Emotion on stage

Christian Spuck is a busy man. Just 40 years old, he is the resident choreographer both in Stuttgart and Chicago, and he's in demand at leading ballet companies from Montreal to Israel.

Spuck's award-winning choreographies blend beauty and sadness, sarcasm and fun, and have opened up dance to new audiences the world over. On a recent visit to Stuttgart, he was adding the final touches to his latest work, "Orphee et Euridice," a co-production of the Stuttgart Ballet with the city's opera company.

Reinventing the classics

After only six years on stage, Spuck ended his own career as a dancer, saying he wanted more from the art form than dancing alone offered him.

"I think that dance, especially if you're working in a ballet company, is for sure not intellectually stimulating," he said. "To be a very good dancer, you have to reflect a lot about dance history and dance technique - but the priority is the very hard, disciplined work in the studio every day. I wanted to try out things, not follow something that was set."

He's done a lot of exploring since his first choreography, a pas de deux called "Towards the Night," went straight into the repertoires of the State Ballet in Stuttgart and the German Opera Ballet in Berlin back in 1996 - a sensation for a debut work. Spuck often draws inspiration for new works from German classic literature, like Wedekind's "Lulu," Hoffmann's "Sandman" or Buehner's "Leonce and Lena."

But not just any classic will do.

"The story needs excitement, it needs lots of emotions, it needs to tell me something," he said. "I should have the feeling it will tell the audience something. It should be a story that's not too complicated so that I can adapt it for dance."

Busy schedule

Choreographers don't just compose ballets, they also cast the dancers and train them for their roles. Spuck is particular about the people he chooses to dance the works he creates. He said he looks for people that he likes and has a connection with, even if they are not the most technically proficient.

"Sometimes I choose people who are technically very limited but they have something else I find very fascinating and then I create the part around the dancer," he explained.

Spuck has a tough schedule. There is the choreography to be written, the studio work with the dancers, and of course, the traveling: Chicago, Montreal, Stuttgart, Oslo and Berlin are all big on his current itinerary. All of this is done backstage, without any of the buzz from being in the limelight or the excitement of being onstage.

"It's actually harder and more nerve-racking to present a choreography than to go on stage myself, because when you dance and perform, you have the situation in your hands, you can manipulate it," he said. "But when you create a piece, when the curtain opens, I don't even have to be there, it's in the hands of the dancers and the theater - so I'm just sitting there nervous."

Years in the making

Still, being there on opening night is a must for Spuck. Sometimes years of steady work - with dancers, technicians, theater administrators, musicians, conductors, and others - go by between a commission and a first night. For Spuck, this time is all a fruitful purgatory until the opening, when critics either celebrate or condemn his work.

There are also times when the audience loves Spuck's work, but he himself has doubts - like with "Ulysses," which he did with the Royal Ballet of Flanders for the Edinburgh Festival.

"After the first two performances the curtain closed and I thought, 'What have I done?' The audience was screaming and they were all really excited but it didn't touch me at all and I thought, 'This is weird, this production."

Despite his claim that he had to "go get drunk in some corner of the theater" because he was so scared he had produced "absolute rubbish" at the premiere of "Lulu," demand for his time and his ideas continues to grow.

"It is painful," Spuck said, "but I think having doubts is important; otherwise you can't step forward."

Author: Peggy Graham (jen)
Editor: Kate Bowen