Suzi-ann Ryan

take every opportunity that comes your way

25 year old Australian Ballet School graduate Suzi-Ann Ryan can be scene in this years most talked about dance film, Mao’s Last Dancer. She is currently touring with Graeme Murphy’s AIDA for the Sydney Opera.

How did you hear about Mao’s? 

I got a SMS from a friend of mind who teaches at Sydney Dance Company telling me there was an audition on that afternoon. I was outside Sydney and I didn’t make the audition. Just by luck I managed to get my CV to Graeme and Janet, and I got a call the next day from the assistant director asking if I’d like to be a part of the movie, which was very, very exciting. Apparently Janet said she wanted to have me because she saw the Swan Lake photo I sent with my CV. They asked me to understudy the part of [Lorrie] Madeleine Eastoe’s part. 

How did you feel?

I was really, really excited.  I wasn’t sure what was going to be expected of us other than the dancing, so I actually went and did a short course at NIDA for acting, just to be prepared, just in case. Yeah, just keeping up my classes and making sure I was in good shape. 

What was your favourite moment of the experience?

I enjoyed Rite of Spring just because of working with Graeme and Janet.  That was amazing, but generally just all of it. It was so different to live theatre and what we are normally used to doing. 

Can you explain those differences to us?

Well, normally as dancers, we’re so self-disciplined and we have to make sure our hair and make-up’s done and we’re warm and we’re ready to go, and you know, everything is about us. And on the set, everything was done for us. So we get ushered in at 4.00am and our make-up would just be done, and our hair would just be done, and we’d  just be told to relax until they needed us. So it was amazing  just having people do everything for you. The biggest obstacle was staying warm, because you didn’t know when they were going to call you. They say 15 minutes, and then three hours later is when you got called.  So it was very hard to try and stay warm, but that’s just what we did, constantly stretching and staying warm, and moving.

Was there any one particular thing that you could say that you took away from the experience?

I was just so grateful to work with the people that I was working with, Madeleine Eastoe the amazing dancers, and Stephen Heathcote who I’ve loved since I was a little girl.  It was just amazing to work with that calibre of people.