https://www.thestar.com/entertainment/s … allet.html

After winning the prestigious Prix de Lausanne earlier this year, Shale Wagman had offers from around the world.

Sorry Canada — the ballet prodigy, who recently turned 18, is dancing off to England.

“I chose the English National Ballet, because they have a very versatile repertoire so they do many different types of ballet. They have neo-classical works, they have contemporary works and above all, they do classical ballets. So they have a very, very vast repertoire, which I love, and they have many performances,” the Vaughan resident said in a recent interview.

Another big reason? Wagman will join the company as a corps de ballet member, not as an apprentice, meaning a shot at the good parts instead of being part of the background ensemble.

Wagman has been dancing since the age of 61/2 — including other forms of dance, like tap, jazz, hip hop and contemporary — winning virtually every competition he entered. At 11, he competed in Canada’s Got Talent, where he was voted the judges’ favourite and won high praise from comedian/actor Martin Short.

At 13, Wagman won the Youth America Grand Prix, the largest competition of its kind in the world, and received scholarship offers from schools as diverse as the Houston Ballet Academy and Russia’s Bolshoi Academy. He chose the Princess Grace Academy in Monaco where he spent four years perfecting his craft — and his French.

But the coup de grace was the Prix de Lausanne, which since 1973 has been the most coveted prize from dancers between 15 and 18. While Canadians have won prizes at the competition in the past, Wagman is the first to take the top prize, meaning he got to choose from about 50 companies worldwide. Wagman also won the Nureyev Foundation award for artistry, usually given to non-prize winners.

Directors from London’s Royal Ballet, the Royal Swedish Ballet, the Stuttgart Ballet, the American Ballet Theatre and the San Francisco Ballet were lining up to recruit him.

Just a year earlier, a spinal fracture threw Wagman’s future into doubt, leaving him confined to a bed and in a brace for three months.

“Not being able to dance was horrible. I just had to lie on my bed and stay still and not do anything. It was really hard because I’ve never experienced being off for so long. Especially being in the back brace, I had no mobility. It was really hard and I was in a lot of pain,” Wagman recalled.
“But you know, through that I became a lot stronger mentally and physically. I found a new way of working and using my muscles. After my injury, I came back better. It was just a very big learning experience.”

Wagman credits Vlad Novitski, who operates a dance school in Richmond Hill, with spotting his talent early on.

“He moves like cat,” Wagman intones with a Russian accent, mimicking the words Novitski first said to mother Heather Wagman. Tatiana Stepanova, who runs her own ballet school, also played a key role when he started serious training in ballet at 13.

Wagman, the youngest of three boys, said he was shy as a child but his parents encouraged him to pursue dance from the outset.

“It was my whole entire existence from that first time I danced,” Wagman said, noting he did receive some mocking from his peers growing up.

“My whole existence in dance relies on my artistry. Of course, technique in dance is really important … but the way you feel is much more important, what you project artistically when you dance, what you give to the audience — the emotion you project.

“Every time I’m sad and I want to express myself, I always turn to dance. It’s like having a companion, it’s like a best friend. When I dance, everything just goes away and I feel much better,” he said.

“I have so much passion. Dance is the air I breathe.”

Bruce DeMara is a Toronto-based reporter covering entertainment at the Star. Follow him on Twitter:@bdemara