BOOSTED Campaign

BBEALS: BRILLIANT NZ/FRANCE CO-PRODUCTION

Bbeals is a co-production between Footnote New Zealand Dance and Danses en L’R from Reunion, a French island in the Indian Ocean. It will be a full length contemporary dance piece exploring an arc starting from Jennifer Bbeals’ character in the film Flashdance, later encompassing biblical themes from the Tower of Babel to the Great Flood. As well as movement, Bbeals will involve original music, and elements of theatre and circus performance.

French dancer and choreographer Eric Languet fell in love with New Zealand when he was dancing with the Royal New Zealand Ballet from 1988-98. A principal dancer with the company, he became a New Zealand citizen and created a dozen very well received dance works from the full length story ballet Alice (in Wonderland) to shorter contemporary works.

After a decade in New Zealand, Languet headed home to establish his own dance company, Dances en l’R, collaborate with artists from the region, work with dancers with disabilities, and direct the multidisciplinary dance training programme, The Hangar. In the last 15 years, his company has gained an international reputation for excellent contemporary dance: they regularly tour to large festivals, including Avignon and Marseilles in France.

Now Languet has invited Footnote New Zealand Dance to come to Reunion as artists in residence at The Hangar to collaborate with Dances en l’R in producing Bbeals. After further development in our Wellington studios in February 2015, Footnote and Danses en L’R will proudly premiere Bbeals around New Zealand in March 2015, before returning to Reunion for performances there. Both companies are exploring opportunities for Bbeals to travel to mainland Europe, too!

The Footnote dancers are very excited by the invitation to travel to Reunion to collaborate on such a major work. But, although we have already raised most of the money we need to develop and tour Bbeals, we still need to raise more than $15,000 for this wonderful opportunity to become a reality!

Thank you in advance for supporting the dancers of Footnote New Zealand Dance! 2015 is Footnote’s 30th birthday: with your help, Bbeals will become the first tour of our anniversary year…