• 2024
• 2023
• 2022
• 2021
• 2020-2011
• 2010-2001

• Alejandro Muñoz
• Francisco Serrano
• Gemma Bond
• Harris Bell
• Joshua Junker
• Kevin O'Hare
• Layla Hotham
• Petal Ashmole
• Pietro Zironi
• Sae Maeda
• Stuart Cassidy

Joshua Junker & Francisco Serrano

First Artists, The Royal Ballet School

Interviewed by David Bain
American International Church, Mon 15 April, 2024

 

After David welcomed our guests, who’d both won BA awards in their second year at school, Joshua said they’d just had a full call of The Winter’s Tale, having spent a lot of time sitting around in the studio going through the whole ballet. He’s doing Bohemians, clown and shepherds for the first time so lots of pressure. Francisco had done the ballet and is a steward and second act shepherds,so they’ll be busy. The first night is not far off but they’ve also been doing Swan Lake with five shows this week so there’s a lot going on with the Ashton coming up afterwards.

Talking about the MacMillan programme, Francisco said he’d originally been cast as the Friend in Different Drummer. He didn’t know much about the ballet but they’d had a few rehearsals and were quite excited. Dances Concertantes and Different Drummer hadn’t been done for a long time, so everyone was curious to see what they were about.  It wasn’t on the streaming platform, so he watched an old video. They had a few rehearsals and little by little he was covering the Drum Major. If you’re just covering, you don’t get a lot of rehearsal time but after a few weeks they heard Alexander Campbell was leaving so Francisco was put in to see how it would go. It went OK and he was in the Francesca Hayward and Marcelino Sambé cast. It was his first big role and very complex but a great experience, very interesting and a lot of fun. Gary Harris was staging it and they’d worked with him on Anastasia so knew his methods. He’s very relaxed and goes with the flow. Everyone involved in the learning process found him very nice and patient. They laughed about the similarities between Anastasiaand Different Drummerbeing soldiers in both.  After a few rehearsals Gary explained the story to give some atmosphere. Step by step he took them through each character, what the atmosphere was like, how Woyzeck was going through his crisis. They also had Ed Watson, so it was nice to get his take. Alessandra Ferri had some useful information on what they should be feeling and thinking about. So, there were good people around to help them through the work. Wayne Eagling was there for a few rehearsals, but he mainly worked with Marci Sambé and Reece Clarke. He’s the living legend as the role was created on him.  Working with Frankie was great though Francisco didn’t know what to expect. He knew nothing but she was a gem with lots of patience and asking him if something was OK which was lovely. They talked about technique, partnering and character development so there was lots of communication and it was nice to dive into the roles as a partnership. In some performances he was the Friend which was an interesting character to play, always showing sympathy towards and support for your friend while respecting and falling in line with the major, played by Gary Avis and Tom Whitehead. He went through everything with his friend, wanting to help but having no power. It was the sort of character he wanted to play so it was good to have that opportunity.

Joshua did lead soldiers in Different Drummer, a strange experience, but working with Gary Harris was relaxed and fun. He was in the first and last movement of Requiem and covered the Matt Ball/William Bracewell role which he hopes to dance in the future. When covering, you’re usually involved in other things but Phil Moseley, who works out the schedule, tries to give you time though he only did a couple of rehearsals.

It was in May last year that Kevin told Joshua he’d like him to choreograph a piece for the Festival of New Choreography. He expected to do something in the Linbury so when he was told it was for the main stage it was a great opportunity and very exciting for him. In his head it was going to be in the Linbury so his mind had to shift but for the best of reasons. He slowly started to think about what he might to do and had spoken to Lukas B Brændsrød a while before about wanting to make a ballet to a particular piece of music by Nils Frahm so felt it was a sign that now was the time to use it.  It took a while to finalise as it’s not orchestrated but it felt like the right choice. Then he began thinking about the cast, he knows everyone so well and they are good friends who enjoy creating movement together. He sent Kevin a list of people he’d love to work with, for the main cast. He used the younger generation of dancers which perhaps made it easier. He didn’t get everyone he asked for but was very happy with the cast – Francisco, Liam Boswell, Lukas, Nadia Mullova-Barley, Kristen McNally, Luca Acri amongst several others. It was a win for him, and he felt comfortable with the choice. They started rehearsing early in the season as Phil and Kevin give him a rehearsal period from September to February as he was in the building whereas other choreographers who were coming in were given much more concentrated rehearsal times so Joshua had to spread his out and work on an idea then wait a week or two for his cast, while thinking about other ballets which were going on, like Nutcracker. He had to change mindset quite a lot but there was an advantage in that he’d create something, watch on video and see what he liked before returning to the studio. There were pros and cons with being in the building. At his first meeting with the dancers not everyone was there. He began with 18-20 dancers and prepared some movements in advance as it’s harder to work on the spot with so many. He’d try them out on the dancers and change if they didn’t work. The first rehearsal was a bit difficult as they are all colleagues and friends so it was tricky to be authoritative, but it was quite relaxed with everyone respectful and it ran smoothly. He had the music for the first and last bits but for the transitional moment it was created later with the sound designer and only finished in November, so he choreographed on it towards the end. For big groups he had several counts prepared as he felt pressure to be quick and efficient. For a smaller group like Draft Works, he tries to be more in the moment with the dancers and figure out what suits them and see how his movement will go with their natural abilities. For the transitional moment, it was slower and more atmospheric, so he had prepared movements, but the piece wasn’t fully made. The work was completed about a week before opening night and he was happy with it. Francisco was in the cast from the beginning and said it was a great experience. Joshua is a friend, fellow dancer and choreographer. Sometimes in rehearsals he would let lose but Joshua knew what he wanted, was very direct, didn’t waste time, was very respectful and they had fun. There were moments when he saw Josh was unsure, but he kept his cool and got everything done. There was a massive group at the beginning with similar movements and they had to remember the counts. The second part is more atmospheric in contrast to the beginning. The whole cast grew as they danced with each other and there were instant connections when they knew what they had to do and it all went smoothly. Joshua said Francisco and Nadia had done some partnering so he let them try things that fitted themselves which they enjoyed so they kept them in.

Costume design. Joshua is only just starting out so had no great ideas about design and it was a bit of a search, but Julia Giuseppe helped him to look for suitable people. She’d danced with Rambert and had ideas so he contacted someone she’d suggested who wasn’t available, but she recommended Noemi Daboczi who he worked with in the end and they clicked. Asked how much input he had, Joshua said it was a good collaboration. She is quite conceptual with big ideas, and he wants to keep it clean and simple but they found a middle way. All the choreographers had the same lighting designer, Zeynep Kepekli, who was assigned to the whole project. He had ideas beforehand, but she cut them down a bit and they worked well together.

David said there now seem to be five producers at the Royal and wondered what they all do. Julia who looks after Draft Works, somebody else is responsible for the Linbury, another for the MacMillan works, someone else for Wayne McGregor and Chris Wheeldon and an assistant for anyone who needs help and they spread around the amount of work going on in the House though Emma Southworth can cover it all.

Reverting to how they got into ballet, both Francisco and Joshua started in earnest at the age of 14. Josh began with break dancing at home in Holland where he’d watch videos and was excited by the tricks and moves his brother did, so he went to do a class. The teacher wasn’t a break dancer but did contemporary and ballet, advertising in such a way as to get boys to join his class. They did stretching exercises and pointing feet then a break dance piece and he slowly introduced the idea of ballet saying that technique is needed for all styles of dance. In that way Joshua became interested in dance and thought of doing contemporary and ballet professionally. He went to a vocational school but quickly realised he could do better and at 14 he moved to the Royal Conservatoire, The Hague. There he got a proper ballet education with two to four hours training a day as well as academics.

Francisco, who’s from Florida, played baseball for several years as well as swimming and American football. His parents were both dancers originally from Cuba before defecting to Mexico where they performed for a while before ending up in Sarasota. He gradually lost interest in sports and wasn’t interested in ballet either when he was very young, but his Mum encouraged him to stay active and when he was 14 he said he’d give ballet a try.  A pas de deux class was his introduction to ballet, with a bit of hip hop. It was funny there was Francisco and another boy who was also skinny and small, and the girls were a couple of feet taller so the pas de deux was quite cool! His mum was teaching at the school, and she taught him privately for a year or two. She wanted to open a ballet school and gave it a try though his dad wasn’t interested – he was more Bob the Builder – but they built a school together, initially with just Francisco, his sister and a cousin as pupils. He saw its progression and recalled helping to paint the walls. He went to Youth American Grand Prix (YAGP) in New York from where he won a scholarship to the Royal Ballet School.  His parents’ school was quite small and up and coming so they decided to go to a few competitions to show what they had to offer and encourage others to join. In 2013 YAGP was held in Tampa and then they got the opportunity to go to New York. Jay Jolley was there and suggested he joined the ballet school, but Francisco was still very young and very raw in his ballet technique and his mother wasn’t keen to let him go so they asked to defer for a year which was agreed and aged 14 he came to the school where Chris Powney and Jay gave him a second year place. He’d done a lot of hard work meanwhile and spent many hours with his dad in the studio where they had lots of fights but it was good.

Joshua was at the Royal Conservatoire, The Hague and heard about a summer school in London and wanted to go which he did when he was about 15 or16. He didn’t want to audition for the school after only a couple of years at the Conservatoire where he had an injury but preferred to stay with his friends in The Hague. On the last day he heard Chris Powney was asking if he wanted to join the Royal Ballet School. He reluctantly agreed because he felt he had to accept rather than admitting he wanted to stay at home but at least it was only an hour’s flight away. For Joshua it was a massive culture shock in London, so very different from Holland. All the guys were very nice and welcoming - he was homesick for an hour and was surprised how nice it was and he felt very at home so it was no struggle. Classes were interesting and he thought everyone was amazing and so good whereas at home there’d been three boys and one was decent, so he had to up his game. They were young and fun but in class things were very serious and it’s that environment that creates focus, good training, competition and good dancers. His first-year teacher was Paul Lewis and Joshua really enjoyed his classes, very technical, precise, intense, and tough. Some students didn’t really gel with him but personally it was good for Joshua’s training - Paul was nice to him and it helped to raise his game to ballet school level.

Francisco said coming in to the second year was fine, the people were very nice and super excited at the beginning, but it was a big shock moving to a different country and coming into a year when everyone knew everyone else already. It was also a culture shock after being with his Cuban family in Florida where he was used to spending time at the beach with weekend BBQs and not being a city person the cold winter months here were hard, having to wear warm clothes. He didn’t know what a duvet was until he came here so that was another shock! For his first three months David Peden was his teacher and then Brian Maloney took over and Rodolfo Castellanos came later. It was a good mix. He needed an English style of training as he’d only been taught by his parents in the Cuban style. It was hard going into a class with so many people when he was used to a maximum of five where he got a lot more personal attention. He felt very lost for a while when he needed to fix something but was only getting general corrections. Even in the company it’s hard to manage yourself and know what you need to progress technically. The last year was Jay Jolley who gave them company class to get the idea of what it would be like in a company which was interesting. With Rodolfo he felt very at home, very open and back to his parents’ style.  Rodolfo told him he looked very English and composed. He lost himself for a bit, there was a lot of hard work with all the styles being very different.  Brian Maloney does a lot of rehabs and talked about taking care of yourself, warming up and cooling down. There was lots of information from each teacher. Joshua had Rodolfo in the second year which was fun, he is a relaxed guy, more of a free mover and his son Ricardo was in his year and Rodolfo tended to focus on him which was quite annoying, but he was injured for a while and they then got some attention!

School performances. Francisco did Solor in La Bayadere. It was a shock because he wasn’t supposed to do it, but someone got suspended for doing naughty things and he stepped in! He wasn’t ready (but Josh said he looked great) and is very nervous sometimes when it comes to performing. He was in second year, and it was the third year performance and he danced with Chisato Katsura, who was the same age but a different year. Jay gave him the opportunity and after the not so good rehearsal wondered if it was really going to happen but it did and he tried his best. In his own third year he did Rhapsody with Kaho Yangisawa. He loves the pas de deux and she was a dream to dance with, a professional even at school and everyone loved her. So, he had really good memories. In his second year Joshua did Rendezvous which is quite hard with lots of jumping. He also worked with Charlotte Edmonds on a new creation. In the third year he did a solo by Hans van Manen, who he knew from Holland and it’s one of his favourite works with three guys, and free movements which he much enjoyed.

Asked when they knew they were joining the company, Joshua said it was about February or March, later than usual, and he didn’t do auditions. Francisco joined in January and had intended to go for auditions, but Jay said no!  He’d a bit of inside info as at one class Chris Powney came in with Kevin O’Hare and he overheard them mentioning names including his and Joe Sissens’ and wondered if it would happen. This was quite early in the auditioning season. Francisco hadn’t danced with the company while at school, but Joshua had done a couple of things while a student.

Memories from their first season pre-Covid. They did Alicewhich is a big ballet so there were opportunities for the guys, and they did quite a lot which was stressful with some difficult things and double tours to the right while Joshua is a left turner but it worked out and he got over it. Then he was shepherd in The Winter’s Tale. Liam Scarlett’s Swan Lake was on that year which they enjoyed as they got to dance quite a lot. They were fortunate to have an eventful first season which isn’t always the case. Francisco felt quite relaxed in Fille and second year they did various corps de ballet things and a few contemporary works and a Hofesh Shechter piece.

Highlights. Francisco said Different Drummer had been a big one, artistically and technically, and he enjoyed all aspects of it. He enjoys character development more than anything, giving thought to how to present yourself and there’s less stress than in pure ballet. Mercutio was fun, Wayne McGregor’s pieces have been really nice, and Crystal Pite is an angel whose pas de deux he did with Nadia. They were second cast but just being in the studio with her was very special. Liam Scarlett’s Symphonic Dances was one of the biggest things in his first year. It was scary but a lot of fun once they got on stage. He had a few different partners because of injury, but it was enjoyable. Also, one of Joshua’s pieces where he did a duet at the end. Joshua said the first season it was Hofesh. which was fun, Calvin Richardson’s first piece in the Linbury was a highlight in his second season.  He was the nephew in Nutcracker which was after Covid and was really enjoyable. Working with Kyle Abraham on The Weathering was a good experience, and he had a nice solo in it. The Statement by Crystal Pite was a massive highlight. It was one of his biggest dreams to dance that role which he’d seen in The Hague and later at Sadler’s Wells. He also enjoyed doing the beggar chief.

Challenges of working with colleagues and with a company you don’t know. Joshua had recently made a piece for the junior company of Dutch National Ballet. In his second season he did International Draft Works where different companies from all over the world send their emerging choreographers and dancers. He was asked to do that’s years piece and Ted Brandsen came to watch, gave Joshua his card and said he hoped he could come to work with the junior company in some way. Then came Covid so last season he created something for them which was his first commission by a company. Wanting it to go well he choreographed a few things on his friends here, who kindly gave up their time, to see how it might work. He went on three occasions and found he knew a few of the dancers from his time in The Hague. There are pros and cons of working with a new company. One challenge is not knowing how they move, they are classically trained, but also, they are quite young and with little experience of the rep, choreographers or contemporary movement so he had to teach them how he wanted them to move. It was a challenge but they were keen, so it was a very enjoyable process, doing workshops. After a week or two they’d pick up the movement quickly. They were a few years younger than Joshua and coming from the Royal Ballet, he felt it gave him a bit more authority so it felt more comfortable than when he was working with friends and colleagues.

Questions: Francisco had said he had to learn to partner and develop the technique. By this he meant the technique of steps and grips, how his partner wanted to be held and the angle of lifts to make it more comfortable. Each partnership is different, and dancers are of different proportions so communication is very important. You gel with some people quicker than others and get to know what they want; one rehearsal might not be so good but the next day you can build on it.

Who dictates your partner? Kevin and the staff plan it though principals can suggest who they’d like to dance with.  Different Drummer was trial and error and just because Francisco was a cover they didn’t know he’d be needed but they tested him out and it worked OK. For something like Act II of The Winter’s Tale when you’re not in a main role staff look at proportions and height and put people into spots which doesn’t always make for the best partnership.

In the corps, do you have conversations in character? It depends – sometimes as in Manon you’re quite free and there’s a lot going on so you can play around.

In conclusion David offered big thanks to both our guests saying it was always a delight to watch dancers develop. Having seen them at the school it is great to see their progress. We had really enjoyed seeing Joshua’s choreography and Francisco’s principal role in Different Drummer, a great privilege. David mentioned after his first show that Olga Evrienoff described it as wonderful.

Report written by Liz Bouttell and edited by Joshua Junker, Francisco Serrano and David Bain.

© The Ballet Association 2024