Stage echoes | Without you[t] : at the table with Janie & Marcio

The Janie & Marcio tandem will soon blow out the five candles of their victory at Revolutiona TVA dance competition which allowed the two friends to be revealed to the public, to forge an artistic identity and to create two shows, including Without you[t], which starts in a few days. Assessment of five years of passion, complicity and hard work.

Janie and Marcio are still talking a lot about their semi-final number from Revolutionwhere their prowess in suspension in a spiral staircase had moved the gallery, to the languorous tune of Silhouette, from Aquilo. Annoyed to still wear the invisible label Revolution ?

Not at all, they assure, smiling. Connecting people with their flame for dance is their primary mission.

Janie Richard, 37, and Marcio Vinícius Paulino Silveira, 34 years old, have been inseparable for 10 years. They met in 2013, in the ranks of Ballet Ouest de Montréal, after having each worked for different dance companies. Marcio had left Brazil three years earlier to settle here.

The same year, Janie became pregnant. Even today, they often have to clarify that they are not a couple, that Marcio is not the father of Janie’s pre-teen daughter. But the friends are united by an unshakeable friendship. “Marcio is my cosmic brother,” Janie illustrates. The family of one “adopted” the other, and vice versa.

Revolution brought them notoriety, a $100,000 reward, a solidified bond and the inspiration to create their own concepts and classical-contemporary choreographies.

Demanding experience

However, they do not hide it, the experience was demanding on several levels. Marcio also underlines that the production methods, overseen by the producer Fair-Play and Quebecor Content, have changed positively between the second season, in which he and Janie participated, and the sixth currently under construction. This will bring together the best candidates from previous editions, but Janie and Marcio will not be part of it.

“In the second season, it felt a bit like tests [rires]. They now give more value to the dancers, are more open and consider their needs better. And I think they are better paid…” explains Marcio, while his partner remembers the frantic marathon that was the television adventure.

“We spent our days together, we no longer counted the hours, working very quickly. Marcio’s bicep gave out two days before filming. We supported each other, our families helped us. My mother would prepare meals for Marcio, so that he wouldn’t have to cook while we worked…”

“ Revolution, it’s difficult emotionally. Filming was spread over nine months. You don’t see it on television, but it’s very intense, to be summoned at 6 a.m. in the morning and to finish at midnight, to dance as if it were the last time at impossible hours. But that’s part of the game. »

Verification made with Fair-Play, executive producer Marie-Ève ​​Dallaire confirms that “the compensation and services given to participants [de Révolution] have been improved and evolved.

Without a roof, neither you

Their first show, Tuningwas decorated with the prize of the first RIDEAU 2023 tour and seen by 10,000 spectators. To build Without you[t]their newborn, the pair evaluated some 140 dancers in audition, to select eight, with the collaboration of local dance schools.

The story of Marcio’s memories around his grandmother’s good table, once overflowing with food, a vector of exchanges and confidences, served as a spark for the development of the plot of Without you[t]whose title evokes the absence: that of the other and that of the roof which shelters and protects our plots of memory.

The kitchen furniture unit will be at the heart of the staging, signed Frédéric Bélanger (the man behind the recent Twelfth Night at TNM). Dance and video will be combined with original music, and others by Jean-Michel Blais, Flore Laurentienne and Désirée. Before the performance, spectators will be invited to sit at the table and write a personal memory, around which the troupe will orchestrate a number.

Financing before the dance steps

Janie and Marcio consider themselves privileged to be able to make a living from their art, even if, for fun, Janie is also a travel agent, while Marcio has undertaken studies in scenography.

However, the road is not always easy. The day before their interview with The Presson April 18, our interlocutors allowed their fellow dancers to Without you[t] to shorten an exercise to attend the Montreal demonstration in favor of better funding for culture. Recent grant refusals have forced them to rearrange their rehearsal schedules.

“We spend more time in front of our computers writing grant applications than in the studio,” Janie quips. Despite the experience and the years, despite Revolution And Tuningit’s not easier…”

“Sometimes, even if you work really hard in the industry, you need to be the right person, in the right place, at the right time,” Marcio summarizes.

The tour Without you[t], by Janie & Marcio, will begin on May 4, in Victoriaville.

Check tour dates

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From May 14 to 30, at Espace Go (notably as part of the FTA)

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From 1^er to May 4, at the Théâtre Maisonneuve

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Iris Gagnon-Paradis, The Press

Move from there on tour

The youth dance company Bouge de là is touring across Quebec this spring. After six years of broadcasting and 192 performances, this will be the final opportunity to see the show Through my eyes in Montreal (May 5, at 2 p.m., the Maison de la culture du Plateau-Mont-Royal). The workshop show outside the walls Kaleidoscope resumes its part of the service, with performances at the Park of the Multifunctional Center of Carignan, on May 11 (at 11 a.m., 11:45 a.m. and 1 p.m.).

Visit the Bouge de là website

Iris Gagnon-Paradis, The Press