| By Fred Topel
In Theaters April 7
|
All you have to say is Antonio Banderas dancing to the suave, exotic rhythms of tango and samba and every woman in the country is already lining up. Indeed, Take the Lead gives the Latin heartthrob plenty of opportunities to show off his style, but there's more to it than that. Banderas plays Pierre Dulaine, a real life dance instructor who offered his lessons to inner city kids just so he could give back to the community.
That selfless nature is what made Banderas want to play Dulaine more than the Latin lover vehicle. "[His] capacity of love and sharing with nothing in return, that's what surprised me the most because it's a very rare animal in our days," he said. "He was successful, his Academy would have received people, taught people to dance in an easy way. Normally he's just with mature people so they don't give you any problems. They pay you. No, he didn't have to do this."
When he got to meet Dulaine before beginning the film, Banderas even asked him why he gave of himself so charitably. "He said, 'Because, man, I was successful in my life with what I wanted to do. I had a lot of fun, a lot of friends and I wanted to give something back.' It sounds very simple and that's the way that he said it and he said, 'I enjoy that. I find a pleasure in seeing people blossoming and getting out of problems through something that I love very much which is dancing.' Sometimes they said that actors or artists in general are not productive for society because we talk about very material things. We don't produce tomatoes or potatoes or milk or something that's useful, cars. We just go to the heart. I think he talked with a lot of importance in his life so he wanted to share that."
The real Dulaine may not look like Antonio Banderas but the casting is not such a stretch. Both come from a multi-ethnic background. "In reality, Pierre Dulaine is not called Pierre Dulaine. Pierre Dulaine is a stage name. He's called a different way and it's true that he was born in Palestine, that he has lived all around the world and he speaks several languages and he speaks with an accent in all of them. So that was familiar. I said, 'Whoah, I can do this guy.'"
Even though Banderas is the star and Dulaine is the teacher, the film is really about the students. "Pierre Dulaine is a little bit like that, a very invisible man. Kind of sort of traveling away, kind of mysterious too in another way and I love all of those features of him. I loved that from the moment I met him and I tried to keep the characters like that. He's kind of mysterious. You don't know really his background. You know a little bit because one of the kids in an attack of horniness comes to his house, picks up a picture of his wife so you realize in the movie that he's a widower. But until that point, you don't know where he's coming from."
Behind the scenes, Banderas did not take such a back seat, choosing instead to bond with the young actors as much as possible. "I wanted to bond with them and I wanted them to bond to each other too. So I talked to the director and I said to her, 'Do you mind if I do these things, invite them for dinner?' and she said, 'No, I love this. Absolutely.' So it just happened every Saturday nights when we didn't have anything to do on Sunday, all of them together. It was beautiful, put some music, go someplace, talk about this, tell stories. And we had a lot of fun and that is very important. For a movie like that it's very important."
For his own dance scenes, Banderas rehearsed along with the rest of the cast. "In total, 15-16 days rehearsals, an hour, hour and a half each one of them, no more because then we get really tired, sweaty and I have to do all the rehearsals at the same time as the scenes and stuff so we were just alternating the process of dancing and doing scenes because the kids were in the same place where we were dancing too so we were rehearsing everything at the same time. I would have loved to have more time. I was really surprised when I saw the movie. 'Oh, that's good.'"
He'd had a little practice doing Nine on Broadway, and he recalled his work with the legendary Chita Rivera for inspiration. "She managed with 71 years old as she was when we worked to put her leg right here [on her shoulder]. She finished the number like that every night. And she used to tell me, 'Don't dare bend.' She used to come to my dressing room and say, 'Don't bend. I can put the leg if you are straight up.' So I said okay. Every night, she finished like that and boom. She didn't miss one night in 238 performances, didn't miss one night. It was an ovation. Every time that she finished, the whole theater, 'Wow.' I only hear it because I was blindfolded."
Take the Lead opens April 7. |
