The Billy effect: how Billy Elliot inspired a dance revolution

Some call it the Billy Effect. When the film Billy Elliot won the hearts of cinemagoers in 2000, dance schools around the globe saw a marked uptick in the number of boys wanting to enrol.

The musical stage adaptation premiered five years later, and wherever it travelled a similar surge in the popularity of dance for boys followed. Every dancer has their own story, but for many it began with Billy.

Shaun Andrews was 12 when the show last toured Australia. Growing up in regional NSW, his experience with dance was limited to some tap and jazz lessons. An audition call-out for the role of Billy sparked a flame of inspiration, though, and he headed along to see what it was all about.

Wade Neilsen and Justin Smith in Billy Elliot The Musical, which dramatises class conflict, Thatcherite oppression and generational poverty in England's north during the miners' strike of 1984-85.

“There were loads of boys there,” he says. “I danced my little heart out and was not experienced at all, but after the audition a woman from the creative team came out with me to find my mum. She basically said, ‘You need to do ballet. I really encourage you to take up the whole ballet experience.’”

Today Andrews is a dancer with the Australian Ballet. “I’m about to start my sixth year as a professional ballet dancer and there’s no way in hell I thought that was going to happen. I mean, I’m from the Central Coast of New South Wales, I grew up by the beach, I grew up riding horses in the country. I was so far from where I am now, but the right commitment and dedication can really take you anywhere. I definitely identify with Billy Elliot.”

Australian Ballet artistic director David McAllister is a big believer in the Billy Effect. A lot of his company’s male dancers started out taking classes in tap, hip hop, street dance or other styles, and their potential for something more demanding was spotted. “What Billy Elliot did and does is make it OK for boys to do that. There’s probably a little bit more social acceptance to a boy doing tap or hip hop or even maybe jazz, but Billy Elliot breaks down that barrier to ballet as well.”

When McAllister began dancing professionally, he jokes, if you had two legs and were a boy you’d be given a job. Today that’s changed. This year the Australian Ballet took more men than women into the company, while last year Canada’s National Ballet School reported graduating more males than females. Artistic directors around the world say that it’s now easier to find men with the talents and abilities they require than women at the same level. The Billys are doing well for themselves.

The Melbourne cast of Billy Elliot the Musical, (from left) Jamie Rogers, River Mardesic, Omar Abiad, Wade Neilsen. Credit: James D Morgan/Getty Images

If it’s been a while since you last caught up with Billy – or if you’re a newcomer yourself – you might think the tale of a working class boy who defies the small-minded folk of his town to become a world class dancer is one ripe for musical adaptation. But when the stage adaptation of the original film was first announced, it was met with some not-unreasonable scepticism. Billy Elliot featured dancing and music, sure, but it was most definitely not a musical. There were music theatre-friendly themes about following your dreams and staying true to yourself, but there was also a deep dramatisation of class conflict, Thatcherite oppression and generational poverty. How was Elton John going to tackle that?

Surprisingly well, it turned out. Billy Elliot the Musical stands out from its peers as a musical that doesn’t shy away from dramatic complexity. “It’s a fully-fledged dramatic work that stands up in its own right,” says producer Louise Withers. “Because of that, you do get a greater depth of character and a greater depth of storytelling.”

Withers knows Billy better than most. She has worked on seven productions, including the original Australian tour and the one currently travelling Australia. She’s even overseen productions in Korea and Japan.

It might seem strange that a story set in rural, working class England in the 1980s resonates so strongly in East Asia today, and it’s even stranger to hear that Withers had to change very little for those productions. “It’s still a story about a young boy growing up in the north of England, and it’s still about the Maggie Thatcher moment and the mines and the strikes.”

David McAllister, artistic director of the Australian Ballet, says: "Ballet is pretty hardcore, but it’s something that all boys should have an opportunity to do."Credit: Justin Ridler

In fact, audiences in Korea and Japan relate to some aspects of the show even more closely than their Western counterparts do, Withers says. “Because they sacrifice a lot for their children, they believe in helping push their children so that their dreams come true. It’s very familiar for them to have grandma living at home with the family, and to have grandma mentoring the child as well. There are so many situations that they see themselves in and can absolutely connect. It’s about to be done for the second time in Japan and third time in Korea.”

Attention towards Billy Elliot the Musical tends to focus on the lead role, so it’s easy to forget that the show – and the film that preceded it – build a rich world around this central figure. In many ways he’s the product of his environment, and the people around him dramatise the forces that push and pull at him. They’re never just functional, however, and the changes they undergo are sometimes even more dramatic than Billy’s own.

Take Billy’s father: undoubtedly the villain of the piece, he is the primary object standing in the way of Billy’s dreams. And yet, as Withers says, “in many ways it’s his story as much as Billy’s. Billy is persistent and his determination wins through, but the father has the biggest emotional journey to travel.

“It’s a journey from ‘I don’t understand this, it’s foreign to every part of my being’ to being totally supportive and going all out to help make his child’s dreams come true.”

River Mardesic as Billy Elliot.Credit: James D. Morgan/Getty Images

Another character with a pivotal role in Billy’s life is his dance teacher, Mrs Wilkinson. Lisa Sontag, who plays the tough mentor in the current production, says that Mrs Wilkinson is taken on her own path of transformation. “What’s important is that she really is changed by the end of the piece. She’s changed by what Billy brings to her life. In the class she sees him as amusement and then she sees how good he is and he becomes her project. He becomes her reason for getting up in the morning, her muse.”

The musical is known as a challenging one for actors, particularly the notoriously tough Geordie accent they must master. The current production brought with it a lot of work, from dialect coaching to deep dives into the social conditions of Billy’s town.

“We watched a lot of documentaries, did a lot of talking, read articles from the time,” says Sontag. “We got to see their clothing, their hairstyles, what class they were in, how it was treated as a class war, the poverty they would have gone through in those 12 months of striking. How harrowing that would have been.”

Sontag can relate to Mrs Wilkinson on a more personal level, too. She has worked in music theatre for more than 20 years, but also runs a preschool music and movement program. “In an era where we’re trying to get our boys especially to talk about their feelings, your music and drama is something where kids can express themselves. It’s an outlet to let out their emotions, to jump for joy, get out a lot of energy.”

Lisa Sontag plays Billy's dance teacher, Mrs Wilkinson. Credit: James D Morgan

The 2000 film ends with only a brief glimpse of the world that young Billy finally reaches, as a now-adult Billy appears on stage as the star of Matthew Bourne’s Swan Lake. The musical gives us more, however, in the form of a striking scene in which young Billy dances together with the older self he hopes to become.

The role of Older Billy is currently played by Aaron Smyth, whose own story reflects the one he is performing. He grew up on the Gold Coast. “When people found out that I danced at school I got bullied,” he says. “I was literally the only boy for a lot of my childhood dancing.”

Smyth left Australia for New York at the age of 17, and has established for himself a remarkable career as a dancer in companies including New York’s American Ballet Theatre II, the Royal Ballet in London and Chicago’s The Joffrey Ballet. His work has led him to live in six countries, and his role in Billy Elliot marks a form of homecoming.

“Being given the opportunity to dance older Billy now, I remember what it was like at his age and I’m like, ‘Oh my god, I’ve done it. I’ve done the journey.’ It’s a huge full circle moment for me.”

Aaron Smyth, left, and Wade Neilsen play Billy Elliot at different stages of his life.Credit: James D Morgan

While the Billy Effect is real, it’s a mistake to think it’s just about boys taking up ballet. Just as young Billy is shaped by the people around him, so too are they influenced by him, and the Billy Effect is as much about changing social attitudes in general when it comes to boys dancing.

Just last year a Good Morning America presenter mocked the young Prince George for taking ballet classes, but the number who leapt to defend the prince’s enthusiasm suggests that far more people are in the #boyscandancetoo camp.

“There’s still a lot of people out there who do have a bias against male dancers and male ballet dancers particularly,” says David McAllister. “I saw the film with my dad when it first came out. I was a professional dancer by then and I remember my dad going, ‘Was I that sort of dad?’ And I was like, ‘No, Dad, you were fine.’ But I think for a lot of fathers the film was a turning point too. It did change the level of acceptance for parents. Nowadays it’s great because girls can play AFL and boys can do ballet.”

Billy Elliot The Musical opens on February 20 and runs until April 19 at the Regent Theatre. See www.billyelliotthemusical.com.au

THE BILLY EFFECT: SOME RECOMMENDATIONS

If you or someone you know find yourself in the grip of the Billy Effect, the experts say there are a few simple solutions.

“Get enrolled in some kind of school,” says Aaron Smyth, who plays the Older Billy in the current production of Billy Elliot the Musical. “Take one step at a time, not seeing the end goal of how it’s going to happen or where you want to go. That’s the best advice I’d give my younger self. One step at a time. Literally! I remind myself of that to this day.”

The Australian Ballet’s David McAllister says to take the temperature of dance in general before leaping straight into ballet. “I’d recommend going to your local dance school. Ballet is pretty hardcore, but it’s something that all boys should have an opportunity to do.”

Australian Ballet dancer Shaun Andrews suggests a brave attitude: “You have to jump into it. There’s no ‘safe’ approach. It’s about really embracing the whole moment ... All of the local dance studios would love having boys. Anyone who’s in the company that I’m with now started out being the only boy in the dance studio, or one of very few.”

Performer Lisa Sontag warns that dance isn’t for the weak-willed. “It’s completely disciplined and athletic. It can be such an individual pursuit. You’re working on your own technique, your own athleticism, honing your skills ... because it is such an individual pursuit you’re really in competition with yourself. I think it’s very important within sport to be being happy with other people’s successes and not take it as a bad thing but as inspiration for you to try harder. That’s what Billy does.”