Disney on Ice skating into Coralville’s Xtream Arena

Every four years, Olympic skaters dazzle viewers with impossible-looking leaps, jumps and spins.

Disney on Ice skaters do that with every show.

“It’s our Olympics every day,” said Thomas Lizeul, who left his Parisian hometown and a career in finance for a life on the road with Feld Entertainment in 2013.

He’ll be returning to Eastern Iowa with “Disney on Ice: Into the Magic” for seven performances March 3 to 6 at Coralville’s new Xtream Arena.

“We have two former Olympians on this show,” he said by phone from a tour stop in Sioux City. “There’s lots of jumps. This show is really entertaining, with lots of action going on. The opening number is like full-on energy. It’s like a warm-up number. We do body rolls, we do jumps — there’s lots going on. You will see lots of jumps, spins, lifts and overhead lifts.”

Lizeul has been to Iowa and Cedar Rapids with other Disney on Ice adventures, and is looking forward to coming back to the area during the show’s Midwest swing.

Since December, he’s been gliding into the role of Gaston’s sidekick, LeFou, in the show’s “Beauty and the Beast” segment. That’s no one-and-done moment. Like the others in the cast, once he steps out of his featured character, he’ll join the ensembles for the other scenes that recreate magical moments from “Coco,” “Tangled,” “Cinderella,” “Rapunzel,” “Frozen” and “Moana.”

Life on the road has not only taken him to Asia, Europe, the Middle East, Canada and Mexico, but to every U.S. state except Hawaii and Alaska.

Besides getting to explore exotic and unfamiliar places, cultures and cuisines, touring also allowed him to become fluent in English, by brushing up his school-day skills with his co-workers. And he’s watched TV and movies with English subtitles.

“So that’s how I picked it up,” he said, “(adding) more words to my vocabulary.”

Spinning onto ice

He’s been studying the universal language of skating since age 4.

“After watching figure skating on TV, I told my mother that I wanted to do the same,” he said in his official bio.

He stuck that landing, eventually spinning onto the Junior French team and several international competitions. He stopped competing at age 19 and became an international judge, serving as a technician specialist for three years, playing off his technical skills as an ice dancer.

“In ice dance, when I was competing and as a judge … I’m trained to bring curves in beautiful lines and to make the choreography look prettier,” he said. “For me, ice dancers care more about lines, beauty of the choreography and to make it as pretty as we can.”

His time as a judge overlapped with college, where his parents urged him to earn a degree so he’d have something to fall back on, in case he got injured.

He kept training on ice, earned a degree in finance, and after working as a private financial adviser, began chasing his dreams by submitting a video and resume to the casting director Feld Entertainment. The organization produces and presents live shows worldwide, including Disney on Ice, Sesame Street Live! and Jurassic World Live.

As his parents feared, Lizeul was injured in his first year touring, when he caught his blade in his costume and dislocated his shoulders. As awful as that sounds, he rebounded with physical therapy, and didn’t need surgery.

The other career stumble came when the pandemic put his dream job on ice for two years. Since he’s not a U.S. citizen, the travel bans kept him in Paris. He not only continued training during that time off, but he also continued studying. Adding to his finance degree, he earned a degree in human resources, giving him even more options to fall back on.

Rewards

Now 31, he said he’s been able dovetail his college studies with his skating career, saying his work with financial clients gave him the confidence he brings to his performances.

Seeing light in the children’s eyes is a big reward for all of his hard work on and off the ice, where he spends as much time in the gym as possible and watches his diet to stay in tiptop shape, especially for the three-performance days.

Pandemic protocols keep the cast members in a bubble, but he still hopes to safely explore the cities and coffee shops on tour stops. COVID also has put audience meet-and-greets on hold, so he’s looking forward to the day when the skaters can again spend time with their young fans.

It’s the people in the seats that keep him coming back for more.

“Performing for an audience is the main thing,” he said. “I really love it, the energy they give us. I really missed that. Coming back on the road with Disney on Ice was a positivity. I am enjoying it every single day and am really grateful.”

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