Beautiful Vienna

Ok so now we're up to date with my blog, I'm starting to post things as they happen and right now I'm sat in the Arcotel in the stunning city of Vienna... the long and short of it is, I havn't even gone for an explore yet and I can already see it's beauty just from the few streets I've seen so far. It's a slight step up from Oberhausen...


My room



Arcotel, Vienna

It's my day off and we had our first preview show of "Cats" yesterday, I have never heard an audience react like that in my entire career. Vienna is the place where Cats started it's world domination after becoming cemented into musical history in the West End and on Broadway, It's almost as if the audiences of Vienna feel like they own it and rightly so.

I'll be sure to post again after my travels today...

Beautiful Vienna

Help! I'm a performer

Ok! so it's official, the pilot for "Help! I'm a performer" has just gone live on youtube
check it out here- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-t9EoFx1uQ

This post on my blog can be used as a hub for ideas on what to talk about next on my series, let me know what you want to know!

Peace, love and music. x

Meow...

So now I'm almost up to date with today when I started this blog. After Ballet West I got offered a job to do the musical Cats and tour Europe. I was offered the roles of Pouncival and cover of Mr. Mistofellees (Ker Ching!!! another crossed off my list of roles to play before I retire!)

Me as Pouncival

The tour consists of Zurich, Bielefeld, Oberhausen and Vienna over almost a year long contract!

So there was me thinking "well it's not ballet so it shouldn't be that hard"...FAMOUS. LAST. WORDS.
This is by far the hardest job i have every taken, Stamina wise, physically and vocally. Okay so the choreography isn't particularly challenging but boy I'll tell you EVERYTHING IS HARD AFTER 2 HOURS OF SINGING IN A CONTRACTION!!!!!

The show tours in a huge black tent which is moved from city to city, It's very open to all kinds of weather so it's always either too hot or too cold on stage which is raked very strongly and is made up of 3 inches of wood mounted on a steel frame...about as forgiving as concrete!!!!
However it's been amazing fun despite all the pain (it's true when they say Cats performers stay in character by crawling to the shower in the morning).

Ballet West and the China Tour

After working with Ballet Theatre UK's tour I decided to leave after feeling unfulfilled in the small company and wanted to do something bigger while I still could. I found my answer in the company Ballet West who tour China every year with a production. I had heard that they wanted a guest principal to play Mercutio that year in Romeo and Juliet...KER CHING another role to cross off my list thought I!!

L to R: Me, Jonathan and Duncan

I was offered the job and went off to Scotland to rehearse. Still to this day I have never worked with a nicer bunch of people; the corps de ballet was made up of students from the company's school but the principals were all guests like myself, and this is where Duncan Saul and I became Thick as Thieves. With Duncan Saul playing Benvolio, Jonathan Barton (Resident Principal) playing Romeo and myself playing Mercutio we formed a group of lads akin of the romantic ballet's trio of friends that any method actor would have been impressed.

Our dressing room labelled: Heroes' dressing room

Streets of Shanghai



Shanghai Opera House



BTUK and VFB

I started work with Ballet Theatre when I got back from Hong Kong, the shows were Nutcracker and Cinderella.
Initially I was down hearted because the company was such a small one but everyone has to start somewhere, I was lucky enough to play some great roles in both productions- Nutcracker Prince, Russian and Fritz In Nutcracker and Summer Pas de Deux and Prince's Friend in Cinderella.

Summer Pas de Deux

Prince's Friend Solo

The tour was a great experience for me as we toured all over the UK and Ireland, in some lovely theatres and some that were... not so good...

At the same time as I was working with BTUK, Vienna Festival Ballet Contacted me and asked if I wanted to perform the Bluebird in their production of Sleeping Beauty. I thought "Hell yes!" as it was one of the roles on my list to do before I retired. Vienna Festival Ballet was a lot of fun (although I was only there for a limited run) as it gave me a chance to dance a huge role with a big company! I also met a good friend of mine, Phil King, who was dancing the lead, Prince Desire.

Bluebird Variation! Great... Blue Lycra!

The small time...

So I had finished my job in Australia and was feeling pretty rotten about myself, worthless and talentless and there I was, back at college again finishing my last year and graduating that July. Still no job. ready quit and pack it all in... until it was time for Tring's in house competition that we call the BALLET CUP! DUH  DA DUUUUHH!!! All students from the age of 14 upwards may enter, dance some classical variations and an independent adjudicator comes in a judges who was the best overall. I won that year and beat my old rival (both of us had been in the finals since we were 14 and he had always come one place behind me every year) he did however come a very gracious second. Rupert Pennefather was the judge and the gratification gave me a huge boost and also I was scouted by, Director of Ballet Thetre UK, Christopher Moore.

Jesse and I in Hong Kong

That summer after i graduated I was requested to dance in a gala in Hong Kong as a guest artist. Unfortunately I actually had a horrible time because of various reasons: a horrible choreographer who was just plain rude, a concussion whilst on stage, a dodgy partner and bad food! (I wont name names as it's unprofessional but as you can see I had it all in that trip) fortunately for me I had my friend Jesse Milligan for company and sanity and eventually went on and danced some of my favourite roles including Le Corsaire Slave Pas de Deux.

The famous Jumbo Kingdom floating Restaurant

My head wound from a huge drum falling on my head!

A spot of employment



Before I had finished my final year at Tring Park a job offer came through to me from English National Ballet. It was a Tour of Australia with their Angelina Ballerina Shows. Needless to say I was Excited that they wanted to use me but little did I know how miserable I was going to be later on...

The show consisted of me wearing a fat suit and being a mouse 3 shows a day >>>

Yes, it's me as Henry the Mouse!

Now i know what you're thinking "Dude! you were touring Australia doing what you loved and you were getting paid for it AND you were working for a great company" and now I get it but at the time I was so arrogant and disappointed that I wasn't a Principal dancer of the UNIVERSE I didn't enjoy myself.

However I got to see so many great parts of Australia and dance in some great venues.

Hot chocolate at the Lindt Cafe, Saw the Blue mountains, sat on a beach and watched fairy penguins come running past me as they came home after hunting in the ocean, saw Crocodiles being fed, fed wallabies,  and climbed the Sydney Harbour bridge which is like 300 metres high!

Hot Chocolate at the Lindt Cafe.

Endless wilderness in the Blue Mountains

Met this little dude at Featherdale!

National Youth Ballet

National Youth Ballet was probably my first real taste of what being a professional was about, a lot of my friends had done NYB for years before I started, my family were very poor so we couldn't afford it, and when I finally was able to participate (2 seasons before i was too old to do it anymore) I was selected for a principal role in the now late Frank Freeman's ballet "Four Seasons" where I played the Summer pas de Trois and Soloist. It was a massive leap for me to be recognised outside of college and outside of a competition and the role was juicy and virtuoso (which I always love) the movement was "sweaty and languid" as my predecessor Drew Mconie told me and was an exciting challenge to convey that to the audiences we played to in such theatres as the Hackney Empire.

The following season I was selected to play one of my dream roles: the Jester in Cinderella- Choreographed by Wayne Sleep. I received great critical acclaim and was overjoyed (http://www.nyb.org.uk/perf_reviews.html)

Also this character was a great experience in character development for me the Jester is in fact the Boot boy in disguise from the house where Cinderella lived, a sad case really despite all his joy and love. He loved Cinderella so much that he sacrificed his own happiness and loving her forever by giving her away to the Prince in the final scenes so she can live the life he felt she deserved.... :'( 

Never mind eh?

That's me on the floor to the left!

At that year's gala at Sadler's Wells theatre Jill Tookey and Wayne Sleep presented me and my friend/rival Sam Chung with the Bronze Statuette for outstanding work in the company (Something almost unheard of for a company member of only 2 seasons)

Training

Should probably start with my school, the Arts Educational School, Tring Park (now known as Tring Park School for the Performing arts http://www.tringpark.com/) Check it out you might even spy a picture of spotty, 16 year old, me sat in a biology class...bored out of my Skull! Seriously though this school's academic work is at an exceptional standard and not just in comparison to other arts colleges, I'm talking IN GENERAL! I walked out of there with 3 good A levels at A grade (which is part of the ethos at Tring): have something to fall back on! The School offered a wide variety of teaching over 3 different courses (Dance, Musical Theatre and Drama). I experienced the Dance course and, unlike other students, took a firm grasp of all the disciplines that I could get my hands on- Drama, Singing, Ballet, Contemporary (Cunningham, Graham and Horton), Jazz, Tap, Hip Hop...the list goes on but you get the picture.

It was here that I met contemporary dance legend, Robert Cohan, who chose me to be the male soloist in his work 'Class'; a piece desingned to showcase a pure Graham Class (as taught by Martha Graham herself). We were filmed for a documentary designed to archive the Graham Technique in it's purest form and the works of Robert Cohan.

"Start at the very beginning"

So, my name is Jack Allen, I'm a british Dancer/Performer who has been lucky enough to travel the world with my profession. I better start by explaining what the hell is going on... I was trained at The Arts Educational School, Tring Park which specialises in all types of versatile performing, my fortes happen to be Classical Ballet, Contemporary, Jazz and Singing; having been lucky enough to be trained with such versatillity has taken me all over the world in many different types of Show from "Copellia" to "Cats" to Cohan's "Class". I want to share my travels and career experience with you; not only for dancers but for people who like to travel and for those outside the dance world who have a taste for performing; that way everyone can see what it's really like for your every-day, average, performer like myself. I also will be uploading videos on a youtube channel for young dancers to communicate with me about the industry and ask questions and seek advice from someone young but has a wide knowledge of the performance industry. So first I'll blog my current experiences so far so you can all share in my career up to this point!