Choreography in itself is certainly of much less importance than the fraudulent scores that get assigned to favoured teams on an ongoing basis, but it is a relevant topic within the context of how that corruption gets justified. Much of the narrative behind the undeserved rise of Papadakis/Cizeron (as well as the improved fortunes of several of their training mates) has been focused on how the vehicles themselves, particularly those produced by Marie-France Dubreuil, are worthy of praise (and points) for their groundbreaking ability to draw tears from the eyes of both judges and fans.
Now, many points can be made as a rebuttal of that wide-spread belief in Dubreuil's superiority as a choreographer:
that her work is in fact incredibly lacking in dimension and ingenuity;
that the 'soft, flowing edges' fans claim as her trademark are in reality a sign of no contrast, no speed and no intricacy;
that if she has the ability to find and utilize the nuances in a piece of music to create something unexpected, she has apparently chosen not to make use of it;
that any marginal effectiveness her programs possess comes from how the music itself, or the skating skill of the teamA, or the conspicuous displays of emotionB by the skaters carry the lacklustre choreography rather than the other way around;
that as much as she claims that her teams have each been given sophisticated custom-painted styles that are distinct from one another, the movements and steps she proscribes have a characteristic look that is amazingly consistent across teams (something that the message boards are hesitantly starting to come to terms with).
But I'd like to explore another point - that perhaps the reputation Dubreuil receives for creativity is undeserved based not only on her substandard body of work, but also the possibility that the rare fresh idea she does present might not in fact originate with her. To be clear, I'm not claiming this is often the case, merely raising the question. One program coming out of the Lake Placid competitions last week, Smart/Diaz's egregiously over-scored Tina Turner "Proud Mary" Short Dance, caught my attention for its similarities to another piece recently aired on television - and it turns out that is just the beginning of the story.
On the May 2, 2016 episode of Dancing with the Stars, Mark Ballas and his Season 22 partner Paige VanZant C performed a spectacular jive to this song. I was definitely a fan, especially of this thrilling display of precision and dance chemistry:
FYI - This is, generally speaking, what good dance connection looks like. pic.twitter.com/npVPAyaDWk— Canada Blue (@canadablues) 3 May 2016
At least two other people from the ice dance world shared my enthusiasm - Alex Shibutani (who was in the audience with Maia) and journalist Jacquelyn Thayer (who identified the movement above as an advanced figure called the "Jive Tollgate" and who also appears to have noticed the similarities in S/D's new program).
On May 13, Olivia Smart announced the new team's music for the SD. The difficulty, athleticism and energy of VanZant & Ballas' jive was still fresh in my mind, and knowing the skating capabilities S/D had had with previous partners and what interpretation was likely to come out of Gadbois, I weighed in on their chances of living up to the recent number.
S/D are doing Proud Mary? LOL, good luck with that. Even performance-wise, NOPE. But maybe MFD can one-up G/P when it comes to boat miming.— Canada Blue (@canadablues) 14 May 2016
I did not necessarily believe at the time they were basing their SD on Ballas' idea- eleven days is a rather short time for the logistics to work, after all - but it did cross my mind. My suspicions increased, however, when Smart explained in an interview how they switched to Proud Mary after having already chosen other music.
"We actually chose different swing and blues music in the beginning, and Marie then played Proud Mary in one of our lessons, and we both looked at each other and said how much we loved that music. ... So the next day we came into the rink and right away we requested to Marie if we could skate to that music instead!"
(Please note - I am assuming that Dubreuil choreographed the SD based on this interview, but it is not without precedent for one Gadbois coach to assist the team in deciding on music and for another to choreograph a piece. I will update this post if information surfaces that this was the case instead.)
Of course, choreography can to a certain extent serve the purpose of homage. Bent/Razgulajevs's White Christmas-themed SD (likely choreographed by Carol LaneD, and unveiled in the same Lake Placid Senior International competition as S/D's) is one example of this; another would be Paul/Islam's recent exhibition choreographed by Kelly Johnson to Ed Sheeran's Thinking Out Loud. In both cases, the programs include a small handful of upper body gestures copied from a single, well-known source, with the main substance of the choreography being a work onto its own and movements being either new or part of the team's catalogue of prior material.
It should therefore be noted that both the V&B and S/D pieces include classic movements done by Tina Turner and the Ikettes around the time of the song's release in 1970. As can be seen in this 1971 performance, examples include the 360 degree turns at the tempo change in S/D's program, the revolving fists in V&B's, and the bending forward in both:
Three sections, however, stood out to me as owing more to the DWTS version than Turner's - the partnered section preceding the Twizzles, a jump by both partners during the Not Touching Step Sequence and the triple cartwheel ending.
