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Finally free from my language lessons, I got myself ready. Busiest of my days were those I performed on. I felt weary for the upcoming day, it wasn't even because of how busy that today was going to be. It was going to be a very busy day. But I wasn't looking foward to all the goodbyes I'd have to say. It was wild how many people had become permanent fixtures in my life and now I had to leave them behind.
There were days I used to perform for three thousand people; that number had dwindled these days. But I still felt that I had three thousand people I regularly interacted with each day. London used to be this dangerous image full of knife crimes and hooligans to mug me in dark alleys. But within a single year, I had become a native to the city and a network of friends with dreams as lofty as mine.
Pippo was an odd man — would I ever see him again? Would I see the others again? How many more odd folks would I find as I walked my path through life on this earth? As an actor, I cherished every odd character I met; every one of their gestures, mannerisms and tics were a string to add to my bow. All of their life experience would help realise the Wilfred Price I wanted to become.
These were also the days that I could be considered somewhat of a veteran in the industry. Through trial and error, I had a whole process developed and it was all in a bag near the foot of my bed. I hated not having things ready at hand, so I eventually bought a gym bag, then added things to it as I found the need. Days where I struggled to fit my stuff into my backpack were long past. Instead, in the gym bag, I had everything Wilfred Price could ever need.
I messed up once and left my sweaty clothes inside for two nights when I'd gone back to Chester. It was a smelly disgusting thing when I came back to London. So when I got dressed and ready, I started to pack the contents of my "practice" bag from where I kept them dry and exposed to air.
First was my dance shoes — the main ones I wore for daily warmups at Apollo and in tap classes. There were also ballet slippers that I used at the dance studio. Those things disintegrated extremely fast and were a constant annoyance to get replaced. Then there were changes of clothes, my dance belt, shorts and tights. It was a constant battle to have everything clean, but keeping organised had saved my hide enough times already to make the effort worth it.
Then it was my Volleyball knee pads — it was a complete life changer, and my knees no longer hurt when I had to hold stupid poses in Dolittle for extended periods. One of the small tricks that one learnt with experience, but mostly I just watched people around me and copied their tricks and equipment. I had some tapes, markers, my school material and the most recent audition scripts in there too. But today was to be my last day; I had done my tutoring sessions and auditions were on pause as of yesterday so I took them out.
I was missing the brolly and my water bottle, which I would grab from the kitchen, but that was the current iteration of my practice bag that had everything I would need in a routine day.
Vauxhall was a walking distance away from my place, but with how loaded my day was shaping up to be, I had no interest in taking twenty minutes to walk over. Instead, my Granddad dropped me off at Vauxhall in his ageing red Vauxhall. My dance teacher had rented a place next to Vauxhall Spring Gardens — originally it had been known as the New Spring Gardens, and some parts of it had been allowed to be built upon. The place was now mostly full of offices and under the train lines, we passed under a tunnel to the dance studio that I was paying a good portion of my earnings to attend.
Saying goodbye to my Granddad, I couldn't help but see the spray-painted mural on the brick walls and turn my nose up at it several times. If this was a routine day, then I couldn't help but do that routine. The whole place was too pretentious but the mural was bordering on egomaniacal. Unlike the mural outside, the dance studio itself was a warm place of learning and bonding.
The reception area had a store that sold dance equipment — if you've never been to a ballet practice, you'll be surprised at how fast people go through pointe shoes. These were all made from cardboard, satin, leather and glue, built up until they could hold the shape. Dance belts, shorts and tights — most of it I had bought from here, and I was sure that branded water bottles, printed shirts were a decent margin for the owners.
"Welcome to Companie Lagarde!" an enthusiastic girl welcomed me,
"Please don't say that name, Aurélie," I begged,
"Sorry, boss' commands goes," she said with a cute laugh,
"Ugh, where's he?" I asked, making a face.
"He's in studio Un and ready for you." Aurélie pointed towards the studio at the end of the long hall.
"You should tell your boss that labeling things in English would attract more clients in England. Or soon he'll find himself evicted," I suggested,
"I talked him down from Studio de danse un, and he likes to say it's ze charm of ze place." Aurélie said smiling,
"Good impression," I complimented as I made for the studio,
"Oh, are you pumped about tonight?" Aurélie asked,
Groaning, I ignored the question.
Long white halls had many white doors leading to different classrooms. Each door had a clear sign holder with the names of the instructor inserted in. Today, Studio Un had my instructor's name inserted in it. Seeing the name soured my mood, so I skipped right by it to get changed in the dressing room instead. Breathing in and out, I got myself mentally prepared for another practice session — another session of learning. It was just another session of learning, I repeated.
"Ah, nice of you to finally show your face. Two minutes late — you know what to do," the voice said.
I made a groan full of my annoyance. My tiny meditation hadn't worked and my mood was already ruined. Whining, I slid a two-pence coin into the piggy bank.
"You're so shameless with your attempts at extracting as much money as possible from your students," I pointed out.
"You're wrong. I'm just diligent in teaching my students about punctuality! Time is your friend and enemy — better remember it," he said,
I eyed the man's pencil-thin moustache and strong figure. He wore a black leotard with long grey tights and a dance belt — full ballet gear, for it was our ballet class. David was in the room too, and there were plenty of crash mats set against the wall ready to be used for later. It was also an acro day — acrobatics was a tough one, but I was no longer the doe-eyed boy who could hardly dance. To learn more, I had to challenge myself, and lately I'd been focused on aerial jumps from ballet and an acrobatics teacher had been hired by the owner.
"Warmups — up, up," The teacher said,
David lined up next to me to join in the warmups. Ballet had a reputation for being a woman's sport. It was certainly true when it came to the demographics, but like all dance you want to have a partner in the end. Dance was movement, movement was emotion. Professional ballet thus had a fair bit of male ballet dancers. Unlike most boys, I had never looked down on ballet, but nowadays I had respect and admiration for ballet dancers. I used to think of it as a form of dance, something fun it was that, sure but so much more. Ballet was a sport — a highly demanding and brutal sport.
"Light jogs — let's get zem legs warmed up!" he said,
David and I followed our teacher's papce and ran around the room.
"Prance like stags — like ze cute leetle princesses you are!" He chuckled low and deep,
So we did — ballet was a dance focusing on legs, and you needed blood flow there to get it going. Prancing around helped loosen the joints too.
"Let's get down and zirty!"
That was just him being extra. In fact that word could describe my teacher in his entirety. We did stretches and rolls to get our joints and tendons ready for the upcoming abuse. Head rolls, shoulder rolls, neck twists and arms in windmills, imitation rain dance and the kung fu bits — we did them all.
"Plié and calf raises!"
Our warmups were getting faster — building up momentum as we moved through exercises. Ballet for men was strength and grace in equal measures. And for dancers, strength came purely from the legs. So we rolled our ankles, stretched our calves, went into a plié — that is just a fancy term for bending our knees — and then a relevé, where we stood on the tips of our toes.
David currently competes for Great Britain at the Olympics — he was part of the GB gymnastics team. He was genuinely a master at his work, a lifelong gymnast. Unfortunately, sport was a competition, and even as good as he was to be on the team, he just wasn't the best, not in the nation nor in the world. David was a lean and well toned guy, but his legs were strong. He had big and strong calves that he'd worked years to obtain.
Then there was my vaunted teacher — the person who drove me nuts each day but kept it fun enough to make sure I came back. He made David's legs look puny and thin like chopsticks. Those quads and glutes looked almost disproportionate when he was wearing those grey tights. His calves were round, bulbous things that could only be found on one other group of people; cycling athletes. These glutes would make women feel bad about their bottoms. Ballet was a sport of the highest order of difficulty, and its practitioners were athletes at the peak of their craft.
"You may stop admiring me," my teacher said, his moustache quivering with held laughter,
"No one is admiring you!" I said, blushing.
"Wilfred?" He said butchering my name with his stupid accent, "I wasn't talking to you. But you're being so defensive. You are a guilty boy, naughty boy." he said, laughing in that irritating way.
Busted, I thought. It was true that ballet dancers could immediately see my teacher as a lifelong ballet dancer just by the size of his legs. Stammering I tried to come back with a biting remark.
"Core and lumbar extension!" He shouted, putting an end to it.
We got on the floor and engaged our cores.
Ballet for men was all kinds of jumps of varying difficulty. My teacher told me that the jumps were the easy part — it was the repetition that was hard. Swan Lake, a famous ballet from Tchaikovsky, famously had thirty-two fouettés — that's where the dancer spins around on one leg, stops and starts again like a spinning top. It looked elegant, and an audience would be impressed by the ballerina keeping their balance and not falling from spinning so many times. They were wrong.
It may come as a surprise that keeping the balance would be the easiest part — the hard part was the leg that the ballerina spun on; it would bear all the weight focused on the shank of their pointe shoes. According to my teacher, his partners would lose the feeling in their left leg after that sequence but would continue on with the ballet through sheer willpower. Imagine having a dead leg and still having to perform at the highest level — it was the equivalent of a footballer, after a rough tackle, doing a pitch-long sprint. It was passion incarnate.
Ballet was a sport, alright.
Men's version of the same difficulty was eleven grands jetés — a jump where your legs were split to opposite sides, all jumps were successive and performed in a row with as much attitude as possible. I meant that both literally and figuratively — in attitude meant your body weight was only on one leg. So those eleven jumps were your body weight plus momentum landing on the same leg over and over again. It was an endurance sport too — willpower was the minimum requirement to participate.
"First position!"
Ballet was also an art. Art made up of lines — there were only five arms and feet positions; each was numbered easily for convenience, and I had been trained to assume those positions immediately as they were called out.
"David, zis is terrible — terrible, I say!" he exclaimed, throwing his hands up in dramatic despair.
"Oh yeah? Let's see how you get on with acro and gymnastics then," David shot back, cheeks red like a gammon. "How about some 540s? Think you can manage that, mate?"
That was probably the hardest ballet move possible. A jump where the dancer spun one and a half revolution in the air.
"I was doing 540s before I even 'it puberty." He puffed out his chest proudly. "Five-Forty was born in ze ballet theatre — and I perfected it!" He gave that smug little chuckle he was infamous for.
"Then go on — do a routine! Get tumbling, old man. Let's see how you look then," David said, going even redder in the face with irritation.
"Fat chance of zat," the Frenchman sniffed. He turned to me with exaggerated gravitas. "Listen, Wilf — listen to ze foolishness of men. You must stay realistic about your capability, or you will look as daft as zis fool 'ere."
"The day before yesterday you said a man has to at least a bit delusional to challenge the norm," I reminded him, surely he couldn't refute his own words.
"Pfft," he scoffed, flicking a hand. "Zat is if you are tackling easy things — doing a 'ard dance, toppling a government, starting a revolution—"
"Right, because a revolution is such an easy thing," David muttered.
"It is! You must 'ear how many France 'as had. Almost as many as the sunny days as you lot get." He shrugged, entirely serious. "Now, where was I? Ah, yes — delusion! You may be delusional to achieve such easy things. But 'ard things — like beating me at… anything — hah! Fat chance of zat. You must remain sane and evaluate yourself properly!"
Both David and I rolled our eyes; Gilles was an annoying person and a pretentious idiot at most times. Oh right, I forgot to tell that Gilles was indeed the owner of the newest studio in Vauxhall — perhaps one of the only ones still open for business on this riverbank. Gilles' life took a different turn right after he'd gone to France for the holidays. I had no way of telling what had happened for him to change, but Gilles suddenly decided to spend all his life savings to establish himself anew in London — this time as his own person and an owner of a business that he was an industry expert in.
So now he had a dance studio two minutes' walk away from the River Thames, with a massive mural of himself painted on the side of the building. That stupid image could've been any person or someone famous; it could've been something that clients could use to imagine themselves as. Black silhouette was good for that sort of imagery — you could see a crossing sign and know you were barred from it. But no — he had gone and put his pencil-thin moustache right on the silhouette. Egomaniac, Gilles was.
"Are you sure about acro lessons today? You've got an important thing tonight," Gilles asked, his voice almost sounding protective. As he'd said, there was a fat chance of him feeling that way.
"Oh, right — the thing! You could pull a tendon, better skip it," David suggested.
"No, I must keep my routine," I insisted, "Also please don't ask about the—"
There was a knock at the door.
"Jes?" Gilles called, his French accent colouring the word.
"We've got a new student — six-year-old girl! Francesca, she's cute as a button!" Aurélie gushed with a laugh as she poked her head round the door.
"You take her. Let Georgia 'andle reception."
"Okay!" Aurélie giggled, then skipped off. Her curly hair bobbed in time with her steps.
Aurélie was Gilles' sister, and if there'd been any ego floating about in their mother's womb, Gilles must've swallowed the lot before she'd had a chance. Terrible comparison, really, considering Aurélie was only nineteen. A twenty-year age gap was something else entirely — but for all that, they were as thick as thieves.
Not even a moment after Aurélie disappeared, the door banged open again. Georgia stormed in, her heels clucking sharply on the wooden floor.
"What do you mean I've got to sit at the front?" she complained.
"No one's in your class today — except zis one." He said, side-eyeing me. "You'll have to fill in elsewhere," Gilles added, barely glancing up as he got us down doing push-ups.
"I came here to teach! Teach, Gilles. You told me the best way to learn was to do it, and that you had students lined up for me," Georgia accused. With her posh accent and blonde-bombshell confidence, every word landed like a slap.
Slap may have meant something for a man with a shred of dignity. Gilles was not that man.
"I did not say zat," Gilles replied in a sing-song voice, wagging a finger. "I said you will get an agent — and zat I know one — but I promised nothing about students or even a job. Now… did you get an agent?"
"Erm — yes, I did," Georgia said, straightening with a touch of dignity.
"Indeed. So do not worry, woman. I have something diabolical cooked up; I'll get you an opportunity tonight," he said with an evil little grin. The way he side-eyed me as he said it made my stomach drop. The drop wasn't as scary as the unknown.
"I'd rather be out auditioning if there's nothing for me to teach," Georgia huffed.
"You'll need to put food on ze table. I've told you many times — and I pay your salary," Gilles reminded her, flicking his hand in dismissal.
"Hmph." Georgia gave an exaggerated scoff and stalked out.
That was all of the teachers at Companie Lagarde. The name of Gilles' dance studio seemed so humble and normal that one might wonder why someone as extra as him would choose it. But if you had any industry knowledge, you would know that "company" in our industry referred to the cast and crew of a production. Gilles was so pretentious that he had his goal written across the building walls and drawn on the brick façade. He was planning to hire out a dance company for events, shows, compete in competitions, and eventually get big enough to put on his own productions — it was sort of like calling yourself a doctor just after entering med school.
Six months ago, Gilles had been in Chester, in a respected but tiny performing arts school. Something had happened in France for him to chase his dreams again — or perhaps it was the mid-life crisis hitting him. He was at the right age, anyway. There was also a chance that the encounter in Ovalhouse Theatre had changed things for him. When I was out of luck and struggling to get roles, Gilles had come to watch me perform. He met with a woman who was producing Lion King, and I had paid the Ovalhouse for that session! Gilles became a frontrunner for the Lion King production that was going into rehearsals in a month or two and all on my dime. I had no idea if Gilles was cast in a role yet, he was secretive like that. The show was breaking all kinds of records on the other side of the Atlantic and the West End production was highly demanded. It was all but guaranteed that he'd work as a dance captain, just not obvious if he'd also do a role. Perhaps that was why he was here in Vauxhall, fully taking on the role by starting his own dance studio.
Gilles taught dance of all types — jazz, contemporary, ballroom, tap, and some hip-hop. But his first and last love was ballet, and his insanely jacked body told the story. I wanted those thighs, glutes, and quads. Puberty couldn't come faster — I couldn't wait to jump like I had pogo sticks for legs.
"Alright — let's do some centre work and start jumping around," Gilles announced,
David made a fool of himself — he was getting training from Gilles to learn enough to work as a coach in productions. His competition days were nearing their end, and, being a man of realistic expectations, he'd decided to carve out a new niche for himself. With a career in gymnastics and acrobatics, which heavily employed dancing techniques, he was in a good spot to make a lateral move. Vaudeville had popularised acrobatics, and David could teach acrobatics to all kinds of dancers and performers. Having a technical background was a boon when you changed the industry you worked in. He just needed to familiarise himself with the classics. Though I assumed he'd remain a technical teacher for the rest of his career.
"Let's do some jetés, cabrioles — and I want to see your single tour en l'air, Wilfred. Your spotting is quite dreadful there."
"Yes," I replied.
"Yes what?" Gilles demanded,
Rolling my eyes, I said, "Yes, Maestro."
"That's right. Now listen to ze sound of music — You! you try your best, David," Gilles said, laughing,
David was struggling with the new technique, but he was a quick learner. I'd thought myself a fairly quick learner when it came to dancing, but David was shattering all expectations. He knew all the technicals and was an experienced competitor. And spotting was second nature to him — he'd done the similar thing with competitions all over. Judges were as strict as ballet academy judges. I wasn't looking forward to when David caught up and surpassed me — maybe that was my Maestro's intention. To challenge me by a rank amateur who was miles better than me and who would blow past me with ease.
We continued to do jumps each higher than the last; our movements looked varying shades of graceful. Gilles had those trampoline legs — each of his jumps reaching so high that he looked a man flying. David could reach almost as high owing to his technical talents, but he didn't look anywhere near as graceful. I hardly lifted from the ground, but I looked quite graceful, if I say so myself.
Problem was that I was too young to really get more complicated or even practise too many jumps. Gilles told me it had to do with growth plates and the effects of testosterone that puberty had. Essentially my muscles and bones were too weak to do too much practice now. Once Gilles was happy with my work, David took over as my instructor. We moved to the crash mats and did backflips and front flips and side flips. Each time I jumped, David would spot me by finding my waist and at times applying more torque or absorbing some to correct me. I loved acro, it was pure fun.
"Shall we start some tumbling?" David asked, grinning.
"Hell yes!" I said, lighting up like a Christmas tree.
There were no words for how amazing it felt to do the moves I'd learned from David. Backflips were insane, and Nain had already warned me off doing too many, especially out in the public.
"You'll be a bad influence! I don't want kids breaking their necks because of you," she'd said.
Tumbling meant somersaults, flips, twists, cartwheels, handsprings — all rolled into one. Nothing compared to the rush of soaring through the air, feeling completely out of control, yet seizing it back just in time to land straight. It was pure adrenaline bottled for me.
"Right — we'll finish with a bit more centring work. Then you should go and watch Georgia hear herself speak," Gilles announced, clapping his hands.
Both David and I sighed but got to it — it was the boring bit of work in ballet, basic and foundational. Gilles was still unhappy with me not being perfect and even David who was technically sound. I didn't even know if there was ever a perfect form when it came to ballet. If one could pull it off, it was only in the moments. Consistency couldn't be achieved to the degree that Gilles could be happy with. Unless he was speaking about himself, he would never describe anything as perfect. Class had lasted an hour and a half, and I was tired already.
"Your Grandpapa and zis Nein is here," Aurélie said when I exited studio one, I refused to call it Studio Un.
"It's Nain — but keep calling my Granddad like that. You make him sound cute," I replied,
Aurélie giggled — she was a ball full of joy and happiness.
I had lunch with my grandparents. I probably ate three times as much as children my age, at least on performing days. I had to burn a lot of energy each day. Since I performed after seven, timing my meals was crucial. Actors didn't like eating right before a show — feeling too full could throw you off enough to ruin a performance. Eating afterwards was out of the question; you simply wouldn't have the energy to make it through the show. So I stuck to two equal portion of meals: lunch at 2 p.m., the dinner at 5.
Renting a studio in Vauxhall had its perks — mainly the abundance of space. A train line ran overhead, crossing a bridge with a tunnel for pedestrians beneath. The narrow gap underneath doubled as our lunch tables and hangout spot, though mostly it was where the smokers congregated — except during lunch hours. I enjoyed a meal and some conversation with my grandparents. I repeatedly asked what they were up to today, but they kept suspiciously ignoring me.
Inside the studio, I found the room with Georgia's name on the plaque.
"Enter!" Georgia called as I knocked.
"My student — my lovely student. Any parts in your movie for me?" she joked, twirling a lock of her blonde hair.
"Sorry — you're far too young for the roles available," I said, laughing.
"Can't believe you're going to be in a movie with Maggie Smith and Dame Judi Dench. Joan Plowright too…" Georgia's eyes sparkled like the first time she'd heard the news.
"Do you want some tips for tonight? You know I'm really good at those right?" Georgia said laughing,
"Please — let's start," I complained. I didn't want to talk about.
Georgia smouldered at me and let out a low growl, then returned to her papers as if nothing had happened.
She was my acting coach, and often displayed odd emotions and facial expressions because she believed actors should be ready to show any feeling at a moment's notice. I wasn't entirely convinced. Goergia had lovely blonde hair, blue eyes, diamond shaped face, and thin lips that she painted red. A triple threat, she'd been in a fair few musical productions already, but recently she'd set her sights on breaking into screen acting. It required a completely different skill set, and she threw herself into it wholeheartedly.
"Let's do some Meisner," Georgia said excitedly,
"Ughhh—" I groaned,
"We'll do 'What can I do for you?' Imagine yourself as Aurélie — the receptionist outside," Georgia said, closing her eyes to engage her own imagination,
"It's Gilles at the table now," I reminded her,
She looked annoyed for a moment before shaking away all bad thoughts. "Fine — imagine yourself as Gilles," Georgia said with a shudder,
I laughed, understanding her reluctance.
"Now say it with me."
"—What can I zo for you?" we said in unison, both cracking up.
"Okay — let's keep repeating it until you can't hear yourself think!" she declared.
My laughter died down, but I could use all the acting help I could get.
Meisner had this ridiculous technique for practising improv — simply repeating a phrase over and over in different tones, emotions, accents, and characters. I hated it most of the time, but there was no denying it worked. Sometimes brute-forcing things was the only way to unlock a character or slip into an unexplored part of a scene.
Georgia had been plucked straight from the Manchester School of Theatre, where she'd graduated. Before that, she'd studied at the Hammond in Chester. Gilles had never taught her, but somehow fate had drawn them together. Georgia had been promised a good agent who could secure her auditions for the biggest projects out there. Gilles had made that happen by leveraging his own new agent — the one whose name rhymed with Canadian Martini.
That's right — Gilles had signed with Adrian as soon as he returned from France. He'd asked me for an agent! Since then, I hadn't seen him rehearse or read scripts or sides for auditions once. I had a sneaking suspicion he'd signed for connections — primarily so he could recommend Georgia to Adrian and get her to enrol at his studio. Gilles was paying her alright, but he was also charging her because he was teaching her dancing. Circular economy… He'd also charmed Adrian so effectively that half a dozen of Adrian's clients were now paying for classes at the Companie Lagarde.
Gilles had an eye for business and a ruthlessness when it came to exploiting his connections. It was almost impressive — even if he had used me as a stepping stone to land Baldini. And, of course, I was paying him three hundred pounds a week for it. He had me completely under his thumb, and as I looked around the dance studio, I realised that I'd be coming here for years to come.
"Are you ready?" Nain asked,
"Yes," I said, having put on my change of clothes.
"Final performance — are you excited?" she asked,
"Ughh!" I groaned, looking up at the sky in defeat. Everyone kept asking me about tonight and I was trying not to think about it.