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With Covid-19 derailing their plans to dance professionally overseas, East London’s golden dance duo and five-time Dance World Champion title holders, Chace Collett and Ashley Behrens, have spent the past two years honing their craft and training others in their hometown.
Unable to perform regularly and take their talents to international stages, the dedicated duo have had to find innovative ways to keep their careers on track during what some of the most difficult months for performers, artists, musicians and the entertainment industry as a whole throughout the world.
Collett and Behrens, who have been dance partners for more than eight years and working together for more than 10, were set to leave for the US at the beginning of 2020.
The two had secured a nine-month contract performing on a Caribbean cruise liner after auditioning with one of their daring routines.
“We call it ‘hand to hand’; it's a routine where Chace is almost always above my head, her feet barely touch the ground,” Behrens said.
But shortly before they were supposed to travel in March 2020, Covid-19 hit SA and travel bans ensued throughout the world.
Instead of letting disappointment get the better of them, Collett, 23, and Behrens, 37, have continued to train and to grow their dance brand, CHASH.
From offering online classes to students from around the world, one-on-one training sessions in East London, planning and hosting summer intensives, putting on year-end productions and more, they have strived to keep busy and motivated without taking their eye off their professional goals.
“We started teaching online and it actually took off quite a lot. We used to travel around SA a lot to teach, but everyone has had to adapt and its actually been great for the kids who are from out of town,” Collett said.
The pair have had to modify their business model, offering a variety of training packages to suit students from all over.
“In the past we would do big workshops in Cape Town and Johannesburg, but that hasn’t always been possible, so those kids took the opportunity to join in online whenever possible.
“We’ve created a few packages with month-to-month classes and drop in options too for those who couldn’t commit to a full month of classes. We’ve tried to make it very personal and allow kids to take up classes whenever they can,” Behrens said.
He said it had been a process of learning to adapt.
“We’ve had to relearn how to teach and turn the process of teaching others into a 2D experience. At first, when Covid-19 struck we took a step back, but after a while we had kids asking to dance and asking for classes.”
Collett said it had been tough to still make classes exciting and motivate students, but their online offerings had definitely helped them grow.
“Keeping kids motivated through a screen is difficult. It’s lonely without social interaction that dance classes usually allow for, but it’s also been really good for our students from out of town and we’ve even had students from overseas,” Collett said.
“We’ve taught kids from New Zealand, India and the US, so it’s opened up our business model a lot and grown our brand.”
Over this year, the duo have also started having one-on-one sessions with local dancers in their lounge turned dance studio, and finally managed to travel again, visiting Mpumalanga and the Western Cape for dance workshops when Covid-19 restrictions first eased to level 1 lockdown.
While teaching and training young dancers is something both Collett and Behrens enjoy, they have missed performing and hope to be able to continue to follow their dreams of dancing professionally again soon.
“We got our 0-1 working visas in March 2020, just before the travel bans. We had flights booked and all we needed was to do our final consulate interviews. It’s now December 2021 and we still haven’t been able to go over as our interview appointments keep getting cancelled,” Behrens said.
“We were actually moving over so we could dance professionally. Before Covid-19 we were back and forth for six years, and the plan was to be living and working as dancers in the US by now.”
And their goal has not changed. The duo hope to return to the US when it is possible and continue their careers as dancers.
Collett said there were many more opportunities for dancers and performers in the US compared to SA.
She said dancers were seen as athletes and the job — which required a lot of dedication, years of practice, passion and skill — was seen as a real career.
“Being a dancer is a profession; it’s seen as a proper job there. Here dancers don’t always get as much support and dancing often isn’t seen as a profession,” Collett said.
She said it hadn’t been easy to halt their dreams of performing for almost two years.
“We really want to dance, we don’t just want to teach and we can’t dance forever ourselves. It’s been difficult and sad not to be in the US, and I’ve definitely hit some very low lows, but we’ve just had to keep reminding ourselves of our goals,” she said.
Working on their training programmes, their own fitness and training as well as doing admin, organising their year-end production, choreographing and more, Collett and Behrens have had their work cut out for them, and motivation has not always been easy to come by.
“It’s a bit overwhelming and sometimes we have to dig deep for motivation. We’re eating lunch while sending emails and it never ends, at night we have to get to all the things we didn’t get to during the day, but we’re both very disciplined,” Collett said.
“We keep to a strict schedule and we also motivate each other a lot. Being dance partners you know you have to be there for each other and that carries through to life. We constantly communicate with each other and you have to to dance together,” Behrens said.
Training others every day as well as focusing on their own fitness, dance training and choreography, the pair have not been on stage in more than a year, but that changes with their involvement in the Alexander Playhouse’s Showstoppers and their own showcase this month.
Both growing up on the Alexander Playhouse stage, Collett and Behrens have a special connection to the quaint Cambridge theatre.
Which is why, year after year the champion dancers have returned to the theatre to help stage its annual year-end production and are involved in the 2021 production Showstoppers: One Night in Hollywood, which is directed by Jo Stemmet.
“I saw a memory on Facebook from five years ago when we were preparing for Showstoppers and we were doing it before then even, I think we started in about 2012 and we first started with the theatre’s Valentines shows,” Behrens said.
“People always ask us why we do our shows there and the answer is that the Alexander Playhouse is like a home to us.
“There are a lot of memories there and we keep going back, because we want to keep it relevant, keep audiences coming to visit the theatre to keep it going.”
Collett said it held sentimental value to the duo.
“It’s the personal connection to that theatre that keeps us coming back. It may be a small theatre but it started a lot of people’s careers.”
In 2020, the pair had also helped choreograph and stage the theatre’s Showstoppers offering, but unfortunately audiences never got to see the production.
“We got to the week before, and almost started, but then were not able to put on the show.
“Planning of things during this time is really difficult, especially a production and a community theatre production. People don’t get paid to put on a show like Showstoppers so to hold on to a cast for a year isn’t always possible.
“We put in the work, but no-one got to see it and we’ve had to redo all that work this year; it’s a different show,” Behrens said.
In spite of hardships the cast were enthusiastic and excited to be back on stage.
“We’re really glad its happening this year, we’re so happy Jo [Stemmet] decided to go ahead and you can see that even for the cast it’s a breath of fresh air. Everyone is excited to be back under the lights; back in costume.”
The two also have a couple of dance performances that form part of the show, giving audiences a real treat.
“Showstoppers is not as stressful. It’s a chance to have fun and be on stage again. It’s the first time in a year that we’re performing and we’ve missed it a lot. Performers need it and I think the audience will appreciate not having to watch another series on a screen,” Behrens quipped.
The pair have also run two summer intensive programmes during their time in SA , which have taken place over four months at the end of 2020 and again this year, both culminating in a showcase at the Alexander Playhouse.
This year, the pair have trained and prepared 25 dancers from the ages of seven to 25, who reside all over the country, for their year-end showcase.
Receiving tutorial videos in September with the various routines that will be performed in the show, the dancers have had regular training sessions online with Behrens and Collett, but have also had to rehearse on their own at home.
While keeping it fun and joyful, the duo hope to prepare young dancers for the professional world through their summer intensives.
“The dancers audition for each piece and they come to EL from all over the country. We also have a dancer from Namibia who wasn’t able to make it last year because of Covid-19.
“We start in September and teach the routines but also require them to practise at home. When the dancers get here on December 12 we then start putting the show together and perform six days later,” Behrens explained.
“We’re preparing kids for the professional industry, because it’s a big knock going from dancing in your own town, at your own studio. We’re encouraging but we also hold dancers accountable.
“Professionally, if you’re not committed then there are 500 people who will replace you. But if you put in the effort then you will get results,” Collett said.
Spending every day at the theatre during the weeklong rehearsals leading up to their performances, Collett and Behrens plan each detail and work hard to make the programme as beneficial for dancers as possible.
For those who have not had enough of their leaps, lifts and dance tricks, Collett and Behrens will also be performing in their showcase on December 19 and 20.
Breathing new life and vision into the theatre, Behrens and Collett have added LED screens with digital backdrops, extended the stage and incorporated a variety of props into their show.
“We’re very excited and the kids are excited to get here and to perform. We’ve tried to make it exciting and give audiences and dancers a chance to do something they haven’t been able to do much of,” Behrens said.
Their show will incorporate a variety of dance styles including Broadway, heel — work, hip-hop, lyrical, contemporary and more to create a colourful show filled with highs and lows.
The pair said while they looked forward to working overseas and continuing their careers as dancers, they hoped to always be able to come back to their hometown and share their skills, advice and training with young dancers.
“This is where we started so if someone believed in us here, there needs to be someone to do that for other young performers, to show them that no matter what town you come from you, can grow, jump into a big pond and succeed,” Collett said.
- The CHASH Summer Showcase takes place on December 19 and 20 at the Alexander Playhouse. Only tickets for the matinee performance on December 19 are still available. Tickets are R150 and are available by contacting Collett and Behrens at chash.sa@gmail.com
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