Initially, dancing for me was just for pocket money. The dancers are paid well and you get paid on a daily basis. Eventually when I got promoted as an assistant choreographer I was getting paid more. This was during my college days.
The choreographer for the Milton Berle show wanted me to audition. I walked away from that.
I think, as a choreographer and an action designer, you're constantly giving your characters problems to overcome. That's what makes it fun for choreography. But it also makes it fun for the audience to see them solve those puzzles and how they are as a human being.
The thing is that when you are a director, you need to be involved in a lot of different fields. You must be a psychologist, an architecture expert; you must be a choreographer.
When you're a choreographer and you put so much into a routine that's emotionally driven, those are like my ideas and my little babies that I have here and then I put them out there and they're there to be judged and looked at. When it's all over, it's just such a relief.
The Horny Toad in Cave Creek has great food. When I'm in Arizona, I have at least one meal there. I have a daughter who lives out there, and Dee Dee Wood, who was the choreographer on 'Mary Poppins,' lives out there. I still get out there once in a while, but not in the summer.
I never danced a step in my life so naturally. My first motion picture was a musical, and Bob Fosse was the choreographer. I didn't exactly dance for Fosse, I just did the best that I could to do what he taught us to do.
It's an incredible dilemma to be an artist of color and to always be in denial about that, saying, 'I'm a choreographer first and then I'm black,' when in fact, that's not the case. I'm black first and then I'm also a choreographer.
I'm not a good choreographer: I can't remember what I put down.
In Hong Kong, particularly, we craft this art for decades. The action choreographer actually is the action director. He takes over and he choreographs with - by himself or with his team, and place the camera where he feels cinematic effect to bring out that choreography.
