From BFA To FX

After finishing a six-month run on Broadway in the musical revival of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Carousel, Anna Noble '11 is now dancing from stage to the small screen.

On April 23 the LINES Ballet BFA in Dance graduate appeared in the third episode of FX's new Fosse/Verdon drama series starring Sam Rockwell and Michelle Williams that premiered April 9. Anna played a dancing secretary in a dream sequence scene with Rockwell portraying legendary choreographer Bob Fosse.

It's another big step in Anna's dancing career. In 2017, only weeks after dancing in the premiere of an Alicia Keys music video, Anna got the call to audition for Carousel. On April 12 of 2018, Anna made her Broadway debut as a member of the Chita Rivera award-winning ensemble.

"It was a wonderful night and I couldn’t have asked for anything more. Overall, it has been such an amazing journey," Anna said then. "This a dream come true. I will be in a place where I can do what I love and perform for audiences almost every night.”

When Carousel closed on Broadway, Anna worked with choreographer Winston Brown and performed in a cancer benefit for Earl Mosley's Diversity of Dance Inc.'s "Dancing Beyond." She also performed "Conversations" in a New York City APAP Showcase doing the work of Nathan Trice. He, ironically, has set this work on the LINES BFA in Dance program.

After graduating Cum Laude in 2011 from the BFA in Dance program, Anna has persevered in a professional career that has taken her from Maine to California to Norwegian Cruise Line’s Escape to appearing in a video with a Grammy award-winning artist. Now Anna is stepping from Broadway to television.

The journey began in Hartford, Connecticut where Anna grew up. She first heard about Alonzo King’s LINES Ballet before she became a high school student at the Professional Performing Arts School in New York City.

“Alonzo King’s name in dance is large,” Anna says. “I grew up in strict ballet school and Alonzo King is known in the ballet world for contemporary ballet. I remember someone telling me about him and about his LINES Ballet developing a partnership with a college.”

That was Dominican, which launched its BFA in Dance program in 2007 in the School of Liberal Arts and Education. Anna applied to five schools, and Dominican was the first to reach out to her.

“I felt so much love from them. It felt like it was a done deal,” Anna says. “Coming to Dominican was a blessing … it was not scary at all for me coming from the east coast. I thought it was going to be an adventure. I wanted to be a part of something new.”

At Dominican, Anna said she discovered GYROKINESIS^® exercise methodologies and the “gift of choreography,” attributes she applies to her career as a freelance performing artist, dancer, teacher, and choreographer. Her goal was to be well-rounded.

“I always knew I was going to dance. Period. No matter what anyone told me, that was going to happen,” Anna says. “I came to Dominican to learn. I was full out in the moment of whatever I could soak up.”

She learned well, embracing the timing and technique she was taught.

“Alonzo King and all the teachers there were geniuses,” Anna says. “The style of ballet they teach is that you’re not a robot. You’re a 3-dimensional thinking, feeling, and spiritual being. That in a nutshell is what LINES is about.”

• Request information about Dominican’s undergraduate programs.

The LINES/BFA in Dance experience propelled Anna into a professional career that led her to Philadelphia, Washington D.C., and currently New York City. It included performing as the star dancer in a musical After Midnight that transferred from Broadway to Norwegian Cruise Line then Anna returned to land where during the summer of 2016 she was the featured dancer for Ragtime at the Ogunquit Playhouse in Maine.

Then came her big break. Through her agency, McDonald’s Selznick Associates (MSA), Anna auditioned for and was chosen for a dance scene in Alicia Keys’ music video “One Love.” Anna was paired with a high school classmate, Tislarn Bouie, when the shooting took place in Brooklyn. She waited about a year before the video was released in September 2017.

“As a dancer it was a great milestone for me to be attached to a famous name and be in a music video because I want to do everything. Overall I want to be a performer who can be hired for anything in arts.”

About two weeks after the video came out, Anna received a call-back for Carousel.

“You have to develop this peace of mind where it’s like anything can happen. You have to prepare yourself and do the best you can,” Anna says. “This is not going to be the highlight of my career. This is a springboard. What’s next? That’s always how I feel.”

What's next includes a return to Anna's hometown. She is headed to Hartford to rehearse and perform a new musical, The Flamingo Kid, a world premiere production with the Hartford Stage Company through June. It will be directed by Tony Award winner Darko Tresnjak, featuring a book and lyrics by Tony winner Robert L. Freedman (A Gentleman’s Guide to Love and Murder) and music by Tony nominee Scot Frankel (War Paint).

As they say, the show must go on and Anna appears to be in good company.

Image: Shea Vision Photography