ICE DANCE CHAMPS HIT THE ROAD

It stands to reason that Olympic Gold Medal ice dancers Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean would have solid dance backgrounds. How else would they get to be world champions?

Not so, say the British pair, in town this week with an 18-member company to begin their first U.S. tour (Friday at 8 p.m., and Saturday at 1 p.m. at the Forum).

“Our first skating coach was very technically minded and made us think up our own routines,” Dean explains. “That’s when we began a learning process by watching dance and getting involved with music. Our formal training was on the ice.”

“We started ballet class two years ago,” Torvill adds, “and it certainly helped our skating--it enables us to understand and control our bodies and to move more easily.”

Skating partners for 11 years, pioneers in the art of ice dancing (an event new to the Olympics in 1976) and veterans of numerous competitions, Torvill, 29, and Dean, 28, are authorities on this specialized skating/dancing hybrid. They point out several differences between floor and ice dancing.

“Skating is all about speed and motion,” says Dean. “Your standing leg is in a slight plie , but you must keep your free leg in a clean, straight line and your torso correct, all while moving. What you do on the floor is different on ice because your center of balance shifts forward slightly to compensate for motion. We find our balance off the ice is harder because we’re so used to that motion.”

“Distance and space are other factors,” says Torvill. “Dancers dominate the stage, but skaters on ice feel minute; it’s such a huge space to cover. And we always work in the round, as opposed to stage dancers, who are seen front-on by the audience.”

Adds Dean, “The skates themselves can be a distraction to the audience, and we have to ‘disguise’ them by getting the right extension and turnout so people see only the dancing, not the skating.”

Torvill and Dean say the choreographic process can begin with either music or concept. “It used to take us two or three months to choreograph a piece,” Dean says, “but we’ve learned to be quicker by working with other choreographers. We get on well with contemporary choreographers like Graeme Murphy from the Sydney (Australia) Ballet Company, who’s done several numbers for us.”

“We choreographed in bits at first,” Torvill says, “but now we get the whole thing done roughly and then go back and polish. Chris is the idea person and I’m his guinea pig, but I usually decide what works. We also have our ballet master constantly watching us and making notes.”

“It’s much easier now that we’re professionals,” Dean says. “As amateurs we had four minutes to perform under pressure, but now we have all the time and creative freedom we need to establish a mood, with no restrictive rules. That’s why we started our own company: to do what suits us rather than fit ourselves into someone else’s format. We didn’t want clowns or high-kicking girls, we wanted a dance show.”

Torvill and Dean place their company style somewhere between the Ice Capades and the John Curry company. “He (Curry) appeals to a ballet audience and works on the stage,” Dean explains, “while we’re more contemporary and we prefer to skate in large arenas for speed and movement.”

As for the direction ice dancing has taken in recent years, Dean sees a narrowing of creative opportunities. “Since we retired from competition, the amateur world has introduced more regulations, which are stifling the art. It’s hard to be original within those limitations, and we hope they’ll get past that.”

With their lives currently devoted to rehearsing and performing, Torvill and Dean have little free time, but do see as much theater and dance as they can.

Looking ahead, Dean says, “We hope the show will have a life of its own and we hope we’ll be involved artistically, perhaps start a skating school. It’s taken us a lot of time to gain the knowledge we have and it would be a waste not to pass it along to others who would appreciate it.”