This evening featured two men who surely need no introduction: Akram Khan and John Ashford. Tonight's Reel Lives was the latest installment of events where leading dance artists discuss the films which have inspired them the the most, seguing into discussions about their careers and other topics which might crop up in the course of the evening.

Akram Khan's groundbreaking career has seen him fuse his classical Kathak background with contemporary dance in order to create a unique movement style which is utterly compelling to watch. He has collaborated with artists including Juliette Binoche, Anish Kapoor, Nitin Sawhney, Sylvie Guillem, Antony Gormley, Hanif Kureishi and Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui - as John Ashford pointed out later in the evening, Akram Khan is one of the few dance artists in this country to be working constantly, in collaborations with other people.

John Ashford was Theatre Director of The Place from 1986 to 2009 and was instrumental in its growth in significance as a contemporary dance venue, promoting the early works of some of today's major dance companies. In 2004 he created The Place Prize, and in 1997 he created the European dance network Aerowaves, of which he is currently the Director.

 

 

1. The Time That Remains (2009), directed by Elia Suleiman

A man flamboyantly crosses the road carrying a bin bag to a dustbin across the road. Beside his front door is an enormous tank; the tank's gun follows him as he walks across the road then returns. Then his phone rings; he paces back and forth across the road, with the gun trying to keep up with him.

Akram Khan explained that the director of this film, Elia Suleiman, is an amateur choreographer: all of the roles and situations in this film have been choreographed, and the beauty of the film is the depiction of everyday life juxtaposed against the constant threat of violence; it also shows a way of addressing political situations without actually talking about it.

This film influenced Khan's most recent work DESH: the tank in this scene appears in DESH, while an iconic image of a little boy surrendering in front of a tank during Bangladesh's 1971 independence was used for the animated boy running away from attack.

Khan then discussed the difference between performing in Leicester, where DESH was premiered, Sadler's Wells and Théatre de la Ville in Paris. He and Ashford agreed that London is second to Paris for performing, making Sadler's Wells second to Theatre de la Ville. But while in Sadler's Wells, he might fear the audience towering over him, in Paris they throw things at you. Khan mused at how Parisian audiences know when to pack tomatoes for a show.

In Leicester, Khan asked a local activist to help with bringing audiences to see DESH; the people he brought were very disturbed and moved by the show, as felt it was about them, the experiences they lived through, and they even recognised the little boy from the animation.

He has been approached by several renowned directors about filming DESH, including Danny Boyle and Joe Wright (Atonement). After the disasters of his early experiences with film, Khan would definitely insist on co-directing any film made.

 

 

2. Downfall (2004), directed by Oliver Hirschbiegel

Khan is a huge fan of Bruno Ganz, the lead actor in this film, who physicalises each of his roles. In this film, where he portrays Hitler, he recited his lines in silence, in an operatic style, by rapping - each time deepening the physicality of the role; the physicalisation of his character was the most inspiring aspect of the film.

 

 

3. Koyaanisqatsi (1982), directed by Godfry Reggio

 

This film is a sequence of landscape photographs with musical accompaniment by Phillip Glass; Khan described this as "an extraordinary piece of work", and said that it is everything he wants to say in his work about humanity. He loves how music and images can say so many words without saying any actual words; this film inspired him to steer away from written texts, which he was starting to explore at the time, and return to the body.

John Ashford produced a flyer from "Indian Summer", which was held at The Place 20 years ago; it featured four young Indian dancers who would be granted bursaries to train further... and a special performance by a "promising young Kathak solo dancer", none other than Akram Khan himself, aged 16!

Khan had originally studied folk dance under his mother, who pushed him into classical training; the teacher, Sri Pratap Pawar, was more interested in teaching Khan's then 4-year-old sister, so his mother struck a deal with him ensuring that he'd teach both siblings. Later, his community pushed him to seek a degree, which led him to the dance department at De Montfort University (he later trained at Northern School of Contemporary Dance). He'd had no exposure to contemporary dance by that time; immediately before the audition, he popped into the library and watched DV8 and Pina Bausch - both of which totally broke his perception of what dance is and could be! Until then, his training had been about the precision and beauty of dance; it had had very precisely defined boundaries, which simply don't exist in contemporary dance, until the choreographer himself (or herself) creates them.

 

 

4. White Nights (1985), directed by Taylor Hackford

 

Akram Khan met Mikhail Baryshnikov after Sacred Monsters (2006), and said that the most impressive thing about him is that the way he dances is exactly what he is like as a person. He hopes that they'll work on a duet... at some point in the future. Although the movement in the film itself is rather old-fashioned, it has been a huge inspiration for Khan, and Baryshnikov has been a revelation: one of very few artists who can captivate people simply by standing still.

 

 

5. City Lights (1931), directed by Charlie Chaplin

 

We were treated to the boxing scene from this film, which Khan declared to be "physical theatre at its best", with choreography and humour so simple yet so powerful. While it's easy to be complex - and Kathak is notoriously complex - the challenge is in achieving simplicity.

Khan met Merce Cunningham at a conference, who told him that he asks his dancers to have no emotion, as he's only interested in lines and their bodies. Khan questioned that - and Cunningham never spoke to him again.

John Ashford led the discussion towards Vertical Road, and the topics of religion and spirituality. Khan asked if he could tell a little story, which some of us have heard before: several years ago, he was in Australia, having just performed with Juliette Binoche. He was queueing for a taxi, and one rolled up only for a couple to jump in it. They saw him and rolled down the window to ask him "Are you Akram Khan? Didn't we just watch you perform" before driving off, leaving him stranded there.

When a second taxi arrived about five minutes later, he was struck by a powerful urge to phone his father. Although he's very close to his mother, he isn't close to his father and they'd never actually spoken on the phone before - so Khan said. His father was immediately suspicious, assuming that he was in some kind of trouble, or needed money. It wasn't a long conversation. After Khan had hung up, the taxi driver asked him if his father's name was xxx, and if he was from a village called xxx. Khan was immediately suspicious - as he put it, there were approximately 220 people who knew of this village, of which 215 lived there and the remainder consisted of him, his sister, his parents, and clearly this taxi driver. It turned out that the taxi driver had been his father's best friend and had been looking for him for 35 years.

This had been the first time he'd spoken to his father on the phone. What if he'd caught the first taxi instead? This incident inspired him to create a piece on spirituality, which became Vertical Road.

 

 

6. Embrace Life (2010), directed by Daniel Cox

John Ashford introduced this clip by saying that he and Akram Khan were definitely the only two people who had ever seen it, yet the audience was quickly filled with people saying "I've seen it!" It was of a beautifully-choreographed ad for seat belts - you probably know the one.

Khan praised its movement, imagery, narrative: that it was concise and engaging, and said everything it needed to say - and it's a rare art to be able to make an advert which is so memorable. It provided an insight into how to convey a profound message with simple but effective ideas.

While wrapping up, the discussion briefly touched on Khan's future; he only expects to have another five or seven years as a dancer, after which he will choreograph more - he said that although he continues to push himself hard, with two hours' yoga and Kathak training every day, it's getting harder and more painful over time. And while as a Kathak dancer he could expect to have a long career ahead of him, that's not possible in contemporary dance.

And returning to where we started: if you haven't seen DESH yet - or if you have and you loved it, you've got three more chances to see it again at Sadler's Wells: in February and October 2012, and again in 2013.