When I was in New York after I left the Army, I studied for two years at the American Theater Wing, studied acting, which involved dance and fencing and speech classes and history of theater, all that.
All cultures through all time have constantly been engaged in a dance with new possibilities for life. Change is the one constant in human history.
I don't want to see people decorating a house or digging a garden. As for guys like Jonathan Ross, he got an award there last Christmas. What for? He doesn't sing, dance or tell jokes, does he?
I don't really know any other musicians like me. I grew up backstage with my dad who played in a post-war dance band, so I always feel at home at a venue.
No movie influenced me more to go after my dreams than 'Flashdance.' After seeing it, I took 15 dance lessons a week. I cut all my sweatshirts. I did the 'Maniac' thing.
When I design a wedding dress with a bustle, it has to be one the bride can dance in. I love the idea that something is practical and still looks great.
All those years of skating and dancing have carried over. I can't design anything without thinking of how a woman's body will look and move when she's wearing it.
I'm a big fan of regular school and regular education. I just learn better in a classroom where I can talk to other students. I want to go to prom and dances and have that social aspect.
I used to love to see Willie Pep and Ray Robinson. To me, the epitome of a great athlete is a great boxer. I just love the rhythm of seeing a man dance, slip punches. I loved the dancers and boxers. I would see them and be mesmerized.
I've studied a lot of great people over the years - Pete Seeger, James Brown - and tried to incorporate elements that I've admired, though I can't say I dance like James.
Dance has helped me with everything. It was a great foundation for discipline, hard work and, unfortunately, the ever-elusive idea of perfection. It lends itself easily to fight choreography, because that's what it really is. Choreography. And knowin...
Sometimes when you are a great mom, you're not so great at your job. And then when you're good at your job, you're not so great of a mom or a good wife. It's a dance that never stops. But it's beautiful.
Hamp would ask me about tempos in the band: 'Jacquet,' he'd say, 'knock off that tempo.' A lot of jazz musicians didn't prefer to play for dancers, which was their loss, really. But good jazz has always had that dance feel.
Being tall is very good for reaching high shelves and seeing in a crowd. Sadly, it has also given me the inability to dance. There's too much of me to look neat, which is most disappointing.
Independent dance - and, fine, it's a very good thing that it remains independent - is a much tougher life: all dancers expect that, and accept that there will be periods of not being able to work, provided there are choice moments during the year wh...
'Shall We Dance?' takes a small, exquisite Japanese movie and turns it into a big, stupid American movie. Still, it must be said that as glossy and overproduced as the thing is, it's a good big, stupid American movie.
It's important for me to put out things that I think are good - I want to be a fan of my own stuff. I also want my live shows to be really awesome, and dance is such an important element for me and my performances.
I was using tape loops for dancers and dance production. I had very funky primitive equipment, in fact technology wasn't very good no matter how much money you had.
I realize that dancers have worked long and hard for standards. However, on occasion, I think that it's good to examine one's heart and ask why are we dancing.
The level of sacrifice in the world of dancing is incredibly intense, that work ethic if nothing else - get up, go to class, rehearsal, performance, get up, go to class - that's your life, and it's like that for a finite time, usually.
I was in a show choir. I can't sing or dance to save my life, but I was very passionate. People said my parents paid the choir director to let me in. It was actually the parents who started that one!
