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| Bennyroyce Royon in a moment from his Juilliard graduation solo, "not the same...," with choreography by Benoit-Swan Pouffer.( © Jan Stary 2006) |
Life after Juilliard has been quite busy for recent graduate Bennyroyce Royon (B.F.A. '06, dance). In addition to dancing with the Metropolitan Opera Ballet this season, his interest in choreography has prompted him to launch his own dance production company, Bennyroyce & Company. He is working on a collaborative dance film project that he hopes to release in late spring or early summer, to coincide with workshops at the New York Institute for Special Education, a school for disabled children.
Tell me a bit about your latest project.
Project 2006: A Trail of Words is a short dance film project that I hope will inspire people to expand their awareness about the nature of blindness. Inspired by a true story, the project unites dance and film to narrate a tale of a blind girl engaged in the short stories she is reading. The stories unfold from blurred dances to clear images as a visual metaphor of our assumptions about what the blind see or do not see. I’ve thought about the project since the fall of last year, but the idea really didn’t fully develop until I met Adam Boyer (my co-director) in the summer of 2005. I was looking for a young filmmaker who shares the same vision and I was lucky enough to find him.
Who are your other collaborators?
Paradise, a student from the institute, is the core inspiration for making the dance film. She became blind just three years ago, on her 16th birthday. I visit her at the school when I can, and she loves to talk on the phone! She’s a talented girl and a fast learner. My friendship with her is important not only because of the dance film, but because she is teaching me about a world that I cannot experience. Then there’s composer Ricardo Romaneiro, whom I met at Juilliard. I’ve heard his music and like it a lot. I really enjoy collaborating with him because our minds are alike. Costume designer Jocelyn Melechinsky and I worked together last year for my Senior Showcase piece, A Remedy of Songs. For this project, we talked about how to tell the story in terms of what the characters wear in the film. She’s fun to work with and always has wonderful insights about my ideas.
Why does the combination of film and dance appeal to you, and what are the rewards and/or challenges of such collaborations?
I enjoy good movies, and I’ve always wanted to know how they make them. Dance is always experienced on stage during a live performance, and I think it’s about time to experience it in the filmic arena. Not only will it open new doors to how we create and view dance, but most importantly, film will make dance visible to a larger audience of people who generally do not attend dance concerts. One of the major challenges of dance/film collaboration is the use of time and space. Since moments in film happen much quicker than in live performance, how do I, as a choreographer, manipulate movement to express the passage of time? With space in film, one has a larger spectrum to work with, from extreme close up to a wide-angle shot. What and how much of the movement do we want to show? It’s really very challenging, because you’re adding another dimension.
Videos of your work often appear on YouTube. How do you think the Web alters the way dance is marketed and promoted?
I’ve seen many dance clips of major companies on YouTube, along with just dance in general. I think it’s really great that we now have a way to share dance on the Web. It is good promotion for the art of dance, but we have to be careful of copyright issues. Someone can just steal your choreography and put their name on it! Or you could be using someone’s song that you had no rights for. My suggestion is that, before you post any of your performance clips or works online, ask yourself, “Do I want to take the risk of displaying this on the Web?” When I post some of my works on YouTube, I tag them with information including title, creator, date, place, and also the standard copyright tagging.
