Tell us a bit about yourself, particularly why you chose to focus on contemporary dance.

I’m 34 years old and live in Victoria, Gozo with my family: my husband Marc and my son Gulio. I was born and spent my childhood in Xewkija with my parents and sister. I was brought up to go church and doctorine lessons every single day of my childhood years.

I encountered the stage at a very young age at our parish centre. Our Parish Priest, the Reverend Archpriest Carmel Mercieca used to put up operettas every year. All kids and teens had no choice but to take part because he believed in the potential of children. He never treated us as just kids. He gave us important roles and demanded for the parts to be delivered properly, as he would expect from an adult. He used to push us to our limits while working very hard himself after spending long hours on his black typewriter to translate and convert the operetta in Maltese. 

I remember my evenings sitting in his office, on his beige floral print sofa, reading the script in question. The productions always started with the reading of the script verses to the other performers and discussing the roles. That's where it always started. I have such vivid memories of the excitement surrounding the stage… the people walking about, the make-up being retouched, the smell in the costume wardrobes, the ladies who used to help out during the nights of the operettas, and naturally preparing  stacks of luncheon meat and butter sandwiches – the cast's favourites. They always came with glasses of hot tea and lemon. I am still a big fan of tea and lemon!

I cherish those moments and am very grateful to this man as he taught me the most valuable thing in life; to believe in my capabilities and to believe in the younger generation. He has instilled in me his love and respect for theatre which I today translate into dance. I believe that is why Naupaca Dance Factory's dance methodoly and approaches inevitably tend to have a strong theatrical style.

When and why did you set up the Naupaca Dance Factory?

Naupaca Dance Factory was established in 2004 as a contemporary dance organisation made up of a group of individuals coming from different artistic backgrounds, who strive to create and share ideas about bodily movement and artistic expression. We constantly seek to explore dance as an interdisciplinary medium, and to present to audiences a sense of performance that is both limitless and visionary.

Does being based in Gozo present any particular challenges or advantages compared to dance companies in Malta?

Like every other dance company in the world, we walk into our studio prepared for long hours of training and rehearsals. There are no particular advantages or disadvantages – I see Malta and Gozo as one whole beautiful country with so much cultural resources to offer. Due to its small size, we need to unite our energy in order to promote the cultural aesthetic which makes our islands. When and if we succeed, we will take the glory as a whole country. 

How seriously is this type of modern dance taken in Gozo?

Our production Alice's Adventures Underground last year was similar to The Death of Snow White.  We secured a full house at the Aurora Opera House twice. Thankfully, seats for The Death of Snow White also sold like hotcakes. I guess this speaks for itself – once our audiences have made the decision to want to witness our productions, they would have inevitably crossed over to Naupaca’s side and would want to keep re-experiencing new forms of dance and performance. That is, at least, what we hope to be the case.

Do you plan collaborations with other dance companies and international artists?

Stephan Pechar is Czech and he is a professional dancer at the National Ballet of Prague. He will be dancing the role of the Prince in The Death of Snow White.  I can say that it's on our agenda to keep establishing links and collaborating with other artists on a larger scale for future productions. Unfortunately funds are always the main problem which restricts us from expanding faster, and sadly for our past and current productions we failed to be awarded any national or EU grants.

Why did you choose the Snow White fairy tale as the basis for this dance show?

Everything finds its basis with what inspires us. During the last weeks of Alice's Adventures Under Ground last year, Luke Azzopardi (production & costume designer) and I had noticed that we had the perfect candidate for the role of Snow White (Marise Grech) enroled within the company. That's where it all started – after studying her movement and testing her through her performance as a dancer in Alice's Adventures Under Ground we were sure that Snow White was our next big venture. We actually started working on this upcoming production in the last two weeks of Alice's Adventures Under Ground. Marise (who will play the role of Snow White – Nix Candida) has inspired us. Later on we started researching and discussing ideas and concepts in order to develop what would be our final script and product: The Death of Snow White. Marise has worked particulary hard this year – I am confident she is going to justify why she is onstage in the leading role.

The DEATH of Snow White is quite a dramatic title. One can assume that it is a dark and deep story correct?

We have used the original Grimm Brothers’ story titled Little Snow-White as basis for our script and have kept very faithful to it. Our chosen title is fruit of the conceptual fields our script explores, particularly the breakdown of conventions of narratology and chronology, beauty, maturity and death. Audiences of all ages will be able to grasp the essential core of the story, but naturally only a critical eye would be able to fully comprehend the reasons for the deconstruction of the chronology and come in contact with death as we would like it to be portrayed. We have also taken artistic liberty to explore most of the story’s thematic elements through a biblical aesthetic and form of narration, as well as through a rather orientalised visual.

Tell us a little bit about your fellow crew behind the show.

The production is being co-ordinated and managed by Deborah Agius, who will also be dancing the role of the Queen – Regina in the production. She joined Naupaca in December 2010 upon accepting the role of the main dancer in The Dream; An Imaginary Transition During Sleep.

Luke Azzopardi, the designer in charge of the Production Aesthetic & Costumes also got on board during this production, and has since been arguing with me on many literal and conceptual levels about what should come first at Naupaca: the choreography or the costumes. For this production, he has decided to depict the contrast between the Queen – Regina and Snow White – Nix Candida through the splitting of the visual content into two parts; a Gothic and imposing aesthetic through religious iconography and another orientalised/eastern visual which could be linked to Japanese Art from the end of the first millenium. 

Maria Theuma, the scriptwriter and concept artist joined Naupaca Dance Factory before preparations for Alice and for Snow White has focused her efforts on writing a set of narrations written in a Biblical verse to be danced to onstage. From production to production, other artists collaborate with us, and this time we have the aforementioned Stephan Pechar dancing as the Prince and composer Lukas Grech who has composed an original music score.

The show is on at the MCC, Valletta, on 9 December at 8pm. Naupaca Dance Factory would like to thank Mr Ray Attard at MCC and Dr Michael Caruana at Aurora Opera House for their support for this production. Tickets & bookings are available at www.mcc.com.mt and at MCC booking office, open daily from 10am to 1pm & 5pm to 7pm. Tickets start from €15. For more information please visit www.naupacadancefactory.com