Proximus Stars on Ice Belgium, 2003
Text
& Photos © Joy
Stars on
Ice, one of the most famous ice-shows, was finally in Europe, for the
first and hopefully not for the last time.
It’s
a show with lots of well-known and popular skaters. My report will talk
about all of them, using the order in which they skated in the first half
as a guide-line.
At first
the opening, a woman whose name I forgot (Sabine something), announced
several things around the show in Dutch and French. And after that the
fun really started:
Morning
by Edvard Grieg
Was the opening music where all the skaters came on the ice, the individual
skaters did some jumps and spins, the ice-dancers showed several lifts.
What
are you doing with the rest of your life? by Barbra Streisand
This was Katarina Witt’s programme for the first
part. Her skating is nice and elegant and gracefull, but unfortunately
doesn’t appeal to me very much, same goes for her second piece:
‘Fever’ from True Story. Especially in this part
she could have tried to get the audience to participate, by snapping their
fingers, but nothing of the kind. |
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Third
to come on the ice, announced as the local boy by this Sabine, who told
the audience that just before the show he said to her how ‘cool’
it was to be skating there. Funny though that he seemed to said so on
Sunday-afternoon as well.
Of course I’m talking now about Belgium’s ‘own’
Kevin van der Perrren.
In the first half he skated to ‘the age of cathedrals’
from the Notre Dame de Paris- Soundtrack. In the second part of the
show he did his short programme at Astor Piazzola’s ‘Tanguera’.
I liked both programmes, good skating, nice steps good jumps. But specifically
his short programme was very appealing to me. Hopefully he skates this
well in Dortmund.....
Next to skate
were Shae-Lynn Bourne & Victor Kraatz. They used
for their music ‘Snake Charmer’ – Gregorian.
Great lifts, nice footwork, bit of an abstract, but nicely done programme.
In the second half they had a . |
very
funny performance, in which she kind of teased him by waving at him first
to come and then to skate away from him. At some point she even dropped
him on the ice. Music then was ‘Sway ’ by Michael Bubble
And
then again another woman’s single skater, Jennifer Robinson.
She used for her programmes ‘Welcome to Cuba’ from the soundtrack
of Die another day and in the second part ‘Teach me Tiger’
by Pink Martini/Ray Charles. At Bofrost 2002 I really liked this girl, she
had some ‘sparkle’ about her which defenitely made her a very
enjoyable skater. But now she seemed to lack that same sparkle, she did
her programmes and she laughed doing so, but it all seemed to me to be happening
some way by using ‘the automatic pilot’. She was just going
through the motions, I guess. Shame, but nice skating though, just not like
last year’s.
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‘Jungle
Dance’ - Deep Forest/Sacred Space and ‘Oriental Dance’-
Hisham
This was the music Margarita Drobiazko & Povilas Vanagas
used for their skating acts. Both of them are very hard to describe. Definitely
good skating, nice moves and lifts but a little abstract, which I very
much liked, however.
Steven
Cousins used in the first part of the show Bruce Springsteen’s
‘Streets of Philadelphia’. Not my kind of thing. I must
admit: he used the music in a terrific way and most people around me enjoyed
it very much, I heard some of them say that he had a nice smile. My opinion
about his smile in this act wasn’t really good, it was more like:
“here he comes with his fake would-be sexy smile”. But to
stay honest, my thoughts about him changes quickly when he came on the
ice the second time together with Viktor and Katarina (more about this
later). And I really liked his second solo-act ‘Disco Science’
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much.
In this act he skates in a black leather pair of trousers and sunglasses.
Nice jumps, great hip-movements, a joy for the eye.
Oksana Baiul was next to skate, this made a carribbean
impression on me, using Jennifer Lopez music, ‘Aint it Funny’.
An enjoyable programme. Her second performance was her Olympic Medal winning
programme on Tsaikovsky’s ‘Swan Lake’ Still as
nice as it was then, however I have the
impression
there were more jumps in it then, but who cares.... Funny thing was that
she fell on her buttocks during the Saturday night show (no, not funny that
she fell....) and after her programme, when she was taking her bows she
pointed to the spot on the ice where she fell, she rubbed her behind and
pouted. She definitlely won the audience’s heart by doing so.
Next
to come on the ice were Barbara Fusar-Poli & Maurizio Margaglio,
who used Lara Fabian’s ‘Adagio’ for their first
appearance. Good programme, with lots of dramatic expressions on Maurizio’s
face. Their second act was their Olympic Bronze Medal winning Rock’n’Roll
at ‘I will survive’ as played by the Hermes House Band.
Still very nice to watch, they really seem to enjoy skating it.
Ekaterina Gordeeva is such an elegant and graceful skater, I could’ve
watched her skating two or three programmes in a row. In the first halve
of
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the
show she used ‘A Sunday Kind of Love’ by Etta James.
In the second half ‘The Red Scarf’ by Stemia. In
this programme she really made an excellent use of the mentioned red scarf.
Beautiful!
Next was
Katia’s husband to skate: Ilia Kulik. His first
programme, Green Tomatoes by Rick Braun was very exciting, he
seemed to have a ball doing it. Ilia laughed and jumped and was so thrilling
to watch I really cannot describe it any further. He never stood still
for a moment, and that is very hard to photograph, like the picture to
the right shows.
His second act was more serious, using James Ingram’s House
is not a Home. But excellent skating here as well, wow.
At the end
of Ilia’s first programme Katarina Witt returned
on the ice with two guys;
Steven
Cousins and Viktor Kraatz
behind her. She skated towards Ilia, stroke her arm along his neck and he
could go. The rest of the programme was a lot of throwing Katarina from
one guy to the other. Both men seemed to really enjoy this act, especially
Viktor had a very broad grin on his face all the time. Their music was ‘Hotter
than blues’ by Quincy Jones.
After this threesome the first half of the show was over and Sabine was
doing some kind of lottery just before the break on Saturday. Sunday she
was thanking all of the sponsors.
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After the break was
over, the second part started and all skaters did their second act, just
a little different order from the first part. Since I already mentioned
their second programmes in my description of the first half I won’t
repeat it now.
Ilia was the last to skate in part two, before the ending, which was skated
to Sister Sledge’s We are family. At first all the girls
came on the ice, wearing costumes that reminded me a bit of an aerobics
class. It took a while and than the boys came out as well.
Trying to get a standing ovation from my surroundings (Sunday-show), I
was the only one standing in my block..........
Overall I liked the show very much, I was really glad to get my hands
on a ticket for the Sunday-show, so I could go another time after Saturday.
Hopefully they’ll be back next year (or sooner....).
Go to Photo Gallery
*** Previously published by Europe on Ice
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