Choreographer's Carnival, Opportunities for New Media

This past Wednesday, as an intern at a dance talent agency, I was lucky enough to be able to go VIP to Hollywood's monthly Choreographer's Carnival that's held on Sunset Boulevard at the Key Club. This post will describe the amazing experience of Carnival and how technology could be further utilized to promote it.

Going to Carnival is a great learning experience for me, featuring new work by professional dance choreographers, producers, directors, and dancers. As a prospective business person or creative production force of the dance industry, steady exposure to Carnival is invaluable.

Here's a little about Carnival from their website just to introduce you to it if you've never heard of it: "Carnival started eight and a half years ago to give working choreographers and dancers a venue where they can have free artistic expression without the constraints of an artist, a director, or a script. Carnival is an event where it features not only choreographers from the film and video industries, but from all over the world: -Paris, Japan, New York, Las Vegas, Texas, Florida, and many more... Where else can you see a show that highlights not only hip hop but ballet, funk, lyrical, tap, modern, performance art, and spoken word? Only at the Carnival, whre you get more dance for your dollar."

Here are a couple performances from last week's Carnival:

I appreciate many things about Carnival and what it does for the dance industry:

1. Increases exposure of dancers and choreographer's work to a more popular, mainstream audience
   
2. Provides a place for the dance community to meet and thrive
   
3. Allows professionals in the dance industry to see new and promising talent
   
4. Offers a welcoming, free space for artists in the dance world to showcase their work
   
5. Puts on a legit dance show monthly in the heart of Hollywood
   

On the flip side, there are some issues Carnival creates that doesn't support a thriving industry:

1. Dancers and choreographers aren't paid for their work (The Key Club must be making outrageous profits)
   
2. Time and effort spent to present this work unpaid detracts from valued professionalism, open scheduling, and quality of paid, industry jobs
   
3. It seems about 90% of the view of the stage are obstructed, which detracts from viewers' experience
   
4. Past Carnival performances are never revisited for monetization purposes
   

Carnival could:

1. Create a better website with online purchasing options where one could download a high quality video of a particular performance for an affordable rate. This would decrease the amount of piracy and free downloading of Carnival performances on YouTube
   
2. Collect tips for dancers on site and distribute funds accordingly (although the reason The Key Club is avoiding this is probably so that people spend all their money on drinks at the club)
   
3. Build a social networking site where scheduling and communication is mainstream and made available to all the necessary people. This could even extend to a dancer's agency where they could align schedules and check for availability of a particular client based on Carnival.
   
4. Create a yearly DVD of "The Best of Carnival" with different editions for different cities. All could be sold together as a box set. It could even be offered through Netflix or as On Demand on Digital Cable
   
5. Make that DVD release in 3D theaters around the country for wider distribution
   
6. Revolutionize the dance industry by somehow making the show a 3D live event in theaters on a monthly basis. It would become the national event of the tightly knit and ever-growing dance community
   

All in all, Carnival is offering a great service to many dancers and choreographers. It's increasing publicity and legitimacy for an industry that hardly gets the credit it deserves. However, it could do so much more to maximize the influx of cash from producing and performing a monthly show. By taking advantage of the long tail on the internet, as well as new media like 3D live action films, Carnival could propel the dance industry into a full fledged, well paying entertainment industry instead of a group of struggling, undervalued artists.

Dance in Movie Theaters

To extend my last post about the upcoming film, Step Up 3-D, I'm going to share some of my ideas on how dance can be further integrated into theaters and other mainstream culture.

Simply speaking, the majority of the population no longer goes to live shows, theaters, and concerts-- unless they're in NYC and want to see Wicked on Broadway. Imagine if actor's performances were limited to stage concerts. Their revenues would be a marginal compared to the amount of money they are able to pull down by being distributed in thousands of theaters in the United States, as well as all over the world.

Before you dismiss me for a dancer who's delusional about the ability for a non-film to be competitive with cinematic distribution, let's look at some examples of how the music industry has used 3D live action film technology to expand their distribution and profits. There are two music concerts in particular from this year that have impressed audiences around the world and gained great profits for the struggling music industry: 1. U2 3D, which has made more than $6.5 million in the US box office so far, and 2. Hannah Montana/Miley Cirus: Best of Both Worlds Concert Tour that has already grossed over $64 million in the US since its release in early February!!!

Here's a YouTube video of the U2 3D concert so that you can see for yourself what's appealing about presenting various performance arts in these new 3D live action theaters:

And here's a posting from a U2 fan on YouTube about his experience:

"Basically put it like this, you would think the band was beside you, at one point Bono reaches out his hand to the camera and it looks like you're in front of him and at the start of the film the camerica cut the crowd and a fan jumped, I was about the tell the person in front of me to sit down, that's how realistic it is, hope you can get to see it, as I said to my mates, it's the closest you'll get to being on stage with the Greatest Band Ever..." 

And just for you Hannah Montana fans... (I know you're out there)... here's a clip from her concert:

I think dance concerts should have a special place in cinemas... Some may argue that dance is not as mainstream or popular as music in terms of being able to pull in a large profit throughout the United States. This may be true for now, simply because the dance industry has failed to revolutionize and adapt to remain relevant with the prospect of new media.

I would also urge those who think a properly marketed dance show wouldn't be profitable in 3D live action theaters to remember a few recent dance related movies and their resonance in the cinema industry as proven by their respective box office revenues:

-Stomp The Yard: $61,365,221 in the US

-Step Up: $65,269,010 in the US

-Step Up 2 The Streets: $45,448,225 in the US

-You Got Served: $40,066,497 in the US

-Hairspray: $118,823,091 in the US

And as if that weren't enough, think about all the successful TV shows that showcase different types of dance: ABC's Dancing With The Stars, MTV's Americas Best Dance Crew, of one of the summer season's highest rated shows, FOX's So You Think You Can Dance, which doesn't even rely on celebrities from other industries to bolster audience viewership. Here's a clip from SYTYCD:

It's clear that dance is growing and creeping into the mainstream entertainment industry. It's time dance concerts come to 3D live action movie theaters. This will a create an experience that's over all:

         1. cheaper than a concert

         2. presented up close and personal

         3. more convenient for all people around the US