Shall We Dance?
The story of a man’s renewal
Chicago lawyer John Clark (Richard Gere) knows his life is almost perfect. He loves his beautiful wife (Susan Sarandon), he’s built a successful career and raised two wonderful kids. And yet … the workday is always the same routine, the commute is a grind and the family’s usually too busy to spend time together. Sometimes John wonders if this is all there is, until one evening on his way home from work he gets off his train and does the unthinkable. Without telling a soul, he secretly begins taking dance lessons. Suddenly, John is thrust into a whole new world - of motion, music, camaraderie and passion. As this very serious man becomes literally light on his feet, his whole life, and marriage, transforms.
The uplifting and comic story of a man’s renewal, Shall We Dance is inspired by the runaway Japanese hit of the same name. In this new version, starring Richard Gere, Jennifer Lopez, Susan Sarandon and Stanley Tucci, the tale of a quiet workaholic finding wild rapture on the dance floor is transported to the American search for happiness,
It all begins when John Clark is riding the evening train, and spots out his window a young dance teacher (Jennifer Lopez) staring back at him from the run-down Miss Mitzi’s Studio. Haunted by her gaze, John looks for her night after night. Finally, he gets off the train and signs up for the beginner’s series of ballroom dance lessons. At his first class, John spends more time on the floor than gliding across it. Awkward and shy, it seems unlikely he’ll ever find any grace at all. But soon, dance becomes John’s obsession, his escape, his one means of pure joy. He’s drawn further and further into this exotic realm, even discovering a fellow employee who’s also hiding his ballroom dance habit (Stanley Tucci), while pretending to be a sports jock.
Yet John cannot seem to tell his wife Beverly about his new-found love out of fear that she’ll think he’s unfulfilled by their marriage. As he clandestinely prepares for Chicago’s biggest dance competition, his secretive behavior causes Beverly to hire a detective, suspecting that John’s having an affair. But John will soon discover that it isn’t enough to chase his most private dreams - because the best part is sharing them.
“Shall We Dance is not just about a restless man entering the seductive world of dance,” says director Peter Chelsom, “but about a whole group of people who through a kind of boot camp for dancers, get to explore who they really are and who they want to be. From the start of rehearsals I wanted us to acknowledge that the film should not be a story then a dance number, then more story and so on, but that the story always continued through the dance scenes and most importantly the story was actually furthered by the dancing.”