The man behind the magic of Sleeping Beauty
MAGALIESSIG - As excitement builds before the opening of Sleeping Beauty on Ice, the man behind the magic, Tony Mercer is hard at work perfecting the production.
Mercer is the artistic director of the Imperial Ice Stars, and has a background in theatre production as well as having been a lighting specialist and tour manager for recording artists.
However Mercer always had a great love for figure skating, and while watching a figure skating show in 1989 he hit on the idea of theatre on ice.
“The show I was watching had incredibly talented dancers but the peformance lost its magic for me because of the freezing cold arena, uncomfortable plastic chairs and bad lighting.”
It took 14 years for Mercer’s dream to eventually be realised, but in 2003 the Imperial Ice Stars was officially formed.
Mercer’s greatest challenge in staging theatre on ice has been to change the audience’s mindset.
“It’s the [belief] that figure skating is performed on a 60m rink so it is [believed] the skaters can’t perform elements properly on a stage because the space is too small, but you must remember that figure skating is done on an icerink designed for playing ice-hockey. [Figure skaters] don’t really need that much space,” he said.
Mercer explained that when he creates a production he always aims to give the audience a different perspective.
“I like to make the stories more real and human rather than fairytales. I never want to go too far because the productions are for everyone, young and old – but I don’t believe in doing something the same way just because it’s always been done that way,” he explained.
Mercer said that he especially loved South African audiences. “South Africa doesn’t have a history of ice-dancing but I think this gives the audiences an open mind. I don’t like it when people call ice-dancing ‘ballet on ice’. It is a totally separate dance form and I think South African audiences judge our performances with that in mind,” he concluded.
