DANCE
J
ulia Cheng is on a high. Her cho-
reography for Cabaret at the
Playhouse Theatre in London
was nominated for an Olivier
award last month, and the show
took seven prizes, including best
actor in a musical for Eddie Redmayne
as the Emcee.
Right now, though, she is upset that
I am not eating the fries she ordered.
“My Chinese mum would be cussing
that we’re not eating,” says Cheng, 37.
“Please eat with me!” Cheng is a force-
ful presence, wearing a shiny jacket
(“I’m a child of the Eighties”) and
speaking warmly about Cabaret and
her new show with her own company.
But first, how did she work with Red-
mayne on his memorably unnerving
performance — all kinked angles and
twisty wrists. “Eddie’s one of the hard-
est workers,” she says. “He was always
the first in the studio, observing and
offering tools to improvise.”
Redmayne himself hops on a call to
sing Cheng’s praises: “She’s an amazing
leader, with enormous empathy and a
great heart.” He first played the Emceeas a pupil at Eton, but this was a whole
other level of commitment. “I enjoy
movement but I’m definitely not a
dancer. Julia allowed me to feel free to
f*** up and express myself while also
teaching me the basics. She found
where my instincts were, but then
pushed them to extremes. In many
ways, she was the heart of the piece.”
Cheng has form with Cabaret — she
was a Kit Kat girl in a show at college in
Luton — but she didn’t rewatch Bob
Fosse’s film to research for this show.
Instead, she relied on “my instinctive
responses. I wanted it dark.” Cheng
laughs. For her, the work honours the
uncompromising performers of 1930s
Berlin. “Those cabarets had so many
great Jewish artists. When the trains
were going to the concentration camps,
artists who had vanished from cabarets
played for people on the train. It
chokes me up, because that’s what real
artistry is — you give and you are a bea-
con of hope. I try to carry that.”
She spoke to a Syrian musician in the
show who, when her home was under
attack, picked up her violin and played.called Warrior Queens. Is Cheng a war-
rior? “My sister would say I’m a bit
bossy,” she concedes. A shorter version
of the piece appeared in the Breakin’
Convention festival in 2016, inspired
by hip-hop and its competitive battles,
but also Mulan, the martial heroine of
Chinese legend, and Cheng’s own tom-
boy childhood. “It sounds different in
Cantonese, but my dad called me a
cowgirl — ‘You’re so brash, you should
be a bit more ladylike.’”
Her attitude is exemplified in her
company’s name — House of Absolute.
Houses are the tightknit groups that
structure New York’s ballroom scene,
familiar from the TV series Pose. “It’s
your chosen family, your tribe,” Cheng
explains. “They support you in ways
that your blood family may not under-
stand. I want to create opportunities
for people to find their own voice.” cDavid JaysWarrior Queens is on Fri and Sat at
Sadler’s Wells, London EC1. Cabaret is
booking until Oct, kitkat.club“She believed it was her last moment.
That’s what we connected to in this
piece — like every moment is your last.”
Cheng’s journey has been unconven-
tional. She was “hellbent on dancing”,
but as the youngest of four children
ballet classes were curtailed because of
money: “Food was the priority.”
Her new work at Sadler’s Wells isGreat moves Julia Cheng in Warrior
Queens; Eddie Redmayne in CabaretTHE WOMAN WHO TAUGHT EDDIE REDMAYNE TO DANCE
JACK THOMSON, MARC BRENNER1 May 2022 11