Spanish Director Announces Film about Carlos Acosta

Spain, France, Germany, the United Kingdom and the Cuban Institute of Art and Cinematographic Industry (ICAIC) will participate in the stage of production

Spanish director Iciar Bollain confirmed in Havana she will direct a movie inspired on the life of famous Cuban ballet dancer Carlos Acosta and shooting will begin in autumn this year in Cuba.

According to the filmmaker, Scottish scriptwriter Paul Laverty, two-time winner of the Golden Palm at Cannes and usual writer of the Ken Loach films, wrote the script for the feature film based on the autobiographic book of the dancer: ‘No way home’, but the film won’t be a biopic.

The film will be articulated around the relation of Carlos and his father, who was very strong, very special and will reflect the life of the dancer, but the focal point will be the relation between a father and his son, director Bollain advanced to Prensa Latina.

There will be events not found in Acosta’s book and will omit others that are in the book, in the intention of not making an eminently biographic picture.

A great number of critics consider Carlos the best ballet dancer of his generation. Beyond the stage, the Cuban has two books published in the United Kingdom, one of them in the novel genre.

Bollain, recognized by the Cinema academy of her country with a Goya in 2003, is thinking on a three-stage personality: childhood, youth and adulthood, this last one interpreted by Acosta himself, as it will go into greater detail in his present as director of his own company in Havana.

This stage will detail his development as contemporary dancer, as for the other stages the filmmaker is in the process of casting.

According to the director, several entities of Spain, France, Germany, the United Kingdom and the Cuban Institute of Art and Cinematographic Industry (ICAIC) will participate in the stage of production.

Acosta was a star of the Royal Ballet of London until his retirement from the great classics in 2015, year when the

Film Critics Circle of Great Britain gave him the National Dance Award in recognition for his achievements of a lifetime dedicated to that art.

In Cuba, he also was recognized with the National Dance Award, while in the United Kingdom he received the title of Sir in 2014, when he was recognized as Commander of the British Empire.

At present, Acosta directs and dances in his own company, founded in Havana, in April, 2016.

The evolution of my company has been progressive and very strong, because we have accomplishjed to reduce the distance between the classic technique and the contemporary, he commented to this journalist a few months ago when referring to his dancers of very different training.

There you will see you cannot distinguish who is who and it is exactly what we have pursued, the idea of training the dancer of the 21st Century, who can normally assume all the world dancing trends: classic, contemporary and also hip,hop, why not, he said.

As director he wants choreographers of the world to see in Acosta Dance his dreams come true because he has dancers capable of doing everything.

About his movie, to be shot in Havana and other cities in the world, the famous Cuban dancer advanced it will have a lot of dance and he will make choreographies especially for the film.

I am very enthusiastic because the script is truly fantastic and I also play a part because, even if it is not a biography nor a documentary, but fiction, ratified the artist.

When the prince of Wales bestowed the title of Sir on the Cuban, at the Buckingham Palace, he praised Carlos for having become an inspiration for poor youths.

The movie about his life would not be the first work of Acosta in cinema, as in 2009 the actress Natalie Portman called him to at in the segment directed by her of the film New York, I Love You , and sometime after that he played a role in The day of Flowers, a movie of British director John Roberts.