I was a street dancer.
Ironically, I grew up watching Indian movies as a kid in Russia. I am quite familiar with Bollywood. I grew up watching 'Disco Dancer;' I watched it some 20 times as a kid.
I started out as a dancer as a kid; I've been dancing since I was 4. So, performing was always part of what I was. I don't know if it I enjoyed the response I got from people or if I liked having an audience, but there's something in me that wanted to perform.
Each dancer has a different dialect that they speak.
I'm a lousy dancer.
I started working on stage as a dancer when I was four; by 14 or 15, I knew I wanted to study the craft of acting.
I trained as a ballet dancer - well, I started when I was two and a half, and was serious about it from when I was eight until I was 18.
If I had an extra 20 or 50 years physically, I could have been the dancer of my dreams. But I never became that dancer.
Every dancer has injuries, and your injury could happen that season that you were getting that one part that you've wanted to do your whole career. So you have to appreciate every single moment until it happens.
Being in the wardrobe department meant me and a few other girls dressed the dancers during the show when they had quick changes. Thirty seconds to totally dress a sweaty dancer can be insane and provoke mucho anxiety. Doing this night after night was pretty cray, but I loved every minute of it.
In '92, I got my first Broadway show as a performer - 'Crazy for You.' I was in the ensemble. In fact, I was in eight Broadway shows as a dancer. Seven of them were original shows. That's how I learned to create something from the ground up.
I always did plays. When I was in kindergarten, I got chosen to be Alvin in 'The Chipmunks.' We did a Chipmunks song. I was always a natural performer. It was easy for me. I danced and I sang, and all that stuff. I felt like I'd be something in the arts, but it vacillated between being a dancer and a singer, or whatever.
I liked to read but, being a dancer, I didn't have a lot of time to read.
That is perceptive of you, because in this country men dancers have always been viewed with suspicion. If you were an actor, a star, and a dancer, you had to be, or have a name like someone 'mainstream.'
It was the only ambition I ever had - not to be a dancer or Hollywood movie star, but to be a housewife in a good marriage.
I think of my parents as a single unit, and it's interesting because they shared so much, and they were totally opposite. My mother, a Martha Graham dancer, had a classical background; my father had a back-porch background.
In my heart, my first desire was to be a dancer. I always wanted to dance and I danced from the time I was 7 till I was well into my 30s.
I am a bad dancer.
I was a dancer, and my father was a dancer, so I really grew up in that environment.
I feel like in Atlanta, if you were a female dancer, the more you can dance like the boys, the more respect you get. I was thrust into that kind of dance culture, and it was in my body.
My background is somewhat unusual, as I trained to be a ballet dancer. I worked in the theatre for eight or nine years as a contemporary dancer. But as an actor one does read Shakespeare and does try to learn the classics.
I heard a lot in school, 'You've got a really great talent, but there's no way you're going to be a dancer with that body.'
I was an okay singer. I was an okay dancer. But acting? Never could do it.
I grew up being a dancer, so I was always doing some sort of dance number, like the Tornado in 'The Wiz.'
I love 'The Walking Dead,' 'Shameless,' and - this is going to sound really dorky - I'm obsessed with 'Dance Moms.' I love Abby Lee Miller. Honestly, if there's such a thing as past lives, I was definitely a dancer. Maybe if I ever get a big enough name, I can call Abby Lee Miller myself and ask her to be my private coach.
I'm not a big dancer!
People were being so mean as a result of my ability - a gift, really. So I think that's what makes me fight harder to provide an option to aspiring kids or artists. I wouldn't want anyone to go through what I went through... to see a little girl or a little dancer experience such unnecessary rejection.
Performing, not rehearsing, is a dancer's raison d'etre, and I've been lucky to 'etre' in some extraordinary places - Cuba, Paris, Mongolia. In particular, a two-week stint in Greece leaps to mind. We danced in the Acropolis's Herodes Atticus amphitheater, once a venue for gladiator spectacles.
When I was younger, people would always say, 'Are you a ballet dancer?' I had that look - one of those skinny kids with my hair in a bun.
I grew up as a dancer, and music and dance are so closely tied that in ballet class, you're listening to all this classical music, and in modern class, you're working with a live drummer. It was something that always made me feel really comfortable, and I've had a connection to since the beginning.
I could talk for seven hours about Johnny Depp. There's no one like him. He has this amazing ability to watch something and then pick it up and do it, within seconds. He'll hate me for saying this, but I don't care. I'm going to say it anyway. He's Fred Astaire. He's this genius dancer. He says that he can't dance, but he can.
The only dancing I did was at the discotheques. I was a very good disco dancer. I say that I learned disco dancing at the wrong places.
I was always going to be a dancer - I drifted into acting.
I was a dancer first, which made me realize how much I loved performing.
In general, for me, a big thing in my life has been just sort of learning what true self-esteem is and what true positive self-image is. And being a dancer, and growing up in that world, you're so focused on yourself, and you're so focused on achieving goals, on finding perfection, and working on your craft.
Madonna is a pro. I don't like her and have no respect for her but- I don't think she should be called a musician or a dancer or whatever you know, but I do have, well I do have respect for her ability to completely manipulate the media and have them work for her.
