Three-time Olympian Tessa Virtue is making a return to the performance world this month, but it’s going to look a little different than usual. The world champion ice dancer is stepping off the ice and onto the stage for her solo dance debut, and it’s going to be at one of Canada’s largest dance festivals.
Virtue was tapped by Fall for Dance North Festival artistic director Robert Binet and artist in residence Alyssa Martin to perform in the annual festival. Her performance is now a part of the festival’s first signature program, called Legends.
When the world first met Tessa Virtue at the Olympics in 2010, it was always with her ice dance partner, Scott Moir. The duo went on to become famous not just in Canada but around the world, winning gold in 2010 and becoming the first ice dancers in North America to do so, silver in 2014 and gold in 2018. They also won silver in the 2014 team event and gold in the 2018 team event. Their double gold medals at the 2018 Olympics earned them the title of the most decorated Olympic figure skaters of all time.
While the duo have since gone down separate career paths — Virtue earned an MBA and works as an executive advisor with Deloitte, while Moir is the head coach at the Ice Academy of Montreal in London, Ont. training the next generation of ice dancing duos — most of us still think of them as a pair.
But with Virtue’s festival debut, that’s all changing. She’ll be stepping into a performance without Moir for the first time. Even Virtue herself acknowledges that this is a new step, telling CBC that she asked Moir if he was available to join her for a duet (he’s too busy coaching, so don’t expect any surprise cameos at the festival).
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The performance is going to be a marriage of Canadian royalty: the work is set to Céline Dion’s “It’s All Coming Back to Me Now” (could anything be more fitting for Virtue’s comeback solo performance?).
Of course, everyone’s excited to see Virtue back on the stage, in the context of a rink or not — all three of the first dates of her program sold out and Fall For Dance North ended up adding one final performance date on Oct. 18 at 5:30 p.m., with limited tickets.
Her solo, titled An Unruly Heart, is created by Martin and will combine the artist’s approach to contemporary dance with Virtue’s desire for new forms of artistic impression. Also within the Legends program is Sweet Gwen Suite, a reconstruction featuring choreography by Bob Fosse and Gwen Verdon and performed by Hubbard Street Dance Chicago.
You can grab tickets to the program, which takes place at Bluma Appel Theatre, here.