'Nature has a judgment'

Asif Kapadia has never seen a ballet, and Akram Khan has never made a film: the duo talk about their new climate crisis dance movie, Creature

- Tanjil Rashid

INTERVIEW

Asif Kapadia and Akram Khan

IN THE OPENING SCENE OF CREATURE, a new film based on an English National Ballet production at Sadler’s Wells two years ago, a man appears out of nowhere, writhing, squirming, twitching. He is not in agony but suffering from something possibly worse: bewilderment. When he walks, he loses his footing. It’s a ballet turned upside down; instead of rising to the air in an elegant saute, the dancer flounders uncomfortably on the ground. Creature, as the nameless protagonist is known, has been transplanted to an entirely unfamiliar environment – a polar research station – where he is being subjected to an experiment to test the limits of the human body to endure cold, isolation and homesickness.

The architects of this film were themselves transplanted to an unfamiliar environment when making it. Asif Kapadia, known for directing documentary portraits of Amy Winehouse and Diego Maradona, had never even been to see a ballet when he was asked to adapt this one for the cinema. It would also be a first feature film for Creature’s originator, Akram Khan, a choreographer known for injecting a heavy dose of south Asian and contemporary dance into the genteel ballet world. Khan has won an Olivier award and Kapadia an Oscar. Despite their mastery of their disciplines, neither has dared venture too far outside them – until now.