Facing the Real World with Honza Pelichovský
Show Notes
Honza is a professional dancer who traveled across the country as the Dance Captain on the Dirty Dancing National Tour and the Fiddler on the Roof National Tour. He’s performed with numerous dance companies in New York City and is now living in Charlotte, NC with his partner and puppy, where he is navigating the next stage of his career.
In today’s episode, Honza expresses how he brought his ballroom dance training into his college training and professional work and how he deals with criticism and disappointment as both a student and professional.
Honza and Jess discuss how while college education in dance can be valuable it often does not align with the realities of the professional dance world and how words and feedback given to dancers can have a lasting impact on their self-confidence and artistic development.
(Part 1 of 2)
Follow along on Honza’s journey: @honzapelichovsky
TW: Brief mention of sexual assault.
Transcript
Jessica Altchiler
Hello and welcome to the story project. I'm your host, Jessica Altchiler and today's guest is Honza Pelichovsky who is a dancer and a person struggling to figure out what it is to be and live as an adult. He was born and raised in Prague in the Czech Republic and moved to the United States almost 12 years ago to attend college in New York City. After graduating from Marymount Manhattan College, Honza performed with several dance companies around the city and had the most fun with the chase Brock experience. And Daniel works in Dance Company. Honza travels across the country as the dance captain for the Dirty Dancing national tour, followed by the Fiddler on the Roof national tour, and also worked many much less fulfilling side jobs. At the start of the pandemic, Hans are relocated to Charlotte, North Carolina, where he lives today with his partner and their little spreadsheet. In today's episode Honza discusses how he deals with criticism and disappointment as both a student and professional what he gained and what was missing from his college education. And how feedback given to dancers can have a lasting impact on their confidence and development. This is the first of two parts of my interview with Honza, and I'm so excited for you to hear how he so generously displays his vulnerability. Without further ado, here is Honza Pelichovsky
Hello -- we are here with the one the only Honza Pella Cox. Hi. Oh my gosh, it's how did this happen? Did you see that?
Honza Pelichovsky
I did see that. Was it like a disco party behind me? That was weird. Did it do that? I have no idea.
Jessica Altchiler
I've never seen that before. I wish everyone could see it. Actually. Maybe I could put it in somewhere.
Honza Pelichovsky
Well put it on. That was fine. Hysterical.
Jessica Altchiler
That was so weird. It's like that new FaceTime update that I don't have yet but if you do it thumbs up and it shows an emoji of a thumbs up.
Honza Pelichovsky
Oh, that's that's what's happening. Oh my god. That's hysterical. Oh,
Jessica Altchiler
maybe because it's on your phone. Do you think do you have an update? Maybe
Honza Pelichovsky
I maybe I've never seen it or used it but I'm just gonna keep doing it throughout.
Jessica Altchiler
What if you do a heart recording? Or he's gonna
Honza Pelichovsky
go pause pause pause pause is coming out. This is so creepy. We are gonna die because AI is gonna take over way sooner than we think. Well,
Jessica Altchiler
I think that every time that you need to really punctuate something you're saying on the podcast, you can make one of those, like hard.
Honza Pelichovsky
Thumbs up hearts. What else? Can I do something bad?
Jessica Altchiler
I don't know. Yeah. Can you do middle finger? I guess no. Okay, that's technology is not that.
Honza Pelichovsky
Technology is big. That's what it is. I'm sure it's
Jessica Altchiler
okay, so Honza is one of my dearest friends. I'll just start with that. Because to me on top of being an incredible dancer, performer, professional, all of these things. He is one of the kindest, most loving and supportive people that I have been lucky enough to have in my corner for over a decade. For a decade. It's been
Honza Pelichovsky
1112 2012 Yes,
Jessica Altchiler
something crazy. So 11 and a half. We met freshman year of college at Marymount Manhattan. That's kind of a common theme of a lot of these interviews. I know. But hey, I got a lot of great peeps from there. And our friendship actually evolved a ton after college because we were friends in college, but the closeness and the real, like, just truest of support, and everything definitely came in the years after. And I our stories have had kind of this like, weird back and forth, overlapping disconnected trajectory. And I'm excited to share that because we happen so intertwined professionally, in a lot of ways. And we also have the history of a really intense college experience doing Taylor together, doing Paul Taylor's cloven kingdom together. I'll never forget. So yeah, go for it.
Honza Pelichovsky
You know what I remember, but the two of us I feel like for college, most of us were sort of cast into these three groups depending on our modern one group. So we all gravitated towards our peeps and then it was not hard to break out of it. But I feel like most of us stayed in those little like many groups. We left our little friends on the outside. But for a lot of people I didn't really like get to know them as humans until junior year senior year, which I feel like for dancers makes sense but was were so focused on training, training, training and barely having any time to do anything else. So you find your tribe, and then you just go with them. And then suddenly, two and a half years later, I remember having a class with edit. And I was just like, oh, you're a human behind all of this. And we could actually talk we can we could have a relationship. But it wasn't until I think, first or second semester of junior year. Yeah.
Jessica Altchiler
Yeah. And that's such a perfect example, like a microcosm of the greater performing arts industry, where you have these opinions about people from the outside, for better or for worse sometimes, and then you get to know them. And you're like, right, here's the human behind this picture of an artist, dancer, whatever that I have been seeing. So let us start off with the classic, which I know you're prepared for. So Honza is my first interview with somebody who has heard the podcast before. So those first eight episodes were all recorded within one week of each other. And now Honza is the first interview having listened to six out of eight of those previous podcasts. So the other thing I will say is Honza has been so supportive for like everything over the years. And with this podcast, we've been talking about this, basically, since college and in one form or another, with these ideas that I've been having, and these conversations I've wanted to have, and even though I didn't know, in college, it was going to be a podcast. It started off as a senior thesis I made so we can get into that too. But all that to say, he has been championing me, and really encouraging me to make this happen specifically throughout the past year or two. And so it's happened. And he has been sending me Voice Memos after every single. Oh, yeah, there's the fireworks, the thumbs up fireworks. He's been sending me voice memos, like three minute Voice Memos at the end of every podcast, which he listens to every Friday morning. And he lets it all, he lets it all out. He's like telling me what he thinks and what he loves and what he is curious about. And what sparked something hard to process and what made him emotional or inspired or anything like that. So he is my perfect first interview post. The first interview is season
Honza Pelichovsky
one. Okay? Yeah, can I just say before we jump into anything, I don't want to like, you know, butter you up or anything. But I'm super, super proud of you. I know I'm very critical in my life, both of myself and of the people around me and art and stuff that's out there floating in the universe in general. So I remember still to this day, when we had the conversation. It was during COVID. It was 2020. It was I think, spring or summer. And I used to take these long walks by myself just to like get out of the house or I was staying with my partner and his mom. And and just like just to clear my head. And I would listen to podcasts. And I would be checking in on people. So I would have a lot of conversations. And we were very good at like keeping in touch during that time. And I remember specifically where it was standing. I'm like this little hill in this little suburban neighborhood. And you told me the idea of doing this. And I just remember stopping in my tracks. I was like, this is absolutely brilliant. Like this is doable. This is what you need to think about. Have you thought of this, like, let's make it happen. And I know that time sometimes seems like it's taking forever. Sometimes it feels like it just flies by but the fact that it's only it was only three years later, and you were already doing it. And now you're like you're in every streaming service. And you can listen to this like any other podcasts. It just it's so impressive. And I love it.
Jessica Altchiler
Thank you so much. Thank you so much. Yeah, I truly feel like the conversations I've had with my friends for many years. That's the reason that I did this, because we have these beautiful conversations. And we're processing in real time. And we're healing and we're trying to encourage each other. And so let's put it out there for other people to hear. And hopefully it can snowball into other people's lives whether we know it or not. That's the crazy thing about it. I really don't know who's listening if it's impacted anybody at all. So thank you for your voice, your voice now.
Honza Pelichovsky
What I think is amazing about podcasts. And I think this is what I'm obsessed with in comparison to dance because we're so used to treating dance as well. We're doing it now in the moment and whoever's not seeing it doesn't know it exists. It's ephemeral. Going back to college like it's once it's over, it's over. And if you didn't see it, you're not seeing it. I'm not a big video person. I'm not a big like record myself dancing or record someone else, even though I totally respect that sort of the range of dancing but it is such a here and now Oh, that I love that you as a dancer. But other things too, an artist who's veering into different things is creating something that's just gonna let there and a lot of podcasts that I end up following and listening to. I don't start listening to the first season, it's usually much later. So What's lovely about this is that even if now maybe your audience or listenership isn't that big, who knows who's going to be listening to this in a year, who knows who's going to go back in five years and find this and find it amazingly interesting, either because your career just takes off or because you end up having people on this that are so maybe like a different caliber of what we are now. Like, you never know, it's just something that's going to live their posterity meant something that that you don't have to be on your feet in the middle of a sweaty dance floor to feel like you're doing. Yeah,
Jessica Altchiler
I actually just said last night to my partner that it feels like such a relief to have a creative outlet that I'm not relying on my body for and I there's so many elements that I miss deeply about dancing every day. However, I was injured a lot as you know, I was sick, I was mentally and physically not well, and I was pushing, pushing, pushing, and there's so there's so much about it, I miss, but the freedom of knowing that, if I miss, if I miss a workout in the morning, I don't have to freak out about it, or I don't eat enough and I'm a little bit hungry. And that's not going to just ruin my day, I could just go I'm not I don't have a class I have to make where if I'm a little bit hungry, I'm gonna feel like I'm gonna pass out, I can just go and make more food, things like that. So there's something freeing about it, and something that I really miss. And I wonder, too, if that's part of why now gravitating more towards acting, but also still nervous about that, because it is still in your body. And while I'm not going to have to do a grunge attai like because I honestly, I was always so worried about because I would always have like these. My left ankle was always weak, and I was always nervous about landing on my left ankle. It's okay, I don't have to do that. That's like a big leap through the air. For anyone who doesn't know that is a big leap, just the biggest leap you can do. And I don't have to do that. But with acting, there's still a lot of ways that you need to be engaged in your mind engaged in your body. There's there are a lot of requirements. And so I think my hesitation with it is still that residual tension and stress about relying on my body like that.
Honza Pelichovsky
Do you feel like being a dancer is something that frees you when you're when you're acting, either practicing it or performing? Or is it something for me whenever I'm doing maybe just like a submission or anything I feel I feel trapped by the acting part of it. Because all I want to do is just want to burst out into movement and cover space because it's such a natural thing for me. So like being in my body trying to keep myself in a frame always makes me feel so self conscious, then suddenly you're like feeling your fingers and your feeling and shoulders and you feeling everything else because as a dancer, you're like you have a very different approach. So to me acting is actually sort of holding me in a box which I'm sure that if I was actually acting, the movement prep and everything that you are as a dancer would help you. I just haven't found that connection yet. What how do you connect the two?
Jessica Altchiler
When I first started acting, I I do think that one of the hardest things is knowing what to do with your body because as dancers were were just told to do with it a lot of the time Yeah, and hyper aware too. So all of a sudden you're like what do I do with my What do I do when I'm just standing like I know how to stand in as a dancer Plus, with like ready to perform some ballet across the floor. But what does one do when they're just standing there? So that to me is a challenge. And what I really love about it is so if you're doing something for on screen with a camera, you can make it so subtle, and so small and those are like my favorite things to watch to like what an what a lift of an eyebrow can do, or what a tiny little movement of the eyes can do looking in a different direction. I love that. And I think part of that is that it's very freeing to know that I can engage in I can engage with my body in a way that is so subtle and small, but makes such an impact. I don't need to burst through space,
Honza Pelichovsky
right? Without the grantor to. Yeah. And
Jessica Altchiler
I trust me like, again, I would love to be able to do all of the amazing crazy tricks and movements that people are doing these days. Holy crap, like, What the shit it is amazing. And I will say also that one of my favorite acting classes I took with Heidi Marshall, who I've talked about multiple times now highly recommend, Heidi Marshall, maybe go Heidi, it was a virtual class. And she I can't remember if I said this yet, but she assigned me a scene from Terminator two. And that is like, the last thing I thought I would ever be capable of doing. Or interested in doing. Actually, I was like, Heidi, hola. Me. And it was probably it was just for a class and it was probably the most engaged. I've ever been doing anything acting related. And what happened was it was this really intense scene that had to be like, running down a corridor and like running from something running towards something I don't even remember. And then the Terminator comes and I'm terrified. And I have to like, go from trying to escape and running to then being all of a sudden, so afraid and terrified. And I was like, never I was like I'm I this is going to be just a complete disaster. And what I ended up doing was I ended up doing like jumping jacks, and like lifting weights and doing all this stuff right before I started. So I was genuinely, like panting and then it'll allow me to get so engaged physically, that I couldn't even think about what I was doing. It was just it was an it was an extension of dance. It was an it was starting with my body. And then using the words afterwards, which was such a great lesson for me coming into acting as a dancer. So yeah, I see how if and when I can find a way to just really rely on the fact that I am slash was a dancer. I think that's going to be what can really set me free in my acting and helped me let go of the fears and hesitations that I have with it.
Honza Pelichovsky
Yeah, absolutely. Know that. That's my dream. If I ever were to act in more like a serious way, I would love it to be physical thing. That's why movie musicals sound great, because it's all part of it. The Singing is a whole different beast, for sure. But there's just something about, you're still using your vessel to move around and talk around it or sing around it. But it's not just like you sitting in a room doing a scene, like a long dialogue. That's, that's a whole different kind of worms. Yeah, all different skill set.
Jessica Altchiler
I think you would be shocked by how well you would be able to do that if you started with your body. Like if you if you did yoga before, and you figured out a way to let the words be an extension of your body and extension of your movement, like let it be part of this dance. If you can see the whole scene as a dance and just you're using a different part of yourself and way to express it. But how can the words come out in a way that tells a story through movement of sound, and dialogue and expression in different way? I think I think you'd be surprised that how prepared you actually are for it already. And that it would just take a little bit of
Honza Pelichovsky
like your your coaching, your coaching and your teaching is coming out and I love that. I just want to I just want to have you next to me like whenever I'm trying to do anything to just be like, look at it like this, try like this, you'd be surprised how much you know already. That's that's, you know, you
Jessica Altchiler
know what you're doing thing is my favorite thing about being able to coach and mentor people is I'm like, I know from my own experience that it is so hard to understand what you are capable of and what is possible for you and what's holding you back. It is so hard to see that for yourself. But when I look at anybody else, it is crystal fucking clear. And I think it's part of the adventure and part of the creative process. Have to figure out how can you unleash that within yourself. And yeah, it's it's fun, it's creative. It's engaging both mind body spirit, everything. And, yeah,
Honza Pelichovsky
that's what I love. I love that about you and people who are such gifted teachers and coaches, because it's obvious for them that that's my partner is the same way. Like, it's people who see stuff in people and know how to get it out. I don't relate to that. I've always been so I'm sure we're gonna get to this through like college stuff and, and performance. And I've realized that I own it, I am so self oriented. And that's not self centered to the point that I don't care about anyone. But when it comes to performing, and when it comes to training and whatnot, I don't really have that sense. In me, that's, that's passionate about pulling it out of people. For me, it's like, either see it, or I don't see it, or you're trying or you're not trying, I really don't have that streak in me that's being like, I know, it's somewhere in there. And I don't, I don't really care to pull it out of people. That's why I don't really resonate with teaching, I don't resonate with coaching, or personal training, just because, ultimately, if I'm being very honest with myself, I do not care about other people. That way, like, I don't care about getting it out of you, like I do love and respond to when you have it. And when you're giving me something and I'm interested and I can like look at it, but I don't have that passion.
Jessica Altchiler
How do you think that carries over into dance captioning, though? Because so Honza was the dance captain for the Dirty Dancing tour first, and then the fifth or on the roof tour. And not when I was though, you were ships passing in the night? And so how do you think that relates to dance camp? Because you have to lead and get things out of people. But was there a point of frustration there? Do you think it felt different for some reason? That
Honza Pelichovsky
one, I actually don't find that difficult, because I'm not looking at it as like I'm trying to get the best performance out of this specific person, or I'm not trying to help them grow as a performer, I'm in charge of this bigger thing. That's the show that's that's on my shoulders, or it's partially on my shoulders. And my work ethic is always like, well, we need to make this the best it can be. And within that mind frame, I can pull things out of people and think I think of the bigger picture, I don't necessarily care if this person is going to give me their best performance, I think I need to get more or I need to get this specific flavor, or I need to inspire this specific way of approaching today. Because it's going to be taking care of the whole piece that we're presenting. So it's my it's my sense of responsibility for the product, rather than me being super invested in that one specific person.
Jessica Altchiler
But you had to have probably challenging conversation sometimes or like really connect with people. So maybe you were just you maybe your intention wasn't to help them personally grow. But through your work and through trying to create the best picture and performance as a whole. You were probably doing that just not with that intention.
Honza Pelichovsky
Not even even within it. Like of course I know how to talk to people. And I've learned definitely through those experiences of dance captaining how to approach different people with their different sets of what they hear what they don't hear what they respond to. So absolutely, it's not that I didn't care and I wouldn't tell them. And in that moment, you do care, because you want you want them to feel better. And it's not. It's not just like, oh, I want the show to be better. Hence you need to do this. And this. I'm just saying that I don't have that in like innate feeling in me. I can get into it. I can I'm getting I'm teaching more now than I ever had before. And I think I'm getting better. And I'm learning how to approach it. And I'm sort of still searching for what my dad style teaching style is. But I just mean that it's not my innate instinct. I have to be like, Okay, now we're going to work with this person, and you're going to help them here. How can I do that? And of course, it feels lovely when they give you something that they didn't even know they could do with it's definitely gratifying. I'm not saying that. I don't care about when I see it. It's wonderful. It's just not something I look at people with. It's like a thing I do if it's if that's my job.
Jessica Altchiler
Yeah. Okay, now I'm gonna rewind us a little bit. So I want to get back to the root of the Hamza. So tell us where you're from. How you grew up, how you got into dance. Give us a little backstory, please. And thank you.
Honza Pelichovsky
All righty. So I'm originally from the Czech Republic, which is like the strange thing because moving to the States people don't really know where that is. It's in the middle of Europe. It's people know Prague, which is the capital and that's the city I grew up in. So it's, people don't really have a concept of it is it's a regularly developed. First of all, We're all the country in Europe. That's not that known except for the beer and the soccer, and the ice hockey. But yeah, I had a great life. I grew up in the 90s, which was post what we call the Velvet Revolution. So communism fell a few years before I was born. So my entire childhood was very booming, the West was coming in all the technology and the computers, the TV programs, all the old stuff that I take for granted, was sort of at its peak. So I grew up in that, and I discovered dance through ballroom, not the ballroom scene, but the ballroom dance like the standard and Latin. It was sort of a coincidence, I was going to an elementary school where the school that I ended up going to for ballroom sort of based at a bunch of the gyms, and I just fell in love with movement. It was something that was in my body, I always had been very musical and I loved music. And I actually took I was taking choir lessons at the same time as dance. And then I had to pick one just because of timing and commitment. And I still remember the car ride with my parents when they were like, well, you can either do this, or you could do this. And there was no question in my mind. Like I've always loved singing and I've loved music, but I was just like Dance Dance Dance. So I did that competitively. Because it's ballroom is huge. In terms of competitions in Europe. It's it's, it can get very, I would I say that. The ballroom scene is very competitive. It wasn't very well known to the general public. And when I was getting out of it around the age of 17, we adopted what you guys started as Dancing with the Stars. And I remember there was a huge cultural shift, because suddenly everyone knew what it was about. And to this day back home, people love that program, because it's such high quality, and it's so like, poised and people take it so beautifully seriously, that my mom still to this day says I wish you had dance ballroom later. So we wouldn't have to always be like, Well, what does he do? What is that, like? You could just say, Oh, it's the Dancing with the Stars. And everyone had a point of reference. But by the time that took off, I was already transitioning. I quit when I was 17. And I left out of just just a spur of the moment decision I did a year in the US as an exchange student, for a year in, it would have been I would have been aged senior year here. I was 17. Back home, we have one extra grade. So it wasn't wasn't graduating just yet. And I ended up in Albuquerque, New Mexico, which is it was just this weird public performing arts school that was under construction. So we were outside and trailers. But there was a lot of dance in it. And I was sort of ready at the time to switch gears. But then, because of my application and saying that I've done dance, they put me in a performance, high school and I ended up taking jazz, a modern flamenco. I found a ballet studio that I ended up going to several times a week and I ended up taking ballet classes with 11 year old girls, it was just one of those things. Yeah, so it sort of like ties into this thing that I always say about myself when I try to describe my life. I'm a late bloomer and a lot of aspects of my life when it comes to dancing. When it comes to just evolving as a human being. When it comes to realizing my sexuality. A lot of the stuff has sort of come later to me in life. So I've always been in environments, including college just because of the different schooling system plus the year I took off when we met and everyone was a freshman, I was mostly on average two years older than everyone else. So I remember I've turned 21 right into the first few months of freshman year and some people had literally I remember Doug, he came to school and had just turned 18. So a lot I was I was aged with the juniors but but mentally and developmentally and second language, different culture. I was I was on par with 19 and 20 year olds barely. Yeah. And I that year in New Mexico changed my life, I suddenly realized that dancing was something I wanted to do. I loved the idea of concert dance when it's just you within a group or you within a duet or trio. And it's it just seemed so interesting to me that it wasn't so rigid and you weren't locked with this partner that it was ballroom is like a marriage because you ended up just competing and dancing with this one person. So this was very freeing. And yeah, I fell in love with it. I went back to finish high school for two years in Prague I trained a lot by myself different little places just to catch up. Did a lot of sort of what at the time was known as like the granola dancing of floor work and stuff in Europe, which is now very, very prevalent in the US. But even when we started college was barely getting here. So I remember like I had a little bit of a leg up going into school being like, Yeah, I've been rolling on the ground for the last three years that people here don't know. You know what it is to do a star into like a bug into it. It was just a different time. And then my senior year, I was obsessed with getting into Juilliard. I found a bunch of schools that I ended up applying for auditioning for I took a month off senior year to fly I hear and I did like six or seven auditions. Mary mound was the very last that I added to my list. I didn't really know about it until later. But then through the auditioning process, I fell in love with it. I didn't make it to Juilliard or Ailey. I made it to the other schools, and I sort of based off of the audition just knew that Marymount was the right fit both for New York City that I was obsessed with at the time. And then just just the vibe. So yeah, went to when we met there did four years of college. And yeah, then I don't know if you want me to talk about post college.
Jessica Altchiler
I have a couple of questions actually. believe so. You, I don't think I realized this you had done exclusively ballroom basically until 17. Yes,
Honza Pelichovsky
I did. Well, that last year before I quit, as I was sort of transitioning before I left for New Mexico, I found this company slash dance school that I ended up dancing with a little bit more that just I just wanted to expand and do something else a little bit. So I remember taking two evening classes, Thursdays and Sundays that were sort of like jazz. I think nowadays, you would just call it jazz. But yeah, I did a little bit. So I did a few months before I quit ballroom. But until then it was just a ballroom dance. We did have some lessons once a week that, again, I would call modern jazz, but we call it ballet. So that's where like learn how to like stretch my body. We did some like lateral some cross the floors. And that's where I like got my splits. Because that's not really a thing and ballroom ballroom was very specific set of skills. It's not really about lines or how flexible you are. It's more about the partnering. It's more about the timing. It's more about the technique of the actual hip movement, and it's a different world. But yeah, yeah, I didn't really I didn't take my first ballet class until, until like a month before I turned 18. Well,
Jessica Altchiler
I've That's crazy to me, because a lot of these genres don't overlap that much. Like, there's a general sense with dance, there's rhythm, there's engagement with your body, there's strength and flexibility. There are certain things that are relevant throughout everything. But if you have a tap dancer and a ballet dancer, for example, you're not expecting them to be able to go into the other genre and nail it. So the fact that you had all of that experience with ballroom and then just a few years of all this other stuff before getting into Marymount and going and doing that intensive program with jazz and ballet and modern and contemporary and one semester of tap. That's crazy.
Honza Pelichovsky
Maybe, yeah, I I would agree there's something something translates and movement in general, I think. And I just was really hungry for everything. After I quit ballroom to not necessarily catch up. I wasn't trying to catch up to anyone. I just really enjoyed it. I was fascinated by it. Ballet was like a new beast to me that I was just like, oh, you need this. And jazz was always so easy to me. That's why I loved it. And when I initially enrolled into Marymount, I always think of, and when she was on the, on the podcast, I thought it was gonna be like a legit concentration, I'm sure we're gonna get into that. So jazz was something that I wanted to do. And then everything else just felt like oh, let me just build on technique. But for some reason, jazz because it is so musical. And it is so performative, I think is closest to ballroom to the to the Latin portion of ballroom, because that one is very out there, and you're dancing with your partner, but you're not in in hold, you're not locked into each other. So that just felt sort of natural to me, it was it was a different vocabulary to learn. But it wasn't that out there for me. Tap just never learned to this day. And I agree with that, unless you go into tap with like, this is what the technique is. There's you, it doesn't matter ballet technique for the feet and tap, I don't think overlap at all. To explain
Jessica Altchiler
more broadly for people. It's like, I don't know, I'm not a musician, nor am I a visual artist. But I would imagine it's similar to if you understand music, you can read music, and you understand music theater theory, and you play the guitar. And then you're going to learn to play the piano, there's still a ton you have to learn. There, you have a huge leg up, because you know, music and because you've played an instrument before, but doesn't mean that you don't have to learn how to play the piano. And same thing for if you are really skilled at I'm so bad at giving these
Honza Pelichovsky
giving examples, analogies. Now the instruments make sense. What else would make sense? It's like playing a sport, right? Like some people who are really good at volleyball. They'll probably be better basketball players if they were to ever switch right. Right because the athleticism and the idea of like this is how you hold
Jessica Altchiler
but it's not a given that you you'd be good at basketball just because you've done volleyball before. No.
Honza Pelichovsky
And it's the same thing. When you talk about musicians, I always am so impressed by people who are like, Yeah, I learned this one instrument at school. And then I just like on the side picked up these other three there are necessarily in the same family. And I'm like, well, that's you. That doesn't mean that that's universally true for everyone, some people, and that's at that sort of me, I did piano for seven years. And I resented growing up, because my mom just made me. But I could never just pick up another instrument, of course, like you know how to read music, and you you know how to approach it. But it never even occurred to me that I would want to, like, do these other things. And that they would be easier to me, I was just like, we have to go from the very beginning. Like if I wanted to play the violin, which is my favorite instrument, and I love people who can play it. But that overlap doesn't happen to me. But similarly to somebody has to dancing. Some people just, I always think I'll be honest, I always think of like a person who is skilled in one thing, but then suddenly, whatever they pick up, they look amazing in it, or they or they make up for the lack of training, lack of yours, or the lack of specific technique, but they come at it with their specific flair. And sometimes it even ends up looking or being more appealing when you're looking at it than someone who can be like, Well, I've done it since I was three years old. And I've been doing pas for like 10 years longer than you. But that doesn't necessarily mean that you're going to be more. I won't say appealing. That sounds strange, but you're going to be more stunning to look at or interesting to look at free. Yeah, when you move in, because some people are just very good at bringing that innate sense of movement, understanding and making up for the lack of veggie training.
Jessica Altchiler
So how do you feel like having that ballroom training, which was different than most people in that program? How do you feel like that impacted going into this college program with all these different genres?
Honza Pelichovsky
I've been actually thinking about this a lot. And I think I had a lot of skills that I learned through ballroom that helped me mostly auditioning, because there's such a big difference between concert dance and ballroom the way it's structured in terms of competitions. And I've just been learning about dance competitions in the US, they're hysterical to me, but a very different skill set. So in ballroom, you're never on stage or on the floor by yourself, you are always with your couple, and there's at least six of you. Again, unlike figure skating, it's always a group effort and trying to stand out. So everyone's dancing at the same time that judges are around the ballroom floor, it's not elevated, it's on the same level, and you trying to catch everyone's attention at the beginning in the first round. To get what we call like a little cross or an X, the more x's you gather, the further you go into the next round until you get to the finals, when it's just everyone competing against each other at the same time. And then you get rankings, you get one through how many people 678 And the finals. So that's how you do it. So it's very attention grabbing, and you're trying to be like, Hey, look at me, look at me, I'm great. And then it's also about like, when does this particular judge look at you? What do they see? And how does that affect your scoring within it as opposed to in America, people are so used to from the get go when they do competitions to be like, This is my two minutes on stage. And even if it's good, bad, mediocre, 17 solo to what was I made for for the lyrical competition crew, it's you will be by yourself on that stage for two minutes. So I had such a good leg up for auditioning, because that was just that was my natural habitat. There's eight of us and I'm going to try to dance other people. Absolutely. I'm not nervous. Let's go, let's let's do it again. I was I always love that. And I think at the same time, what I was always good at and my preferred way of performing is within a group piece. Because I've always and that's the competitive streak in me, I've always wanted to be the best and best looking within an ensemble rather than a person who's just by himself on stage, because I've never learned the solo track. So whenever I was first given a solo, there was one show we did in New Mexico, this ballet company that I learned ballet through ended up doing with the contemporary thing of the very end of the year. And for some reason, they gave me a solo, which was unheard of everyone else was doing ballet pieces, and I ended up in so many of them. And one of the solos was very contemporary, and I just did I don't even remember. But that was my first experience and then not till college. And I just always remember feeling so unsure how to approach it. This light is blinding me, I don't know where to step. I'm at 110 the whole time. I don't know how to pace myself. It's so revealing. Like everyone can see me from top to bottom. It's it was always so confusing. So I've always felt much more at home in a group environment. musicality is a huge thing that you bring from ballroom so to this day, I get so frustrated, especially in ballet or any other class when people don't take the musicality as the law. I understand that we all learned different movement qualities and stuff, where the music isn't the most important thing where rhythm isn't really a part of it. But when it's a I always remember in college when we did the dodgy O's, they are there's a count structure. Yes, it's about if you want to add that extra 10 or something. But if you're getting out of that extended like on seven pulling down on aid, and you're not doing it, you're doing it incorrectly. Like, yes, there's there's different things that we're working on. But this is a specific combo with specific count. And I will always get so frustrated when people just like to the music as like the fourth thing to think about. And maybe that's just my insecurity because I was always just like, well, I don't have techniques. So at least I'm going to be like, right on the beat. I'm going to do it as it's supposed to be. So that's, that's something that that's probably why I gravitated towards jazz because it's so count specific and music specific that when you express the musicality, that just it's to me it's quote unquote, correct. Yeah. And of course, I've relaxed a bit. But that's that was the thing I carried over from ballroom the most because even in ballroom within that setting, I was always told when I was little them very musical. And it was one of my strengths. And it's the thing I miss the most about ballroom, especially the Latin section, I miss the specificity of the music, and that always being the thing that dictates the steps, like within a samba, it's always going to be the same rhythm, there are going to be different steps, and everyone's going to put them together in a specific combination. But the beat and the underlying sort of motor is the same. And you can you can rely on that. And you that's how, you know, it's a samba versus a cha cha or something else. It's the it's the musical underpinning, which is what I love. So dancing to music, and doing it. I will say properly, but
Jessica Altchiler
you're gonna say that you're
Honza Pelichovsky
doing it with intention, that that's the thing that you're dancing to. That's what I've always carried over from home.
Jessica Altchiler
That I think is a huge reason why I loved ballet when I was younger, and still love ballet, but it felt very mathematical. Like, this is what I do. This is when I do it. This is proper, this is improper, this isn't right, this is wrong, even though now that's truly the antithesis to my jam as an artist and what I teach and everything, but back then, all I cared about was being a good student, and being a good person. And while still care about being a good person, like just doing things that seemed like I was checking something off a list. And also quickly circling back to when you had to make that decision to if you're going to choose ballroom require, I had to do the same thing with a bunch of things. And my, like, I had to slowly drop tennis, drop karate, all these things. And my last one was between dance and gymnastics. And I do not remember how I made this decision because I loved gymnastics. And what I loved a lot of it was that it was very clear leveling, like you get this step you would you learn this step you learned this trick, whatever, I don't even know what you call it. And then you move to level four. And then you get these checkboxes and then you move to the next level, it was very clear cut, you work on this, you try to achieve this goal, and then you move on. And to this day, that is something I have a very hard time with not having a clear checkbox on like, who's going to give me an A plus anymore. That who's going to, there's no, there's no one telling me what to do, really. But then also, anytime someone is telling me what to do, I'm kind of resistant of it. So it's you know, it's just, it's just my own personal stuff. But
Honza Pelichovsky
I think you're touching on something really interesting both ways. So it's because within dance and the ideas of, of movement in general, when we compete, and when we put people in a competitive environment. It's all about how can we create a structure for scoring. I think gymnastics is doing a very good job at it. I think figure skating is trying to do a very good job with it. Ballroom concert dance, all this other stuff that we do is so subjective with ballroom since I left it, I've heard that they've they've gone into like a scoring category. But still, it's unless you're doing a flip backwards and you have a specific way of landing it. You can really judge people's hip action versus the next person's it's always going to be how they look how they look together, what step you're looking at, at the specific time, what's their timing, it's so many things. And I think the other thing you're touching on I think as kids, it's very good to have structure like that. That's why I think it's good to start with something that is very specific. This is how you go about it. This is what you accomplish. This is how you level up. This is how you move to the next category. I've always loved it. But I feel I feel like that's why I left college so much because it was such a specific environment of not to say that it was even playing field at all. I understand that it was walking into it with a specific gender with a specific baggage a specific look specific time but it always felt to me like this is what do you need to do to get the attention? This is what you need to do to get into this piece. This is how much you need to work in order to be noticed and to learn this thing that you're not good at and Then hopefully it will lead to these pieces this level and this and this technique, and this amount of them relying on you, it just just felt like, I've always wanted to learn the structure of somewhere where I was, or what I was a part of climate, the way it was structured. And then once I got to the top, play with it, and fuck around with the things that I can sort of push against or say that they don't work or criticize, but I've always loved having a structure. So I think as kids even now, when I teach, I teach this group of dancers, they're they're very levels of the ages at the same time. And I still see it, they just respond to jazz that I teach them much more because of the fact that it's more in a box that has a specific technique and a specific approach than when I teach them contemporary on Saturdays. And I sort of tried to infuse it with something a little more experimental, that just not that it goes over their head as if like they couldn't understand it, I just don't think they in that most people in that age category, they they don't crave that. They want that structure, they want to know how to be best at it, how to be better at it, how to look at the person who's older and better and mimic them. I think that's why I love that we sort of started doing stuff in college, because a lot of us had to break down and become comfortable with stuff that was a little more experimental or a little less structured. But I wouldn't go back and change my training for it. I loved it. And I just I desired it at that time.
Jessica Altchiler
It's so interesting to hear you say that for many reasons. So in terms of college, I felt like there was no rhyme or reason to what was happening in terms of there was nothing that I could do with my body with who I was with what I had, that would get me to those places. So it's interesting to hear, you say, Okay, there's this ladder to climb, I see it like you achieve this thing, you make this connection, whatever it is, and then you could see it. Whereas for me, it felt like there's truly nothing to be done. I'm just trying to get by with a degree because I have Marty here. And it makes me think of the horrible rubrics that they had to grade us. Yeah, in our classes. And this will probably be shocking to anybody who is not aware of like, what they grade us on in dance school. But when I've shared this with people, their jaws dropped to the floor. So I remember so specifically, like I saw in one of the ballet rubrics, it was like, articulation of the feet. Yep, that was and another one was like use of turnout. So
Honza Pelichovsky
if you have a bigger turnout, but you're choosing to not use it exactly my point, it's pretty much just saying facility. And you're either good. Yeah, exactly.
Jessica Altchiler
It's hiding behind it saying, Okay, I'm not I can't just grade someone on how beautiful the arch in their foot is. So I'm gonna write articulation of the foot. Like, I get it to trust me, I know that turnout can be used or not used. And that articulation of the feet can be like better, like I can prove and prove like I'm not saying it's totally irrelevant. I'm just saying that there is no world in which me using my max turnout would have given me a good grade on that rubric. There is nothing I could have done no matter my feet, or my feet, my feet or my fucking feet. My turnout is my fucking turnout at a certain point. I have been in a ballet class since I was two years old, if I am 20 years old. And this is how I'm using my turnout. And also like, notice it over time. Notice that from when I came to this college program to the end, it probably didn't change actually, it probably got worse, because I was so sore muscles tighten, my muscles are so tight, and everything hurt and I was powering through. So actually that grade probably lowered over time. And again, it's not to say that there isn't room to discuss these things. But I just don't think it was I don't think that's that was honest. And additionally when we would get graded on performing that Raizy That was crazy. What is what is that because guess what? Some people were put in the back for the entire dance that they were being graded on. And some people had a five minutes solo on stage
Honza Pelichovsky
Wonderware in one DAW and some people were in three main stages back to back,
Jessica Altchiler
right and also just so in case this comes up again, main stage is like When you have professional choreographers or faculty members or outside choreographers come in, and that that's the show that we would have at the end of each semester. And then DAW was dancers at work, right. So it was called Yes. Oh my gosh, how can I be shivers down my spine?
Honza Pelichovsky
I think yes. But also just like the importance that was assigned to both right, like the big concerts for the actual theater. And then the student work was in the big studio converted into performance space. And that also, of course, translates into who's going to come? How big of a deal was how much time you had to rehearse? The student choreography was performed sooner? The big concerts were later. Yeah, so
Jessica Altchiler
there were a lot of factors. And it it? Yeah, there's a lot of politics involved, for sure. And it basically, some of it also just has to do with your schedule, like, Absolutely, none of your, maybe couldn't find time for any of the rehearsals for mainstage or DAW for that matter. And you never really know. Well,
Honza Pelichovsky
speaking of that, that's, that's that's how I approach school this is so it's, um, I'm gonna say heartbreaking, because I know from talking to a lot our different experiences through college and I'm, I'm not, I'm not blind to it. And I understand I have a lot of friends who had very different experiences. So I do understand that it was very different for each of us. But it's so funny, because it's such a, it's such a not a playing, even playing field. Because when you say that there's nothing you could have done to climb the ladder. For me, I don't even remember the rubrics, because I didn't care about the, the grades, I knew that I was doing well in my classes that I was trying every single day like a crazy person. And that that grade didn't really matter to me, because I knew that at the end of I'm gonna, okay, they're gonna say maybe to work on this, where we're from that, but I was just like, powering through taking class after class after class rehearsal after rehearsal to do like, I had the inner motor, and it was paying off, except for a few things to like, 80 85% that I just like, I was like, Yeah, sure, I'm gonna agree on this doesn't matter. But like, I understand a lot of people, just like you're saying that grading was really traumatic. And I remember freshman year, we had those first, what did they call them, they brought us all in and we had these little evaluation, juries, juries, juries. And I still remember to this day, I'm not going to name drop, but it was a person who ended up dropping out after our first year, and she was a few people in front of me. And I just remember, oh, it's more about I wasn't nervous about like, talking to the faculty, because I felt like, oh, I never get to just like talk. I wasn't nervous about them talking to me about like, not being good enough, or not trying hard enough, or not doing my contractions, right. And then that person, a few people in front of me, came out and she was in tears. And I just I couldn't relate. So yes, our, me as a male, as a white male, have a specific height of different ethnicity. So it was an international students. So those also playing into it. And I was just super hungry to do things. And I think the expectation on male bodies and their facilities also very different. Because if there's eight of you in a year versus 60, then they're going to be less concerned with my feet and more about just like, well, let us put them in pieces, because he's a dude, that, that that never weighed on me. But I know you included other people that was really hard. That's just it's not fair. It's a very different experience.
Jessica Altchiler
It makes me think of what you were talking about how jazz and when you're teaching younger kids and like that structure can be really helpful. And the flip of that is, I think that part of what led to my disempowerment of my own worth and ability as an artist, and all these things came from the fact that everything was so structured. And I think that I had a pretty open experience growing up in a dance studio, like my studio was incredible. And we did ton of ballet and technique, but we also had concert dance and other things. And it was incredible. And even with that, there was this sense of trying to please people trying to, you know, we didn't get graded, but what is the teacher going to say to you? Are they going to praise you in some way? And then when you get to college, and all of a sudden, you have a physical fucking rubric about your body, and you're getting graded on how you're performing. And that structure, I think, really contributed to a lot of pain for a lot of us, and it doesn't allow you to evolve really, as an artist. I think there's a lot of benefits to structure and there's a lot of benefits to challenging that structure, or at least questioning it, being aware of what it is, what it serves and what it doesn't serve. And I think that by the time I got to school, we got to those juries. So we're sitting there and you're like, I'm nervous to talk to the teachers and everything, which is very valid also. But then to say, what are they going to say to me? And what's it going to? What does it mean about me who I am, what I have to offer, what I'm not capable of what they don't see me as. And that can be really life changing, for better or for worse, but I think that the power that we give these people over us, the power that we give them to tell us what our worth is, and what our value is, can be catastrophic. But if you can go in with enough confidence, saying, Hey, I'm gonna listen to these teachers, I think there's a lot of good I can take from them. But hey, let me let me be open to questioning what they're saying and challenging what they're saying whether it's out loud or not, you know, whether it's just me taking that away, because then I can say, hey, you know what, that was a really good piece of advice, but I'm so confident in my self, and what I know, I have to offer that I know that this piece of information they gave me was actually useless, useless. And, and either, like, a lot of the stuff I felt was just not relevant to what the current industry was, and what was.
Honza Pelichovsky
Let's talk about that. We'll get to it. I'm sure. We're still in the trenches. But we're going to talk about the usefulness of college education in dance, and it's feeding into the real world. That's chapter three. Oh, my god, yeah, no, I hear you, I hear you. This is what I have to say about that. I personally loved that college was four years, I needed it. For me, both as a dancer, and especially as a human, I changed so much not the core of me not like the hard working person who cares and is very opinionated, and just like goes head to the wall, even though that's been shifting to lately because of COVID. And being an adult, but I'm not gonna cry now. But the four years were so important, because the person who goes into the jury as a freshman is a very different, hopefully, or at least in my case, was than the person who goes in as a junior senior. And I think they look at you differently, too, because as freshmen, and let's be real, a three or four out of the five people who are in the jury don't even have you in class, they saw you at auditions, literally, just
Jessica Altchiler
really quickly. So a jury is at the end of your first semester of freshman year. And then at the end of each year, you have a jury, which is, you know, three to six faculty members sitting in a room. And then you come in and sit there, and they tell you what they're thinking of you basically of that, and what you need to improve on what you did, well, hopefully, they say what you did well, too. But that's what it was. So we had that initially at the end of the first semester of freshman year, which was terrifying. And a lot of people walked out of those juries, in tears or sobbing. And then after that it was just at the end of each year. So just to give a little background of what we're talking about. So
Honza Pelichovsky
what I meant to say is that unless you are again, freshman year, you only got to perform one semester. So let's say this is your first semester, you're not performing, therefore, they don't see you in pieces or in rehearsals. And then out of the faculty, maybe only one person actually has you for one modern class three times a week. So what are we talking about? They're talking about? Well, they know from auditions, what they remember, but they barely saw you doing anything. And a lot of times they just end up like making stuff up, I think or just remembering something or reacting to something that the modern teacher actually teaches, you might have said throughout the semester that you I don't know did wrong or that you were not getting or something. So I'm like, this is actually not that not that helpful, or most of the people here don't actually have an have interacted with you. So I was always I always knew that I just wanted to impress the people I was actually in classes with or in pairs, or of course, the person who's in charge of the whole program, because I know if you could impress that person, she will put you in the pieces that you want to in the future. Yeah. So and
Jessica Altchiler
that also probably has something to do with the fact that you had this broader life experience and dance experience. Whereas a lot of people who came from again, high school where it's about grades and getting in like what is your SATs score and your AP classes and all this stuff directly into this college program, but I don't know you had more experience and you were a Will to maybe have a different perspective where a lot of us just went in, like, desperately trying to impress and get a good grade and whatever it is. And I also want to just voice that. This shows, this is just one of many examples we talked about on this podcast, that shows how vital it is to be very intentional with your words, when you are in a leadership position, a man very, very intentional with how you are speaking to somebody, and what you are saying, because it can impact somebody for truly and I'm not exaggerating, it can impact somebody for the rest of their lives. And it can seem so silly, in okay, we're, we're these fortunate people in a college dance program. And of course, that even I mean, that privilege there is immense and extremely significant. And still, what one teacher says to you, in one moment, can trigger something so Gmail ball, and it can last forever, because you know, what thing is like, eating disorders, and things like even just lacking self confidence, it carries into everything else in life, and it can be really, really, really, really, really hard to overcome really hard. And that's something that, you know, we're sitting here as little freshmen who were just trying to be in a college program to dance and
Honza Pelichovsky
understand the structure because there are all these other older people that have figured it out and just trying to like, learn it. Yeah, and you're trying to learn what it's like to live in fucking New York City by yourself. And a lot of these people is their first time away from home and it's sitting. It's this different beast. Yeah, so it's, that's so many things. And you add that to it, and I completely agree.
Jessica Altchiler
I also my funny thing about my first jury, the only thing I remember, like people had horrible jury experiences and I remember them so vividly. Like I remember holding someone in a stairwell, crying, like I remember this, but the funniest thing to me was I was in this I guess this must have been at the end of the year because I was in I had performed once I was in a DWP so that means it's choreographed by a student and it was just
Honza Pelichovsky
a random remind me what piece was this? It was Alana. Alana Yes. Oh, yeah. That was a very good piece but didn't close the show.
Jessica Altchiler
I don't fucking remember. Everything in college just No. No,
Honza Pelichovsky
Sara Chen skis clothes. I was in that it was the old boy piece but now all I remember is Alana was was great, a great choreographer and people loved her. Therefore the piece was given a lot of I think a lot of good. Rep.
Jessica Altchiler
I don't remember my freshman year I think most of it is I just remember little snippets. But what I do remember you and I and stagecraft. Yeah, exactly. So I remember that I'm sitting in my jury, and one of the faculty members says to me, you know, you really just need more experience with Alana style of movement. So you should take more classes that are like similar to her style of movement. And I remember sitting there like, what the fuck am I paying you for that like Well, yeah, what do you mean first of all, she's like a student you know, it's not like your system stablish site like it's just general general modern, any contemporary whatever, you know. And you have to go and take these first of all, where and with what time and with what money what energy so are you telling me that I was in the Honors Program, double majoring in this conservatory conservatory program, basically. Unofficial conservatory program. So I'm supposed to go seek out classes over the summer Do you have a style that I don't even I see not even a mentor. Maybe I didn't even like the style who knows like what how is that? How is that constraint anyway i that is a total irrelevant tangent. I just think it is so funny and so accurate to like, you have to go seek out extra things extra classes to what am i Wait, what am I paying you for then? If I can't get that here? It also makes me think of I think this is so funny to like they would always tell me to be bigger and like move bigger through space, which is something that I get into all the time, but
Honza Pelichovsky
you can come if you can come back over the summer and be full taller, we would really appreciate that. But that's that's what that's what they're saying. That's what they're saying. Because, yeah, well,
Jessica Altchiler
I mean, I have so many thoughts about that where we can get into probably a million times, but like, I was so scared to make a mistake, I was so stressed, my body was so tight, like, and I said this actually, I think I said this in a previous previous podcast, you can tell me because you've listened to them. If I've said this before, but the fact that like, you're expected, I said it, and you're supposed to be big and expansive, and move through space, but also be small and
Honza Pelichovsky
petite and weigh nothing.
Jessica Altchiler
Yeah, liftable. Exactly. And I'm the small one. So I'm going to be the one lifted to so like, Be extra. I just mean, like, in height. For anyone who doesn't know, I am like five feet on a good day. So I am
Honza Pelichovsky
off to a stretch and do yoga clients. Exactly.
Jessica Altchiler
On the best day. I am five. That's what I say in my, like self tapes, when they have to ask,
Honza Pelichovsky
I love that. That's how you catch attention. It's like, oh, my good days. I'm five. Okay, can I just jump to the one thing that you just talked about? I think if if anything that comes out of these podcasts is that we want to talk about things that are maybe it will be universal, right? So yes, I completely agree with how you talk about, you need to be very careful when you're in a leadership position. Will you say to people in general, because back to the juries, if that's like a microcosm, in this college environment, they get 60 of them in one afternoon, they just need to get through them. But you as a person only get one, three minutes slot. And you're going to hold on to those things. I remember zero from that. But there are moments in my life that I can pinpoint to where I remember very specifically, and this sticks to me to this day. And it was one of the things when I think I started realizing that jazz was looked down upon in college we were doing, when you come in as a freshman, you still do these auditions, the only one that actually mattered was the ballet audition, because they would have to score you into a level. The modern audition, there was a part of it doesn't matter, because everyone starts with the first level. And the jazz audition doesn't matter. Because freshmen are not allowed to take test. It's an elective later on. Most people just have to take one semester, however, we did all three. And to this day, I remember and it gives me chills. We were doing the jazz combo. And granted, we're in leotards and tights or something. And I was thinking I was killing it. It was a fun audition, I think was shishi, who was who was teaching it. And I was like, Yeah, blog. And I was performing it in front of the head of our department and Mr. Farrow. And you have to like, if you put yourself in my shoes, I just got off of three years of exploring this jazz is the thing I'm most comfortable with. This is my day two or day three in a college environment. This is the person I'm trying to impress. And this is the style that I feel most comfortable with. And I remember both of them. I won't say laughing at me, but they did both like smirk and like, had been like, like as if I was being ridiculous. Like as if as if it was something that was that was laughable, or too much. And I just remember, in my mind, I'm like, Well, if this is the thing I feel the best at. And the reaction is that I'm being ridiculous, then, one, this person doesn't really care about jazz, but two is like, what can I actually what am I actually good at? Am I good at anything? Like, this is the thing I feel most confident in? And it's and it's laughable. So, uh, well, what do I do with that? So that was a very specific, very specific thing. But it goes both ways. I remember that year in New Mexico, I had two beautiful teachers, I remember to this day, I'm in touch with one of them every once in a while I had one for modern, and also led the company in that little high school I was a part of and the other one was a jazz teacher. And I still remember this jazz teacher telling me at one point, towards the end of the year, she said Honza The world needs to see dance. And as cheesy as that sounds and as a lot of us have this sort of champion in our life. And we we have that. That was the thing I built every single college essay around. That was just in my mind and I just like and I wasn't too conceited about like Kabbalah yet. I'm like God's gift to dance and like people need but it was the fuel that I needed to be like, Oh, okay, well, then let's go. Let's go. I can do this. I can do it on a stage because like, apparently someone responds to it. Even if I've only done this specific cell for a year, well, then, what's the limit? So it goes both ways. You have to be very careful what you say to people because they will remember and then you as the person who said it won't even know but that person will carry it. I'm 32 now that happened when I was 17. Yeah, I
Jessica Altchiler
will bring in my best story about that which is at the end of My senior year, which was one of the most trying times of my life, preach, I was I had a sprained back I could barely get through a ballet class yet I was in train the robber battle piece, which is very athletic and physical and exhausting and amazing. arcing loves it, but damn, that was hard. And I, a couple months before had my sexual assaults, and I had not told anybody. And I was just in an absolutely horrible place. Oh, not to mention, I had been doing my like, we had our dance senior thesis in the fall. And I had just completed my psych senior thesis, which I was trying to pitch as a dance intervention, which was shut down this whole thing, just a lot of things. And I was in DW N mainstage. That year, and I was in gave cats Katz's cats, cat gave cats
Honza Pelichovsky
cat ends on a Z. So I would assume that when apostrophe s so either silent Yeah, it's gave I'm so sorry. I deeply love you. I don't remember that piece to this day. It was wonderful. Those black black and black and long ponytails. It's what everyone's doing nowadays. But it was one of the first things when people started being obsessed with Gaga. And with Oh, hot. And it was one of those first things. Yeah, people ended up you weren't you weren't great in it. I remember you told this day you you look great. Thank
Jessica Altchiler
you so much. I was like I was a total mess. And I was sleepwalking and powering through that entire semester. And I'll never again, I'll never forget, he gave me like last minute, maybe a 22nd little improv piece. I had everything about Gabes pieces at the time. And I've talked to him about this since but like, at that time, very, very, very specific, very, like, no room before rotation from the structure. And it created brilliant pieces. And that was just that was his style at that point. And it was what really, really worked well. And so he had me, we were in this like, line line of four people. And he had me break out of the line for 20 seconds of any kind of improv. And I was like, first of all, I hadn't been featured in any way in what felt like a long time. And I felt so grateful to have this moment, but I was also so fucked paralyzed. And so he said, Just like explode, like, have fun, do whatever you want. And I completely blacked out when it happened. And I will never forget that those 20 seconds he gave me like they were so redeeming, and so empowering. And I couldn't really fully take it in because of how dissociated I was in my life at that time and in my body. But after we performed gapes peace, one professor who was my fucking savior that year, like the biggest, biggest blessing ever, she came up to me after that piece. And she said to me, You are so good. And I looked at her like she had 50 heads. I was like, what? You're,
Honza Pelichovsky
you're on faculty, and you're saying what? Yeah.
Jessica Altchiler
And she said, You were so incredible. And you can do. And this is on the heels of this is like graduation coming up. She's like, you can do anything you want. Do you want to do concert dance, you want to do musical theater, whatever it is, you can do it. Like, and I kind of had tears in my eyes, but kind of wasn't capable of accessing anything. Emotionally. Yeah. And I was just like, thank you so much. But I was still like, I'm not ever dancing. Again. I'm quitting and everything. But I talked to her a couple years later about this, about this moment and how pivotal was for me and she also said, like, I still remember you in that piece. Like I remember you in this in this group section at the end, and that's when you really stood out to me and and I told her kind of the whole backstory and what an impact that made on me. And she was astounded. Like she could not believe that that was my experience and how infrequently I had heard anything like that and it seems like it impacted her and she even voiced at some point that like she she takes that with her now as a teacher and realizing that What a word can do, you know, for better and for worse, and that was, I
Honza Pelichovsky
have, I have the flip side of that coin, this is going to be great. But I feel like the thesis of this podcast is the things you say beware. So my other experience is actually a complete reversal. But it was such a huge impact on me. Because whenever we did student pieces, when you were the choreographer, you were assigned a faculty member as an advisor. So this person was sort of responsible for checking in on you a few times each semester when you were creating a piece, and just making sure you're on track, making sure you're thinking of this and that and maybe giving you some prompts. So just someone who would would be like a supervisor, this was my third time and last time choreographing, I've never been a person who wanted to choreograph, I don't think it's a strength of mine at all. I just love that school provided you the opportunity. And I was just like, I'd be stupid not to because this is the only time I'm gonna get dancers for free time for free ad space for free. So I'm like, let me do it. This was the third one of the lots of emotions in my personal life at the time, too. So I wanted to explored within the piece. And I just remember, it was her maybe first time coming in, we were in the middle of I had all these amazing dancers, it was a mixture of like, younger but amazing, and also a lot of my peers, a lot of seniors and juniors and we were exploring this less structured idea. And I don't think I even had all the dancers in that little moment. And we ran it for her without any music. She took me out of the room, into the hallway, and she used the words, I'm disappointed in you. And I just remember, you know, you, as I said, you as a human, or you're developing a lot throughout those years in college, again, different culture, different language. So I am it's mainly about its liberal arts, we talk about things like gender like things that like words matter how you approach people, and I just couldn't believe that this person of this caliber would use those words that we as like 2016 make fun of as like the things that when your parents, or when you're younger, and you hear that I'm disappointed, it's worse than they're mad at you. I just couldn't believe that this person used this vocabulary at me. After one time of seeing rehearsal, I was like, You have no idea where I'm taking this. And this is not helpful at all. So I just remember being flabbergasted. And I'm like, as I said, again, earlier, if that was my freshman year, I would have crumbled, because again, you want to please you want to learn the structure. But as a senior, I just felt like, let's talk, I'm not afraid to tell you that I think you made a mistake that you said something that was wrong, that you didn't really understand what I was going for. And you also are not in a position where you should be saying this to anyone. So I think tying it back in it's important what you say because it can have it can have an impact and both positive and negative. And yeah,
Jessica Altchiler
was there more context to it was it explained more to you after
Honza Pelichovsky
I think I think she was just disappointed or just really confused that I didn't have more or something, it was very, because it wasn't set to music. And then I ended up just using a landscape, the whole piece was just set to a heartbeat. It was literally just a heartbeat in the background going. So all the stuff that was together or in some sort of rhythm was just based on the dancers being together, there was no 5678, there was no this swelled section or this section, it was very much just like, so of course it looked discombobulated. And the whole piece, I don't think it was successful either. But it got somewhere and I was proud of the dancers, I think they had a good time learning it and exploring it. I'm never satisfied with what I make or how I dance. So I wasn't super happy with it. But it ended up being a piece. So I think she was just confused that I didn't have a longer chunk or that it didn't look better or more in sync. I think that's I think that's that, of course, then I don't have such a good recall. But I just remember that one sentence and then the follow up with something along those lines. Yeah, because you don't you don't get to say those words to anyone. Pretty much nowadays, I think those words are a taboo, really, unless it's like a trusted relationship, that you know, the person and you know, they know you. And you can say that when it's been when you've actually been hurt. But the words I'm disappointed in you within like a college environment or like a work environment. I'm like, this doesn't belong here.
Jessica Altchiler
You don't get constructive. There's nothing constructive about it. It's not to say, let me challenge this or let me question this or let me push on this. It's and
Honza Pelichovsky
it also felt like well, I'm not here to impress you. I don't know you. I do respect her. I think she's brilliant. And obviously there were different people with different experiences. I just, I just wanted to tie it back into people can say things that we remember and sort of carry with us for better or for worse.
Jessica Altchiler
It kind of also mirrors the pressure of a faculty member and this isn't to justify that statement whatsoever. Yeah, you know, you're you're maybe trying to keep your job and you're like, Okay, I'm advising this person. I don't think this is as good as I would want it to be with my name connected to it. So maybe this is my way of expressing
Honza Pelichovsky
my fear. Absolutely. Oh my God, that's such a good point. Yes, yes, yes. And now like being an adult was a little more on the other side, like you've done stuff. When you're behind the table, I've done stuff when I'm like behind ish the table or like you're the person leading, I think that's a perfect way to, to look at it to exactly, you're in a new environment, you're not in charge, you're just being hired, you're hoping for tenure, because we're in this world in which concert dance, it's so it's so mercurial. And if you grab that one spot, you're going to fight to keep it, you're going to fight to get tenure, so you can have it. And that's some solid prospects into the future. So I totally understand because if you feel the pressure on you to show yourself in the best light your first year, of course, you're going to put that onto the people that you sort of responsible for. So I think that's a great point to bring up. Absolutely. And it just shows. And that's another thing that I've realized throughout my life, that people who are in charge are only human, they have their own things that they're worried about. And this is going to sound like a cliche, but they're really not perfect. And you can expect them to be that's why they need to be very careful about stepping into leadership positions, because they're going to bring the baggage with them, which is totally valid. But beware, I
Jessica Altchiler
think that's where I like to be very open and honest with my own students. Because I'll have students who texted me or schedule a session or something. And they're requesting a piece of advice about an audition, for example. And what do they do in this situation? Or like just kind of those tricky questions where there's not really a right or wrong answer? And I never pretend to know the answer. Because I don't and no one does. It's all there's so many different ways for things to okay, you can go in and be very confident saying, Okay, you definitely need to do this thing in an audition. Or you could say I, you definitely shouldn't do this thing in Audition, but then a person does it, and they get the job, or they don't do it to get the job, or whatever it is. And I think that's where the trust can come in between mentor, teacher and student. And it's also where the trust can be lost. So a lot of the times, like most people and most teachers I had in school, I had some moment where the trust was lost, because something was told to me as fact that I learned was not backed. And yeah, not help. Well, I think overall, the fact that we were made to believe that certain certain kinds of techniques were super relevant. And we Yeah, absolutely. As industry like, that's a broader example that we would take classes in and it's like, why are why are we so hyper focused on this thing that doesn't exist? Or like that certain, you know, I do also think that we were in this interesting time where I knew nothing about musical theater whatsoever. So I just as I said, I just went to these auditions, musical theater auditions my senior year, because it was the way that you got to miss class. And so my friends, were going to musical theater auditions. And I'd be like, alright,
Honza Pelichovsky
that's fine. I didn't go because I was like, I could possibly. Yeah,
Jessica Altchiler
we have to get into that, because that's one of my favorite anecdotes. So that's what I was doing. And I stumbled into it. And we did have jazz, but as Angela said, in her episode, like The Hunger Games, she was like, we had to like claw to try to get into a jazz class. And also like that jazz class was one specific kind of jazz. And like, I think that there was an inability for a lot of the faculty members to evolve with the times. Absolutely. And that did a huge disservice to us, but also to them as a program. Yeah. So they've had incredible people come in, since like, our beloved Katharine Cobain.
Honza Pelichovsky
Oh my god, I love her. We just had a conversation. I was gonna I was gonna bring her tell me
Jessica Altchiler
I talked to her too. She said, I just talked to Hamza. And then I was like, I'm about to interview Hamza. So we have like, we should the three of us need to be together. They we tried to make that happen before. It's
Honza Pelichovsky
hard. Geography is real. Yeah, I love Catherine. May I take this into like a broader thing about my thesis about college in general? Like, I feel like I'm removed enough from it with what almost 10 years from where we graduated that I think I can say this confidently. And again, it's an opinion, I think, as you said, the teachers who teach at specific colleges are only human beings are trying to have a job. So I get it. They come into it with a specific history. They come into it at a specific time, and maybe you find them teaching I lay there 30 years later, we are hoping that they are active enough in the world of what they teach that they would change with it and understand that it shifts and it definitely has shifted since a lot of these people were active dancers. There was a time in New York specifically, where modern dance postmodern dance had a heyday where there was a possibility of you finding this one choreographer, Devote yourselves to them, and just explode and Lamone or explode with Bill T Jones, or explode with Trisha Brown, like do this one specific thing that you would drink and breathe and eat, and it grew. Unfortunately, that's no longer the case, then it's all about funding. It's all about different styles and fusing what's what's possible. It's about all these amazing choreographers getting older, and the other people who are replacing them need to make a living, therefore, they go into musical theater, they go into LA, and they do different things. So there's not really schools of dance anymore in schools of movement. Therefore, if you don't, as a teacher, change the way you're talking to your dancers about what the reality is out there and don't prep them for this is my experience, this is what it's now if I say something, it's not 100%, correct, doesn't mean that 100% of your auditions are going to look like this. And also, this is the reality of you trying to be a person who's trying to make a living, you can love this style of dance, but you will never make money off of it. The perfect example being grant, we all do grant, I think it's so valid, I loved it from day one until the end. But just like ballet, from pretty much the first semester, you know, if your body is a grand body, and no, no, no tea, no shape, that there, it's just there's a specific way you need to look and the specific way your body needs to bend for you to be able to lend it. And then when you get out there, and you want to join the company, you realize the reality is, they're not working throughout the year, all weeks, the money is very small, it's super competitive. Most of the money comes from them, asking other people from around the world to come and do the second company and pay for it or take regular classes. So the reality of it, even if that is your dream, it's not going to be sustainable for you. And no one really tells you that in college, so So that's one thing. And my second thing, which is like the bigger picture that I understand now, I understand that we want to be inclusive, and people have desires, and they have a love for dance, and it changed my life going to school. And those four years are some of the best years of my life. So I would never change them for anything. However, we shouldn't be reexamining how many people we accept into these programs, because it's a disservice to you as one of 75 in a year to be told that there are jobs for you when that's just not the reality. But colleges are businesses, which is the thing that they never really tell you when you own you're going into so they are trying to get as many into the room as possible, just to be able to pay the college, pay the teachers pay the space. So it's it's this catch 22 In which like, we are graduating with dance degrees, having some sort of a career and then we want to become those teachers. So we're going to go back into the environment of a college to potentially have a job. And we want to keep that job. So we're going to be okay with there being 80 people a year, knowing that only maybe four of them are going to ever actually have a stable career in dance, but we're not going to challenge it, because then we will be out of a job. So I just I personally believe we should be more selective and just have fewer spots. I just I would rather know from the get go, you are not quote unquote good enough for this. Go to law school or you you're not good enough, or you most likely will make it and again, to say that those people have said no to won't then make it but people do defy that. But I would rather be like this is most likely not going to work out this is really competitive. Think of something else. That's that's my two cents.
Jessica Altchiler
Okay, I have a lot to say about a lot of things. Hope I can remember. So one of them is about the companies. So the company world is being different. I think I don't I don't know what it's actually like to be in grammar to be in Taylor or something like that. I don't know what they're paid. I don't know what their lives are like I know, people do it. But I think the important point is, it's very hard to get into something like that. So there are less opportunities because there are less companies like that in general. And it's just hard to get into those. So to be realistic with your students is vital. But then it circles back to this other point. We can't really let our students know this because we need their money. Yeah, we need their money. I also want to mention that. I think there are wonderful things about getting a BFA whether or not you're going to dance professionally because as we know them Many different ways that we can be successful like we just do, we decide what success means to us. Maybe success meant the whole time going into musical theater, maybe it meant creating your own company. Maybe it meant that you wanted to open up a dance studio and teach our maybe it meant that you really wanted to keep performing for four years, but then go into something else, and you wanted to have an undergrad degree. So there are lots of ways that it can fit. I think the issue is with the transparency, about what your life is going to be like, and how you're going to be treated once you're actually in this program. And then once you leave the program, I think that's where the issues come up. We're like, Wait, I thought by you letting me into this program, it meant something else than it actually means. And I think that if you're going to have a program like that, you need to be able to see the individuals more clearly. And I mean, I know they're like every single school has its own issues. It is not just about Marymount like we went there, and a lot of my interviewees went there. And so we're having a lot to say about it. But there are issues across the board, and beautiful things that we can learn from other places across the board. But I think that there needs to be information, knowledge, advice, and guidance that is more streamlined for the reality of what the industry is and what it takes and means to go from a college program into that world. Where your money and your energy and your time is best serving you. Both individually and also as like a faculty member and as a program at large. Yeah, yeah, no,
Honza Pelichovsky
I completely agree. I don't I don't, I don't want to make it sound like I'm ungrateful or that I think the program is crap. I'm going to reiterate, I loved 95% of it. I had a great time. I think I worked hard. I learned so much. It just broke my heart, moving from college into the real world. And both for myself, but I mean, I've been, I would say mildly successful, to be realistic. I've done some dancing. I've done the concert stuff. I've done the freelancing stuff, I did two national tours, and then went back on the first one. I performed some good places in New York, like I can't complain. But I just know people who never stepped on stage after they graduated. And that's to me, that's heartbreaking. And it's not that they it's what they wanted, if that's what they wanted. Exactly. Yeah, exactly. That was one of the biggest revelations when we were in senior year, we were finishing that whole speech about don't think that we have one idea as a school of what it means to be successful. I really believe in that. And again, my best friend opened up a dance studio was her church, it was a lifelong goal. And she's killing it. She is a mom, she's a business owner, it's growing, she is loving what she's doing. And I think that she's living in her purpose. And she went to school to learn that and is doing it, I just don't think it's fair to that large percentage of the in the middle people who had to pivot, not because that's what they wanted. But because that's what they had to adjust to. Because if you stay in New York, and you're auditioning, unless you're successful, you have to do something else to survive, and you have to do a lot of it, you realize that you don't have that much time to stay in training, or estate, working on your craft, as people like to say nowadays, and that's, that's really soul sucking.
And
it's not, I think fair from the colleges to use the 2% of the people who quote unquote, make it and the business to have them plastered next to the offices and have them on the website as the as the face of the program. Because yes, it is a part of the face of your program. It is what success would then what are you studying looks like if that's Broadway, if that's being in Parsons, if that's choreographing on a TV show, or if it's going into Sleep No More straight after graduation or as Gabby said, going into this amazing dance company, even before you graduate, those are amazing things that that truly is the 2% of the people that graduated from the program. So then you also can just use the people who pivoted and went into this and this science or this, this body mind connection or people who went and got their master's in psychology and r&r therapists. It's just not fair to the people whose dreams were never failed and who had to pivot not because they got new dreams, but because they were they were hit by the bustle of reality. That
Jessica Altchiler
is the important thing to clarify. To state like, what are the dreams? What are the things that you actually want and who is being left behind? Not if you're wanting to pivot, or you have been evolving and your desires changed, and you're following those desires, that's fantastic. Like, I love seeing what everybody's doing outside of the dance world. And also to say that I just want to come back quickly to when you said, the people who have made it, quote, unquote, were the
Honza Pelichovsky
greatest for listeners. For the listeners who can't see this right now.
Putting off my fingers for these fingers and bending them and stretching that.
Jessica Altchiler
Yes. So making it right. Okay, you can be on Broadway, or in a major company and still be fucking miserable. I don't know, if that's what making it means, you know, like, it's, there's so many layers to that, too. And that's something that you and I have been talking about recently, because we're both on our own journeys that are a little bit like evolving and fluid right now. And we will get into that right now. And so, that is what's really hard to reckon with, but what I'm hoping also this podcast can, like shed a light on, which is that we all do have these different passions, dreams, goals, journeys, and the more that we share, all of what we are interested and all of the needs that need to be met for us to feel fulfilled in our lives, which is not just about the job and the career and all that stuff, but who we are as humans, and sticking it let me use this as a little transition. Honza What is your human bio? See you next week for part two of my interview with Hans apella kowski. Thank you so much for listening to the story project. It is a dream come true to get to share these stories with you. And I'm so grateful for every single guests and audience member. If you're enjoying the podcast, it would be such a great help if you could do a couple things. First is to follow the podcast on Spotify or Apple podcasts wherever you listen. The next would be to rate five stars and also give us a review. And finally, share any episodes that you'd like with the people that you love. This is a podcast for the community. And the hope is that it can reach as many people as possible from the bottom of my heart. Thank you for being here. Until next time,