, being the constant thinker that he is, he’s not letting himself get TOO caught up in the hype…after all, there’s still another performance of “Swan Lake” to tackle tonight and on Saturday at the matinee! Go check out ABT’s Spring Season at the Met!
Here’s a taste of what the Times had to say:
“But Queen Mother and Tutor on Tuesday night were mere distractions beside the central figure of Prince Siegfried as played by David Hallberg. Has American ballet ever produced such a male paragon of classical-ballet nobility? There’s nothing affected or strained about him. In natural distinction of stance, line both astonishingly refined and blazingly forceful, easy good manners to others and rapt immersion in the story, he epitomizes everything that is already attractive about the young people around him. Thirty years ago, Anthony Dowell was along these lines (but more poetic, less virile). I’m not sure who else, anywhere in the world, in the intervening years has so well embodied the princely type so important to ballet.”
Doesn’t get much better than that! Check out the full review…and grab a ticket!
P.S. Don’t worry. I won’t let him forget that he’s still the goofball from the pictures above. Princely goofball now, I guess!
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