Circle of life: Tony-winning choreographer seeks challenges in every endeavor

By Diana Nollen

Regardless of the language in which Disney's “The Lion King” roars to life, the players move in the universal language of dance.

“Once we started to work on the show, all of my colleagues were at the top of their game. We worked feverishly at this show that's selling tickets all over the world in different languages,” Tony Award-winning choreographer Garth Fagan, 69, says from his home in Rochester, N.Y.

“One thing I'm proud of - they talk and sing in Japanese, in German, but they're always dancing Fagan, so I'm very proud of that fact.”

The blockbuster musical that grew from Disney's animated hit film is making its second stop at the Civic Center of Greater Des Moines, having played to sold-out crowds in 2006. It swept the Tonys in 1998 with awards for best musical, direction, choreography, scenery, costumes and lighting design. It was lauded in all the major New York theater awards that year, picked up a Grammy for best musical show album, an Astaire Award for Fagan, as well as awards in Los Angeles, London, Toronto, Japan, Germany, Australia and the Netherlands.

No wonder Fagan's proud.

And he never grows tired of the show.

“I just saw it the other day in New York for my one millionth time I'm sure, and I'm still bawling like a baby at the first scene,” he says with the laughter that comes easily and often during his recent phone interview.

“It's so refreshing,” he says. “Today you go to a show and they're singing and squawking and you're not feeling a thing if no images are coming to you. It's just studio produced.”

That's not the case with the characters in “The Lion King,” he says, especially with the evil Scar, King Mufasa's brother who spends the show plotting his bloodthirsty ascension to the throne.

“Scar is a cold bastard - a total SOB,” Fagan says. “We've had some brilliant Scars around the world. It's life. Rainbows and sunshine are not what we get dealt.”

Fagan has known his own share of heartache, especially with the death of his young daughter in a car crash years ago. He infused memories and hopes for her when choreographing the female lions as beautiful, brave and strong.

Garth, who studied with Martha Graham and Alvin Ailey as a young dancer in New York, developed his “Lion King” choreography in workshops with the star dancers of his internationally renowned company, Garth Fagan Dance, based in Rochester.

“I could work with them in my studio up here on movement ideas,” he says. “When Natalie (Rogers) first did the cheetah with cardboard cutouts, I said, ‘I want you to be the sexiest cheetah on the savanna, but you're still hunting, not a woozy and floozy. You're a strong, capable blend. I love that mixture. Lots of bright, strong women are still gorgeous and sexy.”

Then he brought the choreography to the “Lion King” cast, whom he calls “the very best dancers.” They understood his style and his intentions for the characters, and what he wouldn't abide.

“No maids or pimps or negative things we get to do as people of color. We'll have none of that. You'll be mean hyenas, but you'll be hyenas. Lionesses, you'll be gorgeous. ... The lionesses are hunting, they're going to kill antelope, but be as sexy as can be. I thought of all the beautiful strong women I know, starting with my mother.”

Fagan credits his parents for shaping his artistic path growing up in his native Kingston, Jamaica.

“I bless my parents,” he says. “I didn't bless them when I was going to lunch concerts hearing Horowitz play the piano or Marian Anderson sing. I had to sit still. It was boring. When I would see (his parents) crying, I thought, ‘I don't get this, but it must be good.' Finally, they were punishing me by not taking me. Now I love classical music as much as jazz. That's just good parenting. I can see with clearer eyes and hear with better ears the variety the Creator has given us.”

He wants audiences to see that variety, too. He describes the Fagan technique as “contemporary dance with the speed and precision of ballet, the weight of modern dance and the polyrhythms of African and Caribbean dance.” That translated well to the music and spirit of “The Lion King.”

“I set for myself the challenge that I wanted to have all the different styles of dance in the show, my thought being that if a child had studied ballet and nothing else or modern dance or hip-hop, when they walked into the theater they'd see something they knew and were comfortable with, but to open their minds and imagination to the variety of dance styles that we have. Jamaican, modern, ballet, Caribbean, hip-hop - we have it all in there, and I think that educates kids more richly.”

Like his friend and dance colleague Merce Cunningham, who died in July at age 90, Fagan plans to keep on working, keep on educating and to celebrate the 40th anniversary of his dance company in 2010 with a gala, revivals of past dances and a new piece with Wynton Marsalis.

The stamp he strives to leave on the dance realm is one of “sophistication and variety of dance by culture and by people of color,” to be remembered as “an artist who took risks and took challenges.”

ARTS EXTRA

What: Disney's “The Lion King”

Where: Civic Center of Greater Des Moines, 221 Walnut St., Des Moines

When: Jan. 6 through 24; 7:30 p.m. Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays; 1 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 7 only; 2 and 7:30 p.m. Saturdays; 1 and 6:30 p.m. Sundays

Tickets: $22.50 to $130 through the Civic Center Ticket Office, Ticketmaster outlets, 1-(800) 745-3000 or www.ticketmaster.com/venue/49258

Information: www.civiccenter.org

FUN FACTS

MASKS & PUPPETS

*  More than 200 puppets are used in the show, including rod puppets, shadow puppets and full-sized puppets.

* 25 kinds of animals, birds, fish and insects are represented in the show.

* 12 bird kites are in the opening number of Act II, “One By One.”

* It took 17,000 hours to build the puppets and masks.

* Mufasa's mask weighs 11 ounces.

* Scar's mask weighs 9 ounces.

* The tallest animals in the show are the 18-foot exotic giraffes seen in “I Just Can't Wait To Be King.”

* The tiniest animal in the show is the trick mouse at the end of Scar's cane: 5 inches.

* The longest animal is an elephant: 13 feet long, 11 feet 3 inches high and 9 feet wide at the ears. It collapses to 34 inches wide to go down the aisle in the theaters.

* 300 feet of carbon fiber and 750 pounds of silicone rubber were used to make the masks.

* The Timon puppet weighs 15 pounds.

* The show uses 19 trucks to transport the production's puppets, set pieces and other materials from city to city; 14 of the trucks are 53-foot semi-trailers.

* Number of wigs in the show: 49

COSTUMES

* The Grasslands headdresses use 3,000 stalks of grass per year.

* More than 100 ants are on the Ant-Hill Lady.

* Number of hyenas in the show: 39.

* Number of wildebeests in the show: 52.

MISCELLANEOUS

* 143 people are directly involved with the daily production of the show: 53 cast members, 21 musicians, 17 wardrobe people, five hair/makeup artists, three puppet craftsmen, 13 carpenters, 10 electricians, eight administrative people, six creative associates, four props people and three sound people.

* Lighting Designer Donald Holder used nearly 700 lighting instruments to create the show's lighting plot.