00:00:09.609 --> 00:00:10.442
Okay.

00:00:10.442 --> 00:00:12.140
All right, okay.

00:00:12.140 --> 00:00:15.320
So, there's thing about well, I will never be considered,

00:00:15.320 --> 00:00:18.150
in the dance world, as simply a dancer.

00:00:18.150 --> 00:00:21.060
I will always be looked at as an anomaly.

00:00:21.060 --> 00:00:22.240
I can not be compared.

00:00:22.240 --> 00:00:26.000
I can't be sort of set next to any of these other

00:00:26.000 --> 00:00:28.290
whatever great dancers that might be out there,

00:00:28.290 --> 00:00:31.350
that, you know, are sort of the hallmarks of dance.

00:00:31.350 --> 00:00:32.770
Who's saying that?

00:00:32.770 --> 00:00:33.900
I'm saying that.

00:00:33.900 --> 00:00:35.130
I'm saying that because that's how I,

00:00:35.130 --> 00:00:37.433
I mean that's how I experienced, you know,

00:00:40.954 --> 00:00:42.127
the dance world, you know,

00:00:42.127 --> 00:00:47.127
'cause they supposedly have this big focus on dance

00:00:47.767 --> 00:00:51.115
and the body and all that, but the reality is that,

00:00:51.115 --> 00:00:53.565
you know, they're interested in the perfect body.

00:00:54.545 --> 00:00:57.712
(light ambient music)

00:01:15.115 --> 00:01:16.848
He's known as the Crutch Master

00:01:16.848 --> 00:01:18.752
and he's surprised audiences all across the world.

00:01:18.752 --> 00:01:20.099
This is something

00:01:20.099 --> 00:01:21.010
I guarantee you have never seen before.

00:01:21.010 --> 00:01:23.630
This is Bill Shannon, who is the Crutch Master,

00:01:23.630 --> 00:01:26.370
and his buddies back here, who are the Step Fenz,

00:01:26.370 --> 00:01:27.960
direct from New York City-

00:01:27.960 --> 00:01:30.830
The show is called The Art Of Weightlessness.

00:01:30.830 --> 00:01:32.650
It's sponsored by The Dance Umbrella,

00:01:32.650 --> 00:01:35.420
and Bill Shannon defies gravity with the help

00:01:35.420 --> 00:01:36.749
of his crutches.

00:01:36.749 --> 00:01:38.470
Get down to the studio at the Opera House

00:01:38.470 --> 00:01:40.440
because there's an amazing performer

00:01:40.440 --> 00:01:42.641
from Brooklyn coming out, called Bill Shannon.

00:01:42.641 --> 00:01:43.540
And the night is called Spatial Theory.

00:01:43.540 --> 00:01:44.466
It's had rave reviews.

00:01:44.466 --> 00:01:45.548
I've never seen anything like this.

00:01:45.548 --> 00:01:46.440
I was looking at the video tape yesterday

00:01:46.440 --> 00:01:47.578
and I was amazed.

00:01:47.578 --> 00:01:50.880
(voices chattering)

00:01:50.880 --> 00:01:52.560
His art sometimes capitalizes

00:01:52.560 --> 00:01:54.014
on interactions with others.

00:01:54.014 --> 00:01:57.014
(voices chattering)

00:02:00.949 --> 00:02:03.263
It's sort of a funky dance routine too.

00:02:03.263 --> 00:02:06.430
(audience applauding)

00:02:17.267 --> 00:02:20.267
(upbeat jazz music)

00:02:33.248 --> 00:02:35.331
Extension 3320.

00:02:38.200 --> 00:02:39.033
Are we ready?

00:02:39.033 --> 00:02:39.866
What's going on?

00:02:39.866 --> 00:02:41.473
I feel like I'm treading water.

00:02:43.800 --> 00:02:44.633
Are we going?

00:02:44.633 --> 00:02:45.771
This way?

00:02:45.771 --> 00:02:46.604
Okay.

00:02:46.604 --> 00:02:47.437
Let's go get a rental.

00:02:51.490 --> 00:02:53.463
I wanna sit in the back.
Okay.

00:02:58.380 --> 00:03:01.173
Keep right toward I-275 North at Tampa.

00:03:05.670 --> 00:03:08.020
It's kind of blindsided me like oh yeah, Perthes Camp,

00:03:08.020 --> 00:03:09.670
cool, they're like okay,

00:03:09.670 --> 00:03:10.890
you're gonna meet a bunch of kids with Perthes.

00:03:10.890 --> 00:03:13.073
I'm like oh, wait a second.

00:03:14.638 --> 00:03:16.683
(all chattering)

00:03:16.683 --> 00:03:19.031
It's gonna be right on beat, okay?

00:03:19.031 --> 00:03:21.589
Three, two, one, jump!

00:03:26.022 --> 00:03:28.847
(light ambient music)

00:03:28.847 --> 00:03:31.500
Turn left to stay at Camp Florida Road,

00:03:31.500 --> 00:03:33.563
then your destination will be on the right.

00:03:36.641 --> 00:03:39.474
(kids chattering)

00:03:51.039 --> 00:03:53.706
(kids cheering)

00:04:00.770 --> 00:04:02.440
It's really emotional for me because

00:04:02.440 --> 00:04:06.120
I'm gonna have this moment of like seeing kids

00:04:06.120 --> 00:04:09.400
living their life at that age and the way

00:04:09.400 --> 00:04:12.503
that I lived my life at that age, which is really tough,

00:04:15.015 --> 00:04:15.848
you know.

00:04:17.400 --> 00:04:19.650
I'm already gonna cry just thinking about it.

00:04:21.270 --> 00:04:26.270
It's something that's really a hard time in my life.

00:04:30.151 --> 00:04:34.790
(light acoustic guitar music)

00:04:34.790 --> 00:04:35.797
When Bill was born,

00:04:35.797 --> 00:04:38.973
Randa and I were both activists.

00:04:41.470 --> 00:04:44.130
I had come of age basically on the doorstep

00:04:44.130 --> 00:04:46.230
of the Civil Rights Movement in Nashville.

00:04:47.090 --> 00:04:49.420
And I was in the Peace Movement, the whole variety

00:04:49.420 --> 00:04:52.120
and spectrum of organizations in the Women's Movement.

00:04:53.600 --> 00:04:56.390
My parents were like all about humanitarianism,

00:04:56.390 --> 00:04:59.040
and like helping the steelworkers,

00:04:59.040 --> 00:05:02.823
and helping the unemployed, and ending, you know, apartheid.

00:05:04.270 --> 00:05:07.140
I grew up with the smell of permanent markers

00:05:07.140 --> 00:05:12.140
on banners, going door to door, delivering leaflets.

00:05:12.380 --> 00:05:17.150
The big picture was we can do better as human beings.

00:05:17.150 --> 00:05:19.918
And we can, we can treat each other better

00:05:19.918 --> 00:05:21.468
and we can have a better world.

00:05:24.060 --> 00:05:26.440
As a toddler, Bill, he loved speed.

00:05:26.440 --> 00:05:29.050
He loved things like Big Wheels going down steep hills,

00:05:29.050 --> 00:05:31.273
and climbing trees and jumping out of them.

00:05:33.340 --> 00:05:36.890
Sometimes after he had been running around a lot,

00:05:36.890 --> 00:05:39.003
he would limp.

00:05:40.770 --> 00:05:42.990
So I took him a doctor and he came in

00:05:42.990 --> 00:05:45.860
and told me he has Legg Perthes Disease.

00:05:47.940 --> 00:05:49.310
And I said I've never heard of that.

00:05:49.310 --> 00:05:51.660
I'm a nurse, you know, but I never heard of it.

00:05:53.970 --> 00:05:58.060
It's a developing deformation of the head of the femur,

00:05:58.060 --> 00:06:00.510
which is normally like a rounded,

00:06:00.510 --> 00:06:04.820
very smooth cartilage covered ball that fits

00:06:04.820 --> 00:06:07.890
into a socket very smoothly and rotates.

00:06:07.890 --> 00:06:12.440
And in his case, the head of the femur

00:06:12.440 --> 00:06:15.860
had no circulation and it becomes necrotic, basically,

00:06:15.860 --> 00:06:18.343
sort of rotten, and becomes misshapen.

00:06:19.680 --> 00:06:22.573
All the doctors in Pittsburgh wanted to operate.

00:06:24.190 --> 00:06:27.040
We talked about subjecting a four-year-old

00:06:27.040 --> 00:06:29.023
to multiple surgeries.

00:06:30.140 --> 00:06:33.090
I'm an anesthetist, I work in a major medical center

00:06:33.090 --> 00:06:35.060
and I know what the aftermath can be

00:06:35.060 --> 00:06:38.950
if you don't have a good result, major pain,

00:06:38.950 --> 00:06:40.583
major risk of infection.

00:06:41.540 --> 00:06:43.670
There's the danger of any kind of mishap,

00:06:43.670 --> 00:06:45.287
a blood clot, you know, things happen

00:06:45.287 --> 00:06:47.463
to people all the time in surgery.

00:06:49.240 --> 00:06:51.117
It's kinda scary, you know?

00:06:53.880 --> 00:06:56.410
And that's when I started researching metallurgy

00:06:56.410 --> 00:06:58.490
of these implants.

00:06:58.490 --> 00:07:02.240
And all these things they've been putting in people's hips,

00:07:02.240 --> 00:07:06.693
you know, deteriorate and the implant kills the bone.

00:07:07.890 --> 00:07:10.580
I was like this, this is not going to happen,

00:07:10.580 --> 00:07:13.773
you know, not for an active kid, so no.

00:07:16.162 --> 00:07:19.980
Randa talked to so many doctors until she finally

00:07:19.980 --> 00:07:21.773
found a doctor that said, you know,

00:07:21.773 --> 00:07:24.193
there's an alternative, which is the brace.

00:07:27.290 --> 00:07:30.000
It felt really sad not to see him, you know,

00:07:30.000 --> 00:07:32.130
crashing down the alley in his Big Wheel

00:07:32.130 --> 00:07:33.660
and doing things like that anymore

00:07:33.660 --> 00:07:35.913
because it had been such a joy for him.

00:07:38.540 --> 00:07:41.797
They were like this, this kind of a cage in a way, you know

00:07:41.797 --> 00:07:44.823
It was like literally living in a cage.

00:07:47.050 --> 00:07:49.640
I went to put him in elementary school

00:07:49.640 --> 00:07:52.793
and they said oh, he'll be in a special education class.

00:07:53.850 --> 00:07:55.780
I had to go to the school board to insist

00:07:55.780 --> 00:07:57.730
that Bill be in a mainstream classroom.

00:08:00.250 --> 00:08:03.860
Bill had to learn to deal with the world

00:08:03.860 --> 00:08:07.060
as it was treating him because he was a freak

00:08:07.060 --> 00:08:08.993
in the eyes of a lot of kids.

00:08:10.923 --> 00:08:11.760
And there was a kid who called him

00:08:11.760 --> 00:08:15.470
a four-legged chicken a bunch, and so I chased him down,

00:08:15.470 --> 00:08:18.483
and wrestled him, and held him 'til Bill got there.

00:08:20.320 --> 00:08:21.740
With Perthes, you know, because you have

00:08:21.740 --> 00:08:26.070
that sort of dexterity of your legs and they kind of work,

00:08:26.070 --> 00:08:29.450
and they look okay, it's like somehow harder

00:08:29.450 --> 00:08:30.943
for people to deal with.

00:08:32.640 --> 00:08:35.510
Even with my disability and kids calling me faker in,

00:08:35.510 --> 00:08:38.150
in the playground, and when I'm wearing a chunk of steel,

00:08:38.150 --> 00:08:39.570
and crutches and running around,

00:08:39.570 --> 00:08:41.370
and hey like still think I'm faking.

00:08:43.140 --> 00:08:45.030
It's alienating when you have a disability

00:08:45.030 --> 00:08:48.180
that no one else understands, and that no one else

00:08:48.180 --> 00:08:49.733
has to solve problems for.

00:08:54.440 --> 00:08:57.940
Bill was a provocateur when he was a month old, you know.

00:08:57.940 --> 00:09:01.963
He was a never a person who was gonna just ride along,

00:09:03.040 --> 00:09:06.549
so he would sneak around without the brace and the crutches.

00:09:06.549 --> 00:09:08.660
(upbeat jazz music)

00:09:08.660 --> 00:09:12.920
In my medical expertise as a third grader,

00:09:12.920 --> 00:09:16.113
I thought the brace should come off.

00:09:18.370 --> 00:09:20.760
I began to play and to try and participate

00:09:20.760 --> 00:09:22.640
as much as I could, even though I was definitely limited,

00:09:22.640 --> 00:09:24.830
like you know, king of the hill, I mean

00:09:24.830 --> 00:09:25.837
every time I would climb up that hill, man,

00:09:25.837 --> 00:09:27.713
I'd get pushed the fuck back down and I hated it.

00:09:27.713 --> 00:09:29.723
I would get so mad, I would cry.

00:09:31.134 --> 00:09:33.353
I mean I would get calls from the neighbors

00:09:33.353 --> 00:09:35.580
they would say your little boy is jumping off walls

00:09:35.580 --> 00:09:37.329
with his crutches, you know.

00:09:37.329 --> 00:09:38.763
And he's climbing a tree.

00:09:40.172 --> 00:09:42.390
The thing is when you're a kid with Perthes,

00:09:42.390 --> 00:09:44.050
like you can always be off crutches,

00:09:44.050 --> 00:09:47.590
like you can always stand up and walk around if you want.

00:09:47.590 --> 00:09:49.700
You can even run if you want and that's kind

00:09:49.700 --> 00:09:53.100
of frustrating as a kid, like I know I can do these things,

00:09:53.100 --> 00:09:55.240
but you're gonna pay the price

00:09:55.240 --> 00:09:58.240
'cause you're gonna feel pain later, extreme pain.

00:10:09.935 --> 00:10:13.550
During your teenage years, your bones harden

00:10:13.550 --> 00:10:15.690
and at that point in terms of Perthes,

00:10:15.690 --> 00:10:18.690
whatever damage has been done to your hip is done.

00:10:18.690 --> 00:10:20.250
But if you don't feel any pain,

00:10:20.250 --> 00:10:21.800
you don't need to use crutches.

00:10:24.700 --> 00:10:26.500
I remember coming home from school

00:10:27.580 --> 00:10:29.480
and he was standing next to the couch,

00:10:30.320 --> 00:10:31.877
and he was like "No crutches!"

00:10:32.806 --> 00:10:35.889
(upbeat dance music)

00:10:37.100 --> 00:10:38.890
I remember walking out of the hospital

00:10:38.890 --> 00:10:41.520
sort of feeling weird, like lighter.

00:10:41.520 --> 00:10:43.700
I really felt very strange with my arms

00:10:43.700 --> 00:10:45.200
without walking with crutches.

00:10:46.890 --> 00:10:49.530
When you grow up always being, you know,

00:10:49.530 --> 00:10:52.850
that kid on crutches or that kid with something's wrong

00:10:52.850 --> 00:10:55.230
with him, when you get that moment

00:10:55.230 --> 00:10:58.460
where you're just a regular kid, it's like thank you,

00:10:58.460 --> 00:11:01.390
like I just wanna just do everything,

00:11:01.390 --> 00:11:03.611
like it truly is an explosion.

00:11:03.611 --> 00:11:06.694
(upbeat dance music)

00:11:15.921 --> 00:11:17.350
It took me a good year to really,

00:11:17.350 --> 00:11:18.380
to get back into walking.

00:11:18.380 --> 00:11:21.200
And then there was breakdancing right there waiting for me.

00:11:21.200 --> 00:11:24.520
When straight from like learning how to walk to learning how

00:11:24.520 --> 00:11:25.486
to moon walk.

00:11:25.486 --> 00:11:27.962
(laughing)

00:11:27.962 --> 00:11:29.580
I remember they had a talent show.

00:11:29.580 --> 00:11:31.500
He's a freshmen in high school.

00:11:31.500 --> 00:11:33.650
Bill would get out there and he was popping

00:11:33.650 --> 00:11:36.442
and moonwalking, and all of the girls

00:11:36.442 --> 00:11:38.740
in the audience went, "Ahhhhhh!"

00:11:40.936 --> 00:11:43.500
It was magical, the, the movement was magical.

00:11:43.500 --> 00:11:45.173
And my brother was lit up.

00:11:50.828 --> 00:11:54.722
♪ It's a beautiful day to go skating ♪

00:11:54.722 --> 00:11:58.047
♪ Won't you shred, won't you rip ♪

00:11:58.047 --> 00:12:01.372
♪ Won't you skate your balls off ♪

00:12:01.372 --> 00:12:04.372
(upbeat rock music)

00:12:06.240 --> 00:12:08.070
They still were doing breakdancing

00:12:08.070 --> 00:12:09.833
and then they went into the skateboarding thing.

00:12:11.943 --> 00:12:14.043
And we just attacked the streets.

00:12:17.014 --> 00:12:17.972
♪ Marijuana!♪

00:12:18.930 --> 00:12:19.763
[Bill] Oh shit.

00:12:19.763 --> 00:12:21.873
It changed my life in one day.

00:12:21.873 --> 00:12:24.200
♪ Cheap beer! ♪

00:12:24.200 --> 00:12:25.853
I knew it was like no going back.

00:12:26.707 --> 00:12:29.166
♪ Women! ♪

00:12:29.166 --> 00:12:30.749
Bill, Bill.

00:12:32.460 --> 00:12:35.860
Look what I did to my board, oh no.

00:12:35.860 --> 00:12:38.583
That was just when street skating was coming about,

00:12:38.583 --> 00:12:41.630
like wall riding, and rail sliding,

00:12:41.630 --> 00:12:43.500
but it wasn't like the rails yet.

00:12:43.500 --> 00:12:45.510
It was like more on the long curbs

00:12:45.510 --> 00:12:47.660
that would be outside the gas stations

00:12:47.660 --> 00:12:49.410
and we'd just slide the whole curb.

00:12:53.990 --> 00:12:56.840
Bill was the kind of skateboarder who, you know,

00:12:56.840 --> 00:12:59.140
looked like he would probably sprain

00:12:59.140 --> 00:13:01.360
an ankle or break an ankle doing a trick,

00:13:01.360 --> 00:13:03.490
and just figure it was the cost of learning

00:13:03.490 --> 00:13:04.353
to do that trick.

00:13:13.070 --> 00:13:15.220
Young people are trying to fight the establishment

00:13:15.220 --> 00:13:17.430
of an ordinance that would prohibit skateboards

00:13:17.430 --> 00:13:19.230
in Pittsburgh's business districts.

00:13:19.230 --> 00:13:22.290
These skaters say their board is their transportation.

00:13:22.290 --> 00:13:24.060
Because I work in Oakland and, you know,

00:13:24.060 --> 00:13:25.000
I live here in Point Breeze,

00:13:25.000 --> 00:13:27.430
so I have to skate through Oakland just to get to work.

00:13:27.430 --> 00:13:28.979
And if they ban that,

00:13:28.979 --> 00:13:30.783
then I'm gonna get a fine going to work.

00:13:31.820 --> 00:13:34.520
You should get the footage of Bill getting arrested.

00:13:35.550 --> 00:13:37.250
He got arrested for skateboarding.

00:13:38.213 --> 00:13:41.818
(all shouting)
(rock music)

00:13:41.818 --> 00:13:44.286
(screaming)

00:13:44.286 --> 00:13:47.753
Get off my fucking hand.

00:13:47.753 --> 00:13:49.120
Just get off my wrist, man.

00:13:49.120 --> 00:13:50.083
What the fuck?

00:13:52.926 --> 00:13:54.418
(grunting)

00:13:54.418 --> 00:13:55.251
Fuck.

00:13:55.251 --> 00:13:56.737
What the fuck is this, man?

00:13:56.737 --> 00:13:58.539
I'm just a skateboarder.

00:13:58.539 --> 00:14:00.032
I'm just a skateboarder.

00:14:00.032 --> 00:14:02.263
I'm skating down the street.

00:14:02.263 --> 00:14:04.373
And the cops threw him in jail.

00:14:05.422 --> 00:14:06.500
It was all in the news.

00:14:06.500 --> 00:14:10.010
And he went to jail saying, "Skateboarding is not a crime!"

00:14:10.010 --> 00:14:11.510
Skateboarding is not a crime!

00:14:11.510 --> 00:14:14.080
Skateboarding is not, that was like the slogan.

00:14:14.080 --> 00:14:17.163
And but actually technically it was.

00:14:19.510 --> 00:14:23.160
I followed them to jail, then they came out

00:14:23.160 --> 00:14:24.860
and we cheered like they were

00:14:24.860 --> 00:14:27.017
political prisoners being released.

00:14:27.017 --> 00:14:28.833
What happened, Bill?

00:14:28.833 --> 00:14:29.714
I don't know.

00:14:29.714 --> 00:14:30.547
(camera shutter clicking)

00:14:30.547 --> 00:14:33.363
After that they had his picture in Sassy Magazine.

00:14:34.310 --> 00:14:37.760
He became a big rockstar to all the girls,

00:14:37.760 --> 00:14:40.390
Like damn, Bill, you look cute.

00:14:40.390 --> 00:14:42.640
(laughing)

00:14:51.950 --> 00:14:55.033
(light guitar music)

00:15:04.480 --> 00:15:07.340
BIll's situation with his illness, you know,

00:15:07.340 --> 00:15:10.090
that had been such a focus for our family that

00:15:10.090 --> 00:15:11.440
when that was gone, then Randy

00:15:11.440 --> 00:15:13.340
and I had to look at our relationship.

00:15:15.604 --> 00:15:17.510
That's the way life goes, perfect storms

00:15:17.510 --> 00:15:19.140
every once in a while where everything

00:15:19.140 --> 00:15:22.033
just goes to fragments.

00:15:24.787 --> 00:15:25.954
Oh, wow, look.

00:15:27.075 --> 00:15:29.650
It's totally destroyed.

00:15:29.650 --> 00:15:32.380
I think Bill felt responsible for me

00:15:32.380 --> 00:15:33.863
and Randy getting divorced.

00:15:37.340 --> 00:15:39.270
Me and my brother, like we were very dependent ton

00:15:39.270 --> 00:15:41.723
each other and we were split during the divorce.

00:15:42.780 --> 00:15:44.150
My brother went to live with my mom,

00:15:44.150 --> 00:15:45.950
but I still had to live with my dad.

00:15:47.070 --> 00:15:48.370
And that was really tough.

00:15:51.360 --> 00:15:56.053
Randy and Bill had a dynamic that was really,

00:15:57.200 --> 00:15:58.923
they had horrible fights.

00:16:00.050 --> 00:16:02.720
My brother really started to get the brunt

00:16:02.720 --> 00:16:07.720
of my dad's hard ass reactions to being defied.

00:16:16.620 --> 00:16:21.273
Bill often saw his art as a sword and a shield.

00:16:22.710 --> 00:16:26.450
For Bill, his art has been very cathartic

00:16:26.450 --> 00:16:28.930
and has been shaped by whatever happened

00:16:28.930 --> 00:16:31.560
to be happening with him at that particular period

00:16:31.560 --> 00:16:34.819
in his life, and his reactions to it.

00:16:34.819 --> 00:16:38.236
(light electronic music)

00:16:47.560 --> 00:16:49.310
Support the troops.

00:16:50.168 --> 00:16:51.501
Bring them home.

00:16:52.410 --> 00:16:54.900
I call the Pentagon's war.

00:16:54.900 --> 00:16:56.150
This is my body.

00:16:58.175 --> 00:16:59.220
My body.

00:16:59.220 --> 00:17:01.143
Art was just the place I went,

00:17:02.520 --> 00:17:04.620
the place I went when I wanted to be

00:17:04.620 --> 00:17:07.370
on a level playing ground with the other kids in class,

00:17:08.780 --> 00:17:12.623
the place I went to get away from my family issues.

00:17:13.556 --> 00:17:15.973
(vocalizing)

00:17:17.139 --> 00:17:20.880
Everybody has that experience of suffering.

00:17:20.880 --> 00:17:23.939
[Electronic Voice] Three-legged chicken.

00:17:23.939 --> 00:17:26.330
[Electronic Voice] Three-legged chicken.

00:17:27.580 --> 00:17:30.540
[Electronic Voice] Three-legged chicken.

00:17:30.540 --> 00:17:33.860
But I think sharing the experience and understanding it

00:17:33.860 --> 00:17:35.520
as other people experience it

00:17:35.520 --> 00:17:37.123
is another step in the process.

00:17:38.881 --> 00:17:41.777
[Electronic Voice] Three-legged chicken.

00:17:43.110 --> 00:17:45.310
Hey, were you sleeping?

00:17:45.310 --> 00:17:47.840
No sleeping, no sleeping today, bud!

00:17:47.840 --> 00:17:50.773
Uh-uh, it's National Un-Holiday.

00:17:51.826 --> 00:17:52.790
♪ Wake up ♪

00:17:52.790 --> 00:17:55.207
(vocalizing)

00:18:03.840 --> 00:18:05.940
I remember there's one scene that, you know,

00:18:05.940 --> 00:18:08.830
everybody goes and does an acid drop.

00:18:08.830 --> 00:18:10.530
An acid drop is like an old move where you

00:18:10.530 --> 00:18:13.053
just like ride off a drop and you just drop down.

00:18:14.170 --> 00:18:15.240
I was just scared of it,

00:18:15.240 --> 00:18:17.740
like I didn't have flexibility in my right leg.

00:18:17.740 --> 00:18:20.490
Every time I would fall or my back leg would get,

00:18:20.490 --> 00:18:21.560
would get pulled out,

00:18:21.560 --> 00:18:25.163
it was like horrible excruciating pain.

00:18:28.230 --> 00:18:30.680
When we were skating, we would just go, go, go.

00:18:30.680 --> 00:18:32.253
And he couldn't keep up.

00:18:33.680 --> 00:18:37.780
And so it would be a question of okay,

00:18:37.780 --> 00:18:41.580
do we stop skating or do we leave my brother behind?

00:18:41.580 --> 00:18:43.060
Are you all right, man?

00:18:43.060 --> 00:18:43.893
Are you okay?

00:18:43.893 --> 00:18:44.970
Yeah, I'm fine.

00:18:44.970 --> 00:18:46.106
You'll be all right?

00:18:46.106 --> 00:18:48.722
Yeah, I'll be fine.

00:18:48.722 --> 00:18:52.140
(dramatic guitar music)

00:18:52.140 --> 00:18:55.030
I knew that my time like without any problems

00:18:55.030 --> 00:18:59.050
with my hips was already into those days were numbered,

00:18:59.050 --> 00:19:00.540
just a matter of time.

00:19:00.540 --> 00:19:04.150
I knew that when I was 16 and I was skateboarding,

00:19:04.150 --> 00:19:06.390
like this shit isn't gonna last.

00:19:06.390 --> 00:19:07.720
There's no fucking way.

00:19:07.720 --> 00:19:09.233
I better enjoy it while I can.

00:19:10.700 --> 00:19:12.770
And then it happened and I started having really,

00:19:12.770 --> 00:19:13.853
really bad pain.

00:19:15.743 --> 00:19:16.576
And there would be times when he would

00:19:16.576 --> 00:19:19.450
just be like in tears from the pain.

00:19:19.450 --> 00:19:22.880
And I'd feel like I was seeing the pain change him

00:19:22.880 --> 00:19:24.083
in his personality.

00:19:28.110 --> 00:19:31.010
It was really, really, really heartbreaking

00:19:31.010 --> 00:19:34.083
to tell him that he had to go back on crutches.

00:19:35.170 --> 00:19:40.170
And for Bill, a bottomless pit of sorrow.

00:19:41.850 --> 00:19:43.620
He cried.

00:19:43.620 --> 00:19:44.583
We all cried.

00:19:47.524 --> 00:19:50.274
(dramatic music)

00:20:53.956 --> 00:20:56.789
(kids chattering)

00:21:04.061 --> 00:21:04.894
All right, 20.

00:21:06.770 --> 00:21:07.653
Go 20.

00:21:10.082 --> 00:21:11.660
Another thing you can do is we go down to the floor

00:21:11.660 --> 00:21:15.110
and come back up, so you have different ranges of,

00:21:15.110 --> 00:21:16.470
levels of your movement.

00:21:16.470 --> 00:21:18.290
You know, you're standing here doing this.

00:21:18.290 --> 00:21:20.150
You open up, you start to step it around,

00:21:20.150 --> 00:21:22.623
two, one, two, spin.

00:21:23.530 --> 00:21:25.470
Like that, get, keep going with your feeling,

00:21:25.470 --> 00:21:27.690
whatever your flow is, but then go, try to go to the ground.

00:21:27.690 --> 00:21:31.170
Go to the ground and do it again, and come back up.

00:21:31.170 --> 00:21:32.283
Just do another turn.

00:21:34.350 --> 00:21:35.550
Yeah, so you go lower down.

00:21:35.550 --> 00:21:38.360
Yeah, beau-, good, then come back up.

00:21:38.360 --> 00:21:40.012
Good.

00:21:40.012 --> 00:21:41.101
Come here, give me five, man.

00:21:41.101 --> 00:21:41.934
You got skills.

00:21:42.874 --> 00:21:44.044
All right.

00:21:44.044 --> 00:21:47.461
(light electronic music)

00:21:53.360 --> 00:21:54.321
Here you go, like that.

00:21:54.321 --> 00:21:57.488
Pop your chest out and roll it around.

00:22:09.667 --> 00:22:10.600
And keep 'em moving.

00:22:10.600 --> 00:22:11.783
Keep your neck alive.

00:22:12.940 --> 00:22:13.773
Good, yeah.

00:22:17.918 --> 00:22:19.640
I have a question that I don't think came up.

00:22:19.640 --> 00:22:21.322
What's that?

00:22:21.322 --> 00:22:22.490
What hip do you have it on?

00:22:22.490 --> 00:22:23.630
I have it bilaterally.

00:22:23.630 --> 00:22:25.480
My right ended up worse than my left.

00:22:26.900 --> 00:22:29.350
Yeah, it started in my right and went to my left,

00:22:29.350 --> 00:22:31.600
so when I started compensating for my left with my right,

00:22:31.600 --> 00:22:33.310
my right wasn't fully healed,

00:22:33.310 --> 00:22:35.310
so I damaged my right more than my left.

00:22:36.297 --> 00:22:37.130
Yeah.

00:22:38.961 --> 00:22:40.340
I'm gonna take you for your x-rays, okay?

00:22:40.340 --> 00:22:41.900
Okay.

00:22:41.900 --> 00:22:44.140
And you're here today for your hips, right?

00:22:44.140 --> 00:22:44.973
Yeah.

00:22:44.973 --> 00:22:45.806
Okay, you're gonna be lying down

00:22:45.806 --> 00:22:46.890
on the table on your back.

00:22:46.890 --> 00:22:47.920
Eww, it's cold in here.

00:22:47.920 --> 00:22:50.040
Do they have to A/C it so much?

00:22:50.040 --> 00:22:51.000
Yeah, for the film.

00:22:51.000 --> 00:22:52.800
For the film it has to be cold, too.

00:22:52.800 --> 00:22:55.223
That's why it's so cold in these rooms.

00:22:59.370 --> 00:23:01.330
You know, I've been wondering why the hell this room

00:23:01.330 --> 00:23:02.889
was so cold my entire life.

00:23:02.889 --> 00:23:06.306
(light electronic music)

00:23:11.810 --> 00:23:13.500
Coming in here when I was five years old

00:23:13.500 --> 00:23:15.290
and just being cold, like all the sudden it would

00:23:15.290 --> 00:23:16.530
just be freezing.

00:23:16.530 --> 00:23:19.433
I just thought why is it so cold.

00:23:24.840 --> 00:23:26.659
Like this machine in 1978,

00:23:26.659 --> 00:23:29.742
(imitating whirring)

00:23:30.887 --> 00:23:33.554
It was like a monster, you know?

00:23:35.400 --> 00:23:37.660
Back then it was like the whole in the window

00:23:37.660 --> 00:23:39.320
was like a little thin little slat

00:23:39.320 --> 00:23:41.140
they would look through like it was a gun hole.

00:23:41.140 --> 00:23:42.525
And they would speak on a microphone,

00:23:42.525 --> 00:23:43.390
(imitating static)

00:23:43.390 --> 00:23:44.420
okay now,

00:23:44.420 --> 00:23:45.870
we're gonna take the picture.

00:23:50.280 --> 00:23:51.270
You know, Perthes Disease,

00:23:51.270 --> 00:23:53.660
the big question is should he or shouldn't he

00:23:53.660 --> 00:23:54.560
have an operation.

00:23:56.350 --> 00:23:58.400
So there's your right hip.

00:23:58.400 --> 00:24:01.820
Normally, that should be a sphere within a sphere,

00:24:01.820 --> 00:24:04.563
a ball in a ball, you know, and that is a mushroom.

00:24:05.481 --> 00:24:08.220
It was very confusing in treating Perthes Disease

00:24:08.220 --> 00:24:10.130
because there's so many different options

00:24:10.130 --> 00:24:12.240
on just attempting to treat it

00:24:12.240 --> 00:24:15.670
and there's no solid method of how to do things.

00:24:15.670 --> 00:24:18.160
And there's still no cure, and no one knows what's right

00:24:18.160 --> 00:24:18.993
and what's wrong.

00:24:18.993 --> 00:24:20.640
It's not always a direct-

00:24:20.640 --> 00:24:24.020
We've inherited a medical model of disability

00:24:24.020 --> 00:24:26.920
that assumes that when there is a body

00:24:26.920 --> 00:24:30.810
that doesn't fit a stereotypical abled body,

00:24:30.810 --> 00:24:34.760
that it is something sad or tragic,

00:24:34.760 --> 00:24:37.780
and something that needs to be cured.

00:24:37.780 --> 00:24:40.580
And so when you see that in Bill Shannon's life,

00:24:40.580 --> 00:24:43.050
when people say well, if you have this hip problem,

00:24:43.050 --> 00:24:45.380
why don't you just get hip replacements?

00:24:45.380 --> 00:24:47.011
And you're doing pretty well,

00:24:47.011 --> 00:24:49.000
but it's gonna go someday

00:24:49.000 --> 00:24:50.670
and you're gonna need a total hip replacement

00:24:50.670 --> 00:24:52.940
when that hits someday.

00:24:52.940 --> 00:24:56.330
The pain that I have is a, is a constant adjustment.

00:24:56.330 --> 00:24:59.273
It's like always adjusting for different gradations of it.

00:25:00.710 --> 00:25:04.260
Perthes Disease causes quite a bit of damage.

00:25:04.260 --> 00:25:06.960
That dead bone, you know, it starts to flatten out,

00:25:06.960 --> 00:25:09.970
and causes a lot of pain and friction in that hip area,

00:25:09.970 --> 00:25:11.870
and so it causes kids to limp,

00:25:11.870 --> 00:25:14.520
or you have pain after walking for a while

00:25:14.520 --> 00:25:16.063
or any physical activity.

00:25:18.280 --> 00:25:20.660
I tell my parents that sometimes it

00:25:20.660 --> 00:25:22.910
was like something was stabbing my leg

00:25:22.910 --> 00:25:24.270
'cause it got so painful

00:25:24.270 --> 00:25:26.660
that I felt like somebody was cutting my leg off.

00:25:26.660 --> 00:25:28.410
The pain it's really bad.

00:25:28.410 --> 00:25:32.140
It's like you, kinda feel this grinding every time you

00:25:33.050 --> 00:25:34.170
take a step.

00:25:34.170 --> 00:25:36.591
In the spring I started

00:25:36.591 --> 00:25:38.523
having just a teeny tiny bit of pain.

00:25:40.220 --> 00:25:43.153
And in the summer I started limping a lot.

00:25:45.000 --> 00:25:46.720
'Cause you never know like whenever you want

00:25:46.720 --> 00:25:49.360
to do something fun, you can't, if you barely walk,

00:25:49.360 --> 00:25:51.320
you really wanna do it.

00:25:51.320 --> 00:25:52.530
Somebody will have to take you

00:25:52.530 --> 00:25:54.370
or you will have to go in your wheelchair and do it,

00:25:54.370 --> 00:25:55.383
and that sucks.

00:25:57.000 --> 00:25:58.290
Do you have any thigh pain?

00:25:58.290 --> 00:26:00.460
Yeah, it radiates down to my knee.

00:26:00.460 --> 00:26:02.580
That's, that's part of it that people don't understand,

00:26:02.580 --> 00:26:04.619
like yeah, okay, my hip hurts,

00:26:04.619 --> 00:26:07.860
but does it hurt enough for me to go get surgery

00:26:07.860 --> 00:26:08.830
to replace it.

00:26:08.830 --> 00:26:12.417
And then how long's that surgery last for?

00:26:14.780 --> 00:26:16.870
You can, you know, get a hip replacement

00:26:16.870 --> 00:26:19.310
and in 10 years you're getting another one.

00:26:19.310 --> 00:26:21.724
And in another 10 years you're getting another one.

00:26:21.724 --> 00:26:24.150
And after so many of them, you can't get another one.

00:26:24.150 --> 00:26:26.150
That's it, you know, you reach the end of the line.

00:26:26.150 --> 00:26:28.920
Now you have to fuse your hip, which is basically

00:26:28.920 --> 00:26:31.443
put it in one position and freeze it.

00:26:32.500 --> 00:26:36.193
And just like I'm not into that option at all.

00:26:38.124 --> 00:26:41.093
I wanna be, you know, responsible for my own fate.

00:26:45.701 --> 00:26:47.420
(light electronic music)

00:26:47.420 --> 00:26:50.930
And so I tried to use canes and they were just useless,

00:26:50.930 --> 00:26:53.380
I mean, because, when my hip really was hurting,

00:26:53.380 --> 00:26:55.270
they kinda really didn't do enough.

00:26:55.270 --> 00:26:57.140
And then when I was trying to be preventative

00:26:57.140 --> 00:26:59.570
and kind of not use them fully but use them some,

00:26:59.570 --> 00:27:01.337
they kind of were in the way 'cause you,

00:27:01.337 --> 00:27:04.830
you can't really have your hands free when using canes,

00:27:04.830 --> 00:27:07.547
so I started using a single point crutch.

00:27:08.590 --> 00:27:11.188
And then he started developing better tips

00:27:11.188 --> 00:27:14.003
for them, and then one day I saw the rocker bottom.

00:27:16.070 --> 00:27:19.240
Those crutches were like no other crutches

00:27:19.240 --> 00:27:21.450
that you see, really.

00:27:21.450 --> 00:27:23.720
And they were legitimate crutches,

00:27:23.720 --> 00:27:25.223
but they were just U-shaped.

00:27:26.482 --> 00:27:29.482
(light dance music)

00:27:32.397 --> 00:27:34.360
With the rocker bottom you had the range.

00:27:34.360 --> 00:27:37.170
You reach forward and you have that range around the curve,

00:27:37.170 --> 00:27:41.150
so you get a longer, smoother push.

00:27:41.150 --> 00:27:43.500
That really made a difference with skateboarding.

00:27:45.070 --> 00:27:47.870
A doctor, you know, with no experience skateboarding

00:27:47.870 --> 00:27:50.300
would probably just look at that and go this motherfucker

00:27:50.300 --> 00:27:55.300
is so stupid, not realizing that with a hip like that,

00:27:55.780 --> 00:27:58.320
you take one push on a board and you just roll

00:27:58.320 --> 00:28:01.220
for like half a block, so you're actually saving your hip.

00:28:04.340 --> 00:28:06.840
When we see Bill Shannon using a skateboard

00:28:06.840 --> 00:28:11.270
as a mobility aid we forget that the mobility aids

00:28:11.270 --> 00:28:14.120
that we're more familiar with, like wheelchairs,

00:28:14.120 --> 00:28:16.070
came out of somebody solving a problem.

00:28:19.220 --> 00:28:21.193
It's just creative necessity.

00:28:22.560 --> 00:28:24.180
I was looking at my childhood

00:28:24.180 --> 00:28:27.786
and how I was in certain situations with my peers where,

00:28:27.786 --> 00:28:29.300
you had to come up with a solution now.

00:28:29.300 --> 00:28:30.791
That's creative necessity.

00:28:30.791 --> 00:28:33.920
It's like the necessary instant reaction gut.

00:28:33.920 --> 00:28:35.930
You know, and that's a, that's playground mentality.

00:28:35.930 --> 00:28:38.040
That's like on the street and you have to come up

00:28:38.040 --> 00:28:39.973
with a solution in the moment.

00:28:39.973 --> 00:28:43.473
(upbeat electronic music)

00:29:05.510 --> 00:29:07.670
He would use them to hit the ball,

00:29:07.670 --> 00:29:09.633
so it was like an extra appendage.

00:29:11.210 --> 00:29:13.480
He could really gain a lot of ground just

00:29:13.480 --> 00:29:16.230
by swinging when we were sprinting,

00:29:16.230 --> 00:29:17.940
and I think that might even have been

00:29:17.940 --> 00:29:19.593
where the glide kinda came from.

00:29:58.349 --> 00:30:00.156
(all chattering)

00:30:00.156 --> 00:30:01.006
♪ With the camera lens ♪

00:30:01.006 --> 00:30:03.197
♪ Spittin' the freestyle with my friends ♪

00:30:03.197 --> 00:30:05.226
♪ Yeah, I'm makin' ♪

00:30:05.226 --> 00:30:08.309
(upbeat dance music)

00:30:09.560 --> 00:30:11.510
They roll up like construction paper.

00:30:13.268 --> 00:30:15.592
Step Fenz, baby, Step Fenz, baby.

00:30:15.592 --> 00:30:16.425
Yeah!

00:30:17.935 --> 00:30:21.018
(upbeat dance music)

00:30:22.440 --> 00:30:24.130
My crew, the Step Fenz, here,

00:30:24.130 --> 00:30:26.990
we counted 15 different clubs a night in New York City

00:30:26.990 --> 00:30:30.930
to dances, just underground shit, after hours in Chinatown,

00:30:30.930 --> 00:30:33.415
but it was like just dance, dance,

00:30:33.415 --> 00:30:35.433
and we would go dance all fucking night.

00:30:37.140 --> 00:30:39.947
There were no established competitions to go to.

00:30:39.947 --> 00:30:42.683
There were these circles and people would battle.

00:30:46.140 --> 00:30:49.520
Their style was clashing with styles, egos clashing

00:30:49.520 --> 00:30:52.190
with egos, you know, going at each other through dance,

00:30:52.190 --> 00:30:53.540
you know, as an expression.

00:30:55.020 --> 00:30:57.410
Anybody that we had known, like we were gonna

00:30:57.410 --> 00:30:58.690
throw some rounds.

00:30:58.690 --> 00:31:00.517
In that, there was a conversation, you know,

00:31:00.517 --> 00:31:01.960
but what if part of the conversation

00:31:01.960 --> 00:31:04.740
was like back the fuck up, you know.

00:31:04.740 --> 00:31:05.940
No sympathy in a cypher.

00:31:06.856 --> 00:31:09.939
(upbeat dance music)

00:31:13.430 --> 00:31:14.460
Crutch knew where to go.

00:31:14.460 --> 00:31:16.420
Where the music was, Crutch would show up

00:31:16.420 --> 00:31:17.821
just like we would.

00:31:17.821 --> 00:31:20.904
(upbeat dance music)

00:31:23.600 --> 00:31:24.940
I came to New York

00:31:24.940 --> 00:31:26.480
and I had a little of this and a little

00:31:26.480 --> 00:31:29.493
of that, you know, but I didn't have any footwork for real.

00:31:31.880 --> 00:31:34.963
(upbeat dance music)

00:31:38.010 --> 00:31:41.530
He was still working on the movement side of it.

00:31:41.530 --> 00:31:44.570
You know, he wasn't as far along by any stretch.

00:31:44.570 --> 00:31:47.953
He was doing a whole lot of falling before he was flying.

00:31:50.800 --> 00:31:53.660
The way he was able to navigate himself around

00:31:53.660 --> 00:31:56.923
on them crutches, that shit don't take overnight, man.

00:31:59.060 --> 00:32:00.210
I started going out to clubs

00:32:00.210 --> 00:32:01.880
and other people were dancing at the cub.

00:32:01.880 --> 00:32:04.010
And I just naturally just started doing little moves,

00:32:04.010 --> 00:32:05.530
like fuck it.

00:32:05.530 --> 00:32:08.070
You know, and then I started going to hip hop spots

00:32:08.070 --> 00:32:10.083
and like doing whatever the fuck I could do

00:32:10.083 --> 00:32:11.933
what I can pull off with my crutches.

00:32:13.560 --> 00:32:14.393
We would dance.

00:32:14.393 --> 00:32:15.226
He would come in.

00:32:15.226 --> 00:32:17.410
He would do a move and if he didn't bust his ass,

00:32:17.410 --> 00:32:18.790
I'd be like yeah, that shit was dope.

00:32:18.790 --> 00:32:21.490
And if he didn't, he always got up and tried it again.

00:32:22.420 --> 00:32:25.010
But there's no way Crutch got a pass.

00:32:25.010 --> 00:32:26.630
There's no way it was, it was easier for him

00:32:26.630 --> 00:32:30.493
to get recognition or props just because he was on crutches.

00:32:30.493 --> 00:32:34.041
You should get rid of the crutches, bitch.

00:32:34.041 --> 00:32:36.740
Get off my stage, yo.

00:32:36.740 --> 00:32:38.743
Do something, do one thing.

00:32:38.743 --> 00:32:40.924
Impress me, impress me.

00:32:40.924 --> 00:32:42.623
Please impress me.

00:32:42.623 --> 00:32:44.861
Close it down, you ain't got shit.

00:32:44.861 --> 00:32:47.512
You got nothin', no footwork.

00:32:47.512 --> 00:32:49.912
Come on, what is that?

00:32:49.912 --> 00:32:51.922
Style, I wanna see style.

00:32:51.922 --> 00:32:53.136
Style, style.

00:32:53.136 --> 00:32:54.742
What you said to me was fucked up

00:32:54.742 --> 00:32:56.715
because my hip is fucked.

00:32:56.715 --> 00:32:57.548
They're not round.

00:32:57.548 --> 00:32:58.612
See, I didn't know that.

00:32:58.612 --> 00:33:00.106
I can walk a little, but I use crutches to dance.

00:33:00.106 --> 00:33:01.163
Let me apologize.

00:33:02.460 --> 00:33:03.550
I didn't know that was the case.

00:33:03.550 --> 00:33:04.870
I thought you was just pulling shit.

00:33:04.870 --> 00:33:05.703
I thought it was your stye.

00:33:05.703 --> 00:33:07.020
I'm from Boston, I did not know.

00:33:07.020 --> 00:33:08.542
I apologize.

00:33:08.542 --> 00:33:10.707
Thank you, man.

00:33:10.707 --> 00:33:11.675
I appreciate that.

00:33:11.675 --> 00:33:14.227
That shit hurt my feelings because I don't have a choice.

00:33:14.227 --> 00:33:15.327
I have no choice, bro.

00:33:16.900 --> 00:33:18.430
But when you first introduce something different,

00:33:18.430 --> 00:33:21.340
everybody's isn't gonna just immediately start hugging you,

00:33:21.340 --> 00:33:22.280
like wow, that's great.

00:33:22.280 --> 00:33:24.337
They're gonna look at you like

00:33:24.337 --> 00:33:25.370
what the fuck are you doing, you know.

00:33:25.370 --> 00:33:26.203
Go home.

00:33:27.320 --> 00:33:29.261
Don't come in here with that bullshit.

00:33:29.261 --> 00:33:32.344
(upbeat dance music)

00:33:36.940 --> 00:33:39.140
Until I got good enough, until I got better.

00:33:41.482 --> 00:33:45.992
♪ One of a kind, verve of the mind ♪

00:33:45.992 --> 00:33:48.589
♪ Servin' a rhyme, workin' on time, yes sir ♪

00:33:48.589 --> 00:33:50.593
♪ One of a kind ♪

00:33:50.593 --> 00:33:51.509
♪ Free-Form fetish ♪

00:33:51.509 --> 00:33:53.048
♪ Medicine in for your headaches ♪

00:33:53.048 --> 00:33:55.587
♪ We bomb fellas, better sin for the medics ♪

00:33:55.587 --> 00:33:58.089
(crowd cheering)

00:33:58.089 --> 00:33:59.327
♪ Stay on mellow ass ♪

00:33:59.327 --> 00:34:00.645
♪ Why you don't walk it ♪

00:34:00.645 --> 00:34:01.650
♪ Nights sparklin' ♪

00:34:01.650 --> 00:34:04.085
♪ Charlie here is my man ♪

00:34:04.085 --> 00:34:06.335
When he's in it, woo-hoo.

00:34:07.620 --> 00:34:10.190
Let it go 'cause he's like ah, yeah, bring it

00:34:10.190 --> 00:34:11.307
'cause you think I don't got it?

00:34:11.307 --> 00:34:12.140
Ah.

00:34:12.140 --> 00:34:13.839
♪ Ripped them off and wax shit gets to solve this ♪

00:34:13.839 --> 00:34:14.982
♪ Gift revolves around ♪

00:34:14.982 --> 00:34:17.253
♪ Earth space station that'll rock you, pa ♪

00:34:17.253 --> 00:34:18.864
♪ Have you runnin' for your ground ♪

00:34:18.864 --> 00:34:19.984
♪ A little baklava ♪

00:34:19.984 --> 00:34:20.979
♪ Let me talk to ya'll ♪

00:34:20.979 --> 00:34:22.178
♪ About some off the wall ♪

00:34:22.178 --> 00:34:23.634
♪ Rapper wannabe in front of me ♪

00:34:23.634 --> 00:34:25.577
♪ That got the balls to not know ♪

00:34:25.577 --> 00:34:29.830
You know, how he would slide that, before he brought it up

00:34:29.830 --> 00:34:31.960
and held it up for a second, like...

00:34:33.770 --> 00:34:37.090
I've seen Shaolin monks with the sticks

00:34:37.090 --> 00:34:38.420
and I gotta tell you, they,

00:34:38.420 --> 00:34:40.288
it's the same

00:34:40.288 --> 00:34:42.630
span of time he's on that stick and he's turning

00:34:42.630 --> 00:34:45.090
and putting moves in concession to make it

00:34:45.090 --> 00:34:47.691
to a combo to a beat.

00:34:47.691 --> 00:34:49.902
♪ One of a kind ♪

00:34:49.902 --> 00:34:52.310
♪ One of a kind, verve of the mind ♪

00:34:52.310 --> 00:34:54.609
♪ One of a kind, heard it in my first step ♪

00:34:54.609 --> 00:34:56.849
♪ One of a kind ♪

00:34:56.849 --> 00:34:59.485
♪ One of a kind, verve of the mind ♪

00:34:59.485 --> 00:35:01.885
♪ One of a kind, heard in my first step ♪

00:35:01.885 --> 00:35:04.760
♪ Servin' rhymes and workin' on time, yes sir ♪

00:35:04.760 --> 00:35:07.884
This is Crutch Master, man, you know what I mean?

00:35:07.884 --> 00:35:10.523
(crowd cheering)

00:35:10.523 --> 00:35:13.440
(percussive music)

00:35:16.503 --> 00:35:20.130
I thought I'd seen it all until I seen UFOs,

00:35:20.130 --> 00:35:22.960
turtles and body rolls on crutches.

00:35:22.960 --> 00:35:26.210
That shit right there is real.

00:35:26.210 --> 00:35:29.460
I like his style and I like the way he's aggressive.

00:35:29.460 --> 00:35:33.284
I like how he goes out there and hits his freezes on point.

00:35:33.284 --> 00:35:36.023
(crowd cheering)

00:35:36.023 --> 00:35:39.790
This man right here is an inspiration to all dancers.

00:35:43.395 --> 00:35:45.764
If you all ain't seen this cat get down,

00:35:45.764 --> 00:35:47.114
you all ain't seen nothing.

00:35:49.752 --> 00:35:53.169
(light electronic music)

00:35:57.182 --> 00:35:59.170
You know, a lot of people like obsess about oh,

00:35:59.170 --> 00:36:01.390
I'm too skinny, I'm too fat, all that stuff

00:36:01.390 --> 00:36:03.640
about not having the right body type to dance

00:36:03.640 --> 00:36:04.553
is all bullshit.

00:36:06.970 --> 00:36:08.420
I'm dancing, it's in your head.

00:36:08.420 --> 00:36:11.313
No matter how healthy you are, your body is limited.

00:36:12.380 --> 00:36:13.540
Once you get that through your head

00:36:13.540 --> 00:36:15.590
that your body is limited, that dancing

00:36:15.590 --> 00:36:17.910
is in your mind and not in your body,

00:36:17.910 --> 00:36:20.183
then you're pretty much free as a dancer.

00:36:23.760 --> 00:36:26.520
So if you're driven to dance, if your soul is of a dancer,

00:36:26.520 --> 00:36:28.690
and you have a bad leg and you're on crutches,

00:36:28.690 --> 00:36:30.390
you're gonna dance no matter what.

00:36:33.182 --> 00:36:36.265
(upbeat piano music)

00:36:37.440 --> 00:36:39.090
It's 6:42 right now and chances

00:36:39.090 --> 00:36:41.300
are you're never seen anything like this before.

00:36:41.300 --> 00:36:44.200
The show is called The Art of Weightlessness.

00:36:44.200 --> 00:36:46.020
It's sponsored by The Dance Umbrella,

00:36:46.020 --> 00:36:48.270
and Bill Shannon defies gravity

00:36:48.270 --> 00:36:51.970
with the help of his crutches in a unique dance performance.

00:36:51.970 --> 00:36:53.560
Bill, thanks for coming.

00:36:53.560 --> 00:36:55.520
Thanks for being here so early.

00:36:55.520 --> 00:36:56.880
I'd never seen anything like this.

00:36:56.880 --> 00:36:58.520
I was looking at the videotape yesterday

00:36:58.520 --> 00:37:01.460
and I was amazed because when you start dancing

00:37:01.460 --> 00:37:02.550
around on these crutches,

00:37:02.550 --> 00:37:04.870
it is just like you have no weight.

00:37:04.870 --> 00:37:06.570
It's like you're light as a feather moving about.

00:37:06.570 --> 00:37:09.440
And it's sort of a funky dance routine, too.

00:37:09.440 --> 00:37:12.440
I heard one critic say that your hip is bad,

00:37:12.440 --> 00:37:14.090
but your hop is spectacular.

00:37:14.090 --> 00:37:16.273
Yeah, that's a, that's a little,

00:37:16.273 --> 00:37:19.126
that was a little cute little title, yeah.

00:37:19.126 --> 00:37:22.209
(upbeat dance music)

00:37:30.570 --> 00:37:32.910
Bill had an idea of putting a couple

00:37:32.910 --> 00:37:37.910
of his old pieces together and create an hour-long piece.

00:37:38.350 --> 00:37:40.000
The Art of Weightlessness, man.

00:37:40.932 --> 00:37:43.930
(upbeat dance music)

00:37:43.930 --> 00:37:46.300
Bill was on another level at the time.

00:37:46.300 --> 00:37:47.960
There were only two pioneering companies

00:37:47.960 --> 00:37:49.040
that was doing hip hop dance

00:37:49.040 --> 00:37:51.190
on the concert stage and he was one of 'em.

00:37:53.642 --> 00:37:54.810
I was completely ignorant

00:37:54.810 --> 00:37:57.310
at that point to like what performance art was.

00:37:57.310 --> 00:38:00.632
You know, if you thought theater, I though the-at-er.

00:38:00.632 --> 00:38:02.110
And so I didn't think about theater as being a place

00:38:02.110 --> 00:38:04.970
that we could like illustrate anything hip hop.

00:38:04.970 --> 00:38:07.400
How can you bring something that exists in a circle

00:38:07.400 --> 00:38:10.870
in a club into the square, into the proscenium.

00:38:10.870 --> 00:38:14.037
(light ambient music)

00:38:22.550 --> 00:38:24.583
Crutch's whole like approach wasn't just

00:38:24.583 --> 00:38:27.970
that he was bringing genuine hip hop into it,

00:38:27.970 --> 00:38:30.700
but he was also bringing in like this abstract art

00:38:30.700 --> 00:38:32.373
into the space at the same time.

00:38:33.950 --> 00:38:36.360
Bill had a raincoat, you know, he came out.

00:38:36.360 --> 00:38:39.378
I had this rain sound effects, you know, on.

00:38:39.378 --> 00:38:41.202
It's trippy, man.

00:38:41.202 --> 00:38:44.190
I mean the show is just like trippy, I'm telling you.

00:38:44.190 --> 00:38:45.820
I'm sitting there during the show

00:38:45.820 --> 00:38:47.410
and I was tripping looking at it,

00:38:47.410 --> 00:38:49.767
like don't forget your cues, you know what I mean?

00:38:49.767 --> 00:38:52.684
(percussive music)

00:38:59.570 --> 00:39:02.940
The politics, the current state of affairs,

00:39:02.940 --> 00:39:05.360
his background, all that stuff is

00:39:05.360 --> 00:39:07.913
put into everything that Bill Shannon does.

00:39:08.788 --> 00:39:11.205
(vocalizing)

00:39:16.977 --> 00:39:20.060
(upbeat dance music)

00:39:41.620 --> 00:39:44.741
♪ Take it easy ♪

00:39:44.741 --> 00:39:48.183
♪ Don't worry about it ♪

00:39:48.183 --> 00:39:52.023
♪ I got this, I got this ♪

00:39:52.023 --> 00:39:57.023
♪ Let me work it, let me work it out ♪

00:39:57.026 --> 00:40:02.026
♪ Take it easy ♪

00:40:02.842 --> 00:40:06.684
♪ Take it easy ♪

00:40:06.684 --> 00:40:11.684
♪ Take it easy ♪

00:40:13.882 --> 00:40:18.794
♪ Don't let me bother you ♪

00:40:18.794 --> 00:40:22.978
♪ I got this, I got this ♪

00:40:22.978 --> 00:40:27.698
♪ Let me work it out, let me work it out ♪

00:40:27.698 --> 00:40:30.281
♪ Take it easy ♪

00:40:31.900 --> 00:40:34.180
So much was happening with his career.

00:40:34.180 --> 00:40:36.647
It just got to be like one thing after another.

00:40:36.647 --> 00:40:40.150
(upbeat jazz music)

00:40:40.150 --> 00:40:43.210
Hip hop is out of all things, it's really important

00:40:43.210 --> 00:40:45.520
to maintain your individuality.

00:40:45.520 --> 00:40:47.560
My name is Jeff Grosso and I'm your host.

00:40:47.560 --> 00:40:50.643
This is fucking Love Letters. Welcome back.

00:40:53.590 --> 00:40:56.670
The Guggenheim, I met Crazy Legs,

00:40:56.670 --> 00:40:58.763
I'm going to Kuwait, I'm going to Japan.

00:41:00.589 --> 00:41:01.756
Whooo.

00:41:03.960 --> 00:41:05.204
We went to France.

00:41:05.204 --> 00:41:06.940
Look at this shit.

00:41:06.940 --> 00:41:08.158
England.

00:41:08.158 --> 00:41:09.870
(humming)

00:41:09.870 --> 00:41:11.349
Scotland.

00:41:11.349 --> 00:41:12.182
Freedom!

00:41:13.120 --> 00:41:14.396
♪ Only ya'll know what happened ♪

00:41:14.396 --> 00:41:15.495
♪ With some passion ♪

00:41:15.495 --> 00:41:17.159
♪ Rappers battlin' all rappers ♪

00:41:17.159 --> 00:41:18.556
♪ Carry it all backwards ♪

00:41:18.556 --> 00:41:19.775
♪ Laugh and say that's it ♪

00:41:19.775 --> 00:41:20.608
♪ It's battlecon ♪

00:41:20.608 --> 00:41:21.736
♪ Future blackness ♪

00:41:21.736 --> 00:41:24.736
(upbeat jazz music)

00:41:34.610 --> 00:41:37.030
There were some good reviews and people really

00:41:37.030 --> 00:41:38.810
like the work and, you know, all this stuff,

00:41:38.810 --> 00:41:41.780
but at the same time the dance world, they were looking

00:41:41.780 --> 00:41:43.703
at it like ahh, isn't that cute,

00:41:43.703 --> 00:41:46.563
he does the breakdance on the crutches.

00:41:48.088 --> 00:41:49.510
I've seen Crutch get angry.

00:41:49.510 --> 00:41:52.540
They keep asking him about his crutches and, you know,

00:41:52.540 --> 00:41:55.740
not about the, the artwork, the music, or the dancers.

00:41:55.740 --> 00:41:59.980
It was a lot about his disability, you know.

00:41:59.980 --> 00:42:01.417
It's kind of fucked up.

00:42:02.920 --> 00:42:06.450
No matter how high you go on skills on crutches,

00:42:06.450 --> 00:42:08.760
there's still the baggage

00:42:08.760 --> 00:42:10.900
of a crutch representing failure

00:42:10.900 --> 00:42:13.533
that can trump your achievements.

00:42:20.770 --> 00:42:21.620
Ready?

00:42:21.620 --> 00:42:22.940
Yeah.

00:42:22.940 --> 00:42:26.070
So tonight we're gonna see

00:42:26.930 --> 00:42:31.930
the two pieces that I choreographed for "Varekai",

00:42:32.170 --> 00:42:33.870
Cirque Du Soleil's "Varekai" show.

00:42:35.267 --> 00:42:39.059
(light orchestral music)

00:42:39.059 --> 00:42:41.476
(vocalizing)

00:42:44.960 --> 00:42:47.820
Just knowing that Bill had anything

00:42:47.820 --> 00:42:50.460
to do with Cirque Du Soleil was just a huge honor

00:42:50.460 --> 00:42:54.189
that one of us made it, one of us did it.

00:42:54.189 --> 00:42:57.606
(grand orchestral music)

00:42:58.601 --> 00:43:01.060
So we were really proud, but I don't think it was like

00:43:01.060 --> 00:43:02.447
anything that really shocked us so hard.

00:43:02.447 --> 00:43:05.020
It was like, it was almost like of course.

00:43:05.020 --> 00:43:06.763
You're supposed to be doing that.

00:43:07.900 --> 00:43:10.400
The contacted me after they saw my glide

00:43:10.400 --> 00:43:12.710
and they wanted me to actually be a performer

00:43:12.710 --> 00:43:16.560
in the show, like a, a main character, basically.

00:43:16.560 --> 00:43:18.260
But then I found out like what their artists

00:43:18.260 --> 00:43:19.210
have to go through.

00:43:23.900 --> 00:43:26.130
I watched these dudes one night

00:43:26.130 --> 00:43:29.103
and this guy was busting his ass.

00:43:32.020 --> 00:43:33.900
I was worried about it damaging my hips

00:43:33.900 --> 00:43:35.790
or damaging the nerves in my arms from doing

00:43:35.790 --> 00:43:37.680
that much every day, same exact thing.

00:43:37.680 --> 00:43:39.130
That just does wear and tear.

00:43:40.240 --> 00:43:43.600
I said I'll train somebody to do what I do and become a part

00:43:43.600 --> 00:43:45.650
of the creative team and do choreography.

00:43:46.920 --> 00:43:49.460
Yeah, yeah, hell yeah.

00:43:51.050 --> 00:43:52.530
Nice.

00:43:52.530 --> 00:43:54.640
He had to teach these gentlemen

00:43:54.640 --> 00:43:56.460
to dance on crutches.

00:43:56.460 --> 00:44:00.523
Vladimir Ignatenkov, three time world champion tumbler.

00:44:01.830 --> 00:44:02.663
Do a flair.

00:44:02.663 --> 00:44:04.630
Flair your legs out, both.

00:44:04.630 --> 00:44:05.640
Yeah.

00:44:05.640 --> 00:44:09.524
And also he had to train several aerialists.

00:44:09.524 --> 00:44:11.453
Keep going, keep your flow on.

00:44:12.440 --> 00:44:15.130
I had these guys threading and parroting and tick tocking,

00:44:15.130 --> 00:44:18.713
and all these different flavors of like boogaloo style.

00:44:20.150 --> 00:44:23.090
Then they had their own acrobatic moves on top of that,

00:44:23.090 --> 00:44:25.045
so it just looked really, really sick.

00:44:25.045 --> 00:44:26.462
Whooo, beautiful.

00:44:29.682 --> 00:44:33.293
(camera shutter clicking)

00:44:33.293 --> 00:44:35.340
The director wanted to put like

00:44:35.340 --> 00:44:37.730
an upside down wheelchair act in the show,

00:44:37.730 --> 00:44:39.180
where there's like clowns in a wheelchair

00:44:39.180 --> 00:44:41.640
that flips upside down and clowns fall out.

00:44:41.640 --> 00:44:45.100
And I was like you're not fucking putting that in the show,

00:44:45.100 --> 00:44:48.170
like I felt insulted literally because he was trying

00:44:48.170 --> 00:44:51.570
to make into like a disability theme where

00:44:51.570 --> 00:44:54.780
my work was gonna be a part of the spectrum

00:44:54.780 --> 00:44:57.440
of representation of disability.

00:44:57.440 --> 00:44:59.420
And I was very uncomfortable with that.

00:44:59.420 --> 00:45:02.563
I didn't want to be a part of the disabled Cirque show.

00:45:03.400 --> 00:45:06.973
I wanted to, my character to be the one that flies.

00:45:07.826 --> 00:45:12.826
(light electronic music)
(audience applauding)

00:45:47.492 --> 00:45:50.909
(light orchestral music)

00:45:52.833 --> 00:45:53.920
When you want to teach people,

00:45:53.920 --> 00:45:55.910
they have to understand what it is you're doing,

00:45:55.910 --> 00:45:58.290
and the communication has to be the same.

00:45:58.290 --> 00:46:00.713
Otherwise everything gets lost in translation.

00:46:02.020 --> 00:46:04.460
So when you develop a technique,

00:46:04.460 --> 00:46:08.340
you begin to codify a language for,

00:46:08.340 --> 00:46:10.590
for a particular vocabulary.

00:46:10.590 --> 00:46:14.480
You name it, you call it what it is, and Bill Shannon

00:46:14.480 --> 00:46:16.853
is doing that in the Shannon Technique.

00:46:16.853 --> 00:46:18.651
(upbeat dance music)

00:46:18.651 --> 00:46:22.484
(singing in foreign language)

00:46:25.230 --> 00:46:28.930
By him creating a specific vocabulary and naming it,

00:46:28.930 --> 00:46:31.560
it creates an awareness that those movements

00:46:31.560 --> 00:46:35.800
have been absolutely articulated, like it's a real choice

00:46:35.800 --> 00:46:38.020
of his body to go to a very specific place

00:46:38.020 --> 00:46:39.680
and he can hit it every time.

00:46:46.092 --> 00:46:47.740
I was in the studio with him.

00:46:47.740 --> 00:46:49.860
We had six weeks of one to one mentoring,

00:46:49.860 --> 00:46:53.063
and I expected to be able to do things like that.

00:46:54.600 --> 00:46:55.493
And he just cracked up,

00:46:55.493 --> 00:46:58.220
he's like you've been trying this for 15 minutes.

00:46:58.220 --> 00:47:00.573
I've been doing that for 15 years.

00:47:01.770 --> 00:47:03.730
Yes, it was dance, it was movement,

00:47:03.730 --> 00:47:05.680
but it was this thing that absolutely

00:47:05.680 --> 00:47:08.230
exploded the preconceptions that I even had

00:47:08.230 --> 00:47:09.263
of what dance was.

00:47:10.610 --> 00:47:12.640
Those are the respected art forms

00:47:12.640 --> 00:47:16.260
or genres in dance are the ones that have technique.

00:47:16.260 --> 00:47:18.070
One that puts itself in

00:47:18.070 --> 00:47:20.130
that frame deserves respect.

00:47:20.130 --> 00:47:22.980
And that is learned and that requires discipline.

00:47:22.980 --> 00:47:25.940
But it's also there's a little bit like a little fuck you to

00:47:25.940 --> 00:47:27.970
that system at the same time.

00:47:27.970 --> 00:47:31.053
(upbeat dance music)

00:47:33.519 --> 00:47:36.686
(audience applauding)

00:47:38.227 --> 00:47:39.487
Yeah, yeah.

00:47:39.487 --> 00:47:40.745
(crowd cheering)

00:47:40.745 --> 00:47:42.570
Yeah, let me hear it, New York.

00:47:42.570 --> 00:47:43.608
(crowd cheering)

00:47:43.608 --> 00:47:44.691
Raise the roof up!

00:47:44.691 --> 00:47:46.252
Raise the roof up, come on,

00:47:46.252 --> 00:47:49.585
all right, all right, let's get this started.

00:47:50.425 --> 00:47:51.258
Yeah.

00:47:51.258 --> 00:47:52.216
Sketchy, Sketchy.

00:47:52.216 --> 00:47:54.200
That's his Sketchy, he definitely stepped it up

00:47:54.200 --> 00:47:56.378
after coming from Cirque.

00:47:56.378 --> 00:47:59.559
One, two, two, two.

00:47:59.559 --> 00:48:03.186
It was a sketchy attempt at bringing hip hop to theater.

00:48:03.186 --> 00:48:05.450
Ewww, nice, D.

00:48:05.450 --> 00:48:07.550
I wasn't necessarily that the moves were sketchy,

00:48:07.550 --> 00:48:09.900
but having hip hop in the theater at that point

00:48:09.900 --> 00:48:11.570
was a sketchy idea to people,

00:48:11.570 --> 00:48:14.561
so it was like a little bit of sarcasm behind it

00:48:14.561 --> 00:48:15.693
if you know Crutch.

00:48:21.220 --> 00:48:22.300
He finally had a little bit

00:48:22.300 --> 00:48:24.250
of money behind it and so we were able

00:48:24.250 --> 00:48:26.863
to give a little bit more to like costumes.

00:48:28.810 --> 00:48:30.460
He was incorporating so many things

00:48:30.460 --> 00:48:32.650
that aren't even typical in hip hop, you know,

00:48:32.650 --> 00:48:34.790
like slow motion capture.

00:48:34.790 --> 00:48:36.360
What I did earlier was air flares.

00:48:36.360 --> 00:48:38.229
I'm going to try to do 10 of them.

00:48:38.229 --> 00:48:39.364
Hype him up, right?

00:48:39.364 --> 00:48:41.244
We want to see it again, right?

00:48:41.244 --> 00:48:42.980
Come on, are you with me?

00:48:42.980 --> 00:48:44.310
Sketchy attempts to try a move

00:48:44.310 --> 00:48:47.100
that you don't necessarily know that you that you can land.

00:48:47.100 --> 00:48:49.968
You're never gonna see that in a contemporary show.

00:48:49.968 --> 00:48:54.968
One, two, three, four, five, six, seven,

00:48:55.480 --> 00:48:57.400
eight, nine, whoaaa!

00:48:57.400 --> 00:48:59.400
(crowd cheering)

00:48:59.400 --> 00:49:01.750
You could feel people, like the energy,

00:49:01.750 --> 00:49:04.293
like oooh please, you know, like you can make it.

00:49:05.170 --> 00:49:08.130
(crowd cheering)

00:49:08.130 --> 00:49:09.750
The crowds absolutely loved it.

00:49:09.750 --> 00:49:13.100
Hand hops, elbow hops, whoa.

00:49:13.100 --> 00:49:15.500
There's so many people in New York that came out

00:49:15.500 --> 00:49:17.770
to see us that we grew up in the clubs with.

00:49:17.770 --> 00:49:20.200
And I think it was their first take at ever seeing us

00:49:20.200 --> 00:49:21.310
in theater.

00:49:21.310 --> 00:49:23.100
It was like we just won a contest somewhere,

00:49:23.100 --> 00:49:24.950
like a battle, and like everybody

00:49:24.950 --> 00:49:27.690
was just so fucking thrilled to see, see it happen.

00:49:27.690 --> 00:49:30.641
Like I, I wanted to clap, but I'm like yeah, we did it.

00:49:30.641 --> 00:49:33.808
(audience applauding)

00:49:52.510 --> 00:49:54.960
Were to add another character to his repertoire,

00:49:54.960 --> 00:49:55.860
did you read that?

00:50:01.900 --> 00:50:04.773
Oh my God, she started out with the ax.

00:50:09.058 --> 00:50:09.970
What are you gonna do?

00:50:09.970 --> 00:50:11.110
Is a real person with pretenses of being,

00:50:11.110 --> 00:50:12.400
oh my God.

00:50:12.400 --> 00:50:14.023
Pretenses of being what?

00:50:14.023 --> 00:50:15.150
A contemptual artists.

00:50:15.150 --> 00:50:16.030
Conceptual.

00:50:16.030 --> 00:50:17.230
Conceptual, I'm sorry.

00:50:18.470 --> 00:50:19.320
That's very nice.

00:50:19.320 --> 00:50:20.493
I'm upside down.

00:50:21.550 --> 00:50:23.520
Well, you either are or you aren't.

00:50:23.520 --> 00:50:24.509
Right?

00:50:24.509 --> 00:50:26.520
If you don't have the potential to be.

00:50:26.520 --> 00:50:27.471
You can't have a pre,

00:50:27.471 --> 00:50:28.360
you don't have a, you don't have a pretense about it.

00:50:28.360 --> 00:50:29.920
You either are or you're not, you know,

00:50:29.920 --> 00:50:31.770
so what she's saying is I'm not, but.

00:50:34.130 --> 00:50:35.630
It's just like I don't know,

00:50:35.630 --> 00:50:40.110
I want to send Crazy Legs to review a ballet show.

00:50:40.110 --> 00:50:41.192
Okay?

00:50:41.192 --> 00:50:42.025
(laughing)

00:50:42.025 --> 00:50:42.858
That's what I want to do.

00:50:42.858 --> 00:50:44.613
And he'll write for The New York Times.

00:50:45.820 --> 00:50:48.060
They're used to seeing one thing one way,

00:50:48.060 --> 00:50:51.480
like theater to them is supposed to be the old fashioned way

00:50:51.480 --> 00:50:54.590
or what they see as, as hip hop,

00:50:54.590 --> 00:50:56.340
that's the way it's supposed to be.

00:50:57.660 --> 00:50:59.880
Any dance critic that comes to my work does not

00:50:59.880 --> 00:51:01.600
know what I did.

00:51:01.600 --> 00:51:03.760
Like ballet is well documented.

00:51:03.760 --> 00:51:05.643
Modern dance is well documented.

00:51:07.751 --> 00:51:09.310
Like I'm out here pushing the boundaries

00:51:09.310 --> 00:51:12.060
of a form I've invented in ways that are completely

00:51:12.060 --> 00:51:14.873
like invisible to someone who's just looking at me.

00:51:16.621 --> 00:51:19.005
What's it feel like to read a review like that?

00:51:19.005 --> 00:51:22.761
Uhhh, it's a feeling of being profoundly misunderstood.

00:51:22.761 --> 00:51:24.564
(laughing)

00:51:24.564 --> 00:51:27.314
(dramatic music)

00:51:36.176 --> 00:51:38.659
Which is, this is how you learn your balance.

00:51:38.659 --> 00:51:40.392
Which is this tight line

00:51:45.249 --> 00:51:50.249
That's how you, bend your knees, keep low, point,

00:51:50.757 --> 00:51:53.282
be like, I'm going!

00:52:01.989 --> 00:52:02.822
Whoa.

00:52:04.251 --> 00:52:07.668
(light electronic music)

00:52:25.161 --> 00:52:27.828
(kids cheering)

00:52:50.817 --> 00:52:53.159
Use your muscles, Earl.

00:52:53.159 --> 00:52:54.722
That was Bill.

00:52:54.722 --> 00:52:56.733
(laughing)

00:52:56.733 --> 00:52:57.816
Come on, buddy.

00:52:58.751 --> 00:53:00.251
Are you coming in?

00:53:03.193 --> 00:53:06.050
While I was here, like I was retouching some part

00:53:06.050 --> 00:53:08.990
of my childhood and revisiting that part of my life,

00:53:08.990 --> 00:53:13.600
and I don't know, my dad during the time

00:53:13.600 --> 00:53:15.960
that I had my disability was going

00:53:15.960 --> 00:53:19.970
through a lot of emotional healing from his own childhood.

00:53:19.970 --> 00:53:23.090
And so I think a lot of the brunt

00:53:23.090 --> 00:53:24.330
of that was taken out on me.

00:53:24.330 --> 00:53:26.100
I was the oldest.

00:53:26.100 --> 00:53:27.900
And that's really hard because I have to think

00:53:27.900 --> 00:53:30.730
like my own relationship to my,

00:53:30.730 --> 00:53:32.960
to my own kids is so different.

00:53:32.960 --> 00:53:35.913
Like I never, I never raised a hand on y kids.

00:53:37.020 --> 00:53:41.273
And my dad didn't know any different, you know.

00:53:43.470 --> 00:53:44.303
So,

00:53:48.490 --> 00:53:50.513
I don't know, it's just hard to imagine.

00:53:59.556 --> 00:54:02.639
(upbeat dance music)

00:54:10.150 --> 00:54:11.900
Bill told me he had met somebody.

00:54:12.980 --> 00:54:16.470
He was pretty smitten, you know, kinda like really kid

00:54:16.470 --> 00:54:18.220
in the candy store kind of smitten.

00:54:20.870 --> 00:54:23.383
Bill was, you know, cute.

00:54:24.590 --> 00:54:26.183
He was very different from me.

00:54:27.350 --> 00:54:31.200
We met in New York and he likes to tell the story

00:54:31.200 --> 00:54:33.950
of us being from the opposite sides of the tracks,

00:54:33.950 --> 00:54:36.340
'cause I was in Carroll Gardens in Brooklyn,

00:54:36.340 --> 00:54:39.190
which was, you know, brownstones.

00:54:39.190 --> 00:54:41.650
And at that time he was in Red Hook,

00:54:41.650 --> 00:54:44.337
which was down and dirty.

00:54:44.337 --> 00:54:46.520
(laughing)

00:54:46.520 --> 00:54:49.760
They were both like theses salmon, just swimming upstream

00:54:49.760 --> 00:54:50.690
as hard as they could.

00:54:50.690 --> 00:54:52.953
I mean you could just, you could just read it

00:54:52.953 --> 00:54:54.743
like from a mile away, this is it.

00:55:00.727 --> 00:55:03.212
Mmmm, boogy, boogy, boogy, yeah.

00:55:03.212 --> 00:55:04.580
Uh-oh, is a lip coming out?

00:55:04.580 --> 00:55:05.760
Look at the lip.

00:55:05.760 --> 00:55:06.593
He's so cute.

00:55:06.593 --> 00:55:07.648
Wait, where's the lip?

00:55:07.648 --> 00:55:08.723
There it is.

00:55:08.723 --> 00:55:10.340
Give 'em the lip, give 'em the lip.

00:55:10.340 --> 00:55:11.173
Ohhh.

00:55:14.430 --> 00:55:17.323
After Sketchy, everybody goes in their own path.

00:55:23.448 --> 00:55:24.281
Daddy.

00:55:27.949 --> 00:55:29.100
Oh, watch out.

00:55:29.100 --> 00:55:29.933
Watch out.

00:55:31.670 --> 00:55:33.080
Crutch did the last thing

00:55:33.080 --> 00:55:34.784
you would expect from Crutch.

00:55:34.784 --> 00:55:36.403
You know, he's like I'm moving to Pittsburgh.

00:55:38.310 --> 00:55:41.970
Like he's growing his own food and vegetables, and has a car

00:55:41.970 --> 00:55:44.360
that runs off like fucking potatoes or something.

00:55:44.360 --> 00:55:45.940
That's, that's Crutch, you know.

00:55:47.502 --> 00:55:50.720
But he goes back to a more refined Crutch

00:55:50.720 --> 00:55:51.963
into solo work.

00:55:54.830 --> 00:55:57.240
Back into his like organic interactions

00:55:57.240 --> 00:55:58.307
with people or their reactions,

00:55:58.307 --> 00:56:00.818
to Bill, you know, doing his thing,

00:56:00.818 --> 00:56:02.068
going through the street.

00:56:05.600 --> 00:56:07.060
It's fucking raining, man.

00:56:07.060 --> 00:56:08.410
Come on, we gotta get started here!

00:56:08.410 --> 00:56:09.900
What's going on?

00:56:09.900 --> 00:56:11.624
What's taking so long!

00:56:11.624 --> 00:56:14.124
(banjo music)

00:56:14.989 --> 00:56:15.863
Hear yourself.

00:56:21.945 --> 00:56:23.018
Oh!

00:56:23.018 --> 00:56:24.080
So I met Bill at School of the Art Institute

00:56:24.080 --> 00:56:26.630
of Chicago in around 1993.

00:56:26.630 --> 00:56:29.640
And I actually remember him, you kinda, can't not,

00:56:29.640 --> 00:56:31.333
remember the way he looked.

00:56:31.333 --> 00:56:32.880
(barking)

00:56:32.880 --> 00:56:36.311
I was like damn, this kid wants attention like really bad.

00:56:36.311 --> 00:56:38.561
(shouting)

00:56:47.310 --> 00:56:49.040
You know, I think being a public spectacle

00:56:49.040 --> 00:56:52.320
as a child, going to demonstrations in public

00:56:52.320 --> 00:56:55.270
throughout my whole childhood, and then being

00:56:55.270 --> 00:56:58.300
in the street skateboarding and breakdancing

00:56:58.300 --> 00:57:01.000
just all fed into like I'm just a performing artist

00:57:01.000 --> 00:57:03.516
in the street, this feels natural to me.

00:57:03.516 --> 00:57:06.016
(banjo music)

00:57:20.560 --> 00:57:23.638
In Chicago we shot on some really nasty, bad cameras, man,

00:57:23.638 --> 00:57:24.743
and it was all noise.

00:57:27.680 --> 00:57:29.137
And just like hidden camera guy in the,

00:57:29.137 --> 00:57:32.240
in the corner, whatever, like off,

00:57:32.240 --> 00:57:35.813
offsite where you can't see any spying on innocent people.

00:57:45.740 --> 00:57:48.480
You know, he's getting tangled up on the street,

00:57:48.480 --> 00:57:50.273
getting caught in doors, you know.

00:57:50.273 --> 00:57:52.883
He's just falling down and he's got crutches.

00:57:55.380 --> 00:57:59.263
So then, you know, somebody'll go to help him.

00:58:02.980 --> 00:58:06.583
And then he'll just make them fail in helping him,

00:58:08.180 --> 00:58:12.447
which is kind of a sad place to be, you know what I mean?

00:58:23.890 --> 00:58:28.020
Once the reemergence of my disability came back in my 20s,

00:58:28.020 --> 00:58:33.020
I was like dealing with the same expressions

00:58:33.040 --> 00:58:34.800
in people's faces again.

00:58:34.800 --> 00:58:38.080
And it was like a really old memory, a very old memory to

00:58:38.080 --> 00:58:40.752
have people treat me the way they did.

00:58:40.752 --> 00:58:43.600
(light electronic music)

00:58:43.600 --> 00:58:47.240
One of the most difficult things about the transition

00:58:47.240 --> 00:58:50.530
from the status of non-disabled to disabled

00:58:50.530 --> 00:58:54.230
is figuring out how to manage the awkwardness

00:58:54.230 --> 00:58:59.193
of encounters between themselves and non-disabled people.

00:59:05.288 --> 00:59:06.650
It was like a turning point when I realized

00:59:06.650 --> 00:59:09.390
that I have this relationship to the public doing tricks

00:59:09.390 --> 00:59:12.550
on crutches, and that it's not all

00:59:12.550 --> 00:59:15.110
like look how cool I am on crutches.

00:59:15.110 --> 00:59:16.810
There's all this other stuff happening.

00:59:16.810 --> 00:59:19.723
And that I have not even begun to deal with it.

00:59:21.168 --> 00:59:23.123
And that was the beginning of that journey.

00:59:26.865 --> 00:59:29.615
(static hissing)

01:00:10.430 --> 01:00:11.693
It's provocative.

01:00:12.880 --> 01:00:16.000
You're taking advantage of people's good nature.

01:00:16.000 --> 01:00:19.223
Like these are good people that care.

01:00:20.820 --> 01:00:23.790
But I was often in the position of helping him

01:00:23.790 --> 01:00:27.020
when he needed help, so I know what it's like

01:00:27.020 --> 01:00:30.770
to be the person who's reaching down to help somebody up

01:00:30.770 --> 01:00:32.810
who may or may not need it.

01:00:32.810 --> 01:00:35.613
So I identify with both sides.

01:00:50.030 --> 01:00:51.320
What happened in that performance

01:00:51.320 --> 01:00:55.210
that's so interesting was that my skateboard was there,

01:00:55.210 --> 01:00:59.560
but the sidewalk had a slight incline to it,

01:00:59.560 --> 01:01:01.520
and so the skateboard just rolled out

01:01:01.520 --> 01:01:02.773
and went into the street.

01:01:05.100 --> 01:01:10.100
A cab crossed three lanes to run over the board on purpose.

01:01:10.910 --> 01:01:13.470
Now mind you, I had no money at that time.

01:01:13.470 --> 01:01:16.770
I was on full scholarship at the Art Institute of Chicago.

01:01:16.770 --> 01:01:18.620
I had no real job.

01:01:18.620 --> 01:01:21.670
My family doesn't have money, plus I no longer

01:01:21.670 --> 01:01:23.740
had a way to get back to the train station

01:01:23.740 --> 01:01:26.570
and back to my house, which like tons of distance.

01:01:26.570 --> 01:01:28.288
I mean it was a long ass way.

01:01:28.288 --> 01:01:30.480
I had to walk all the way to the train.

01:01:30.480 --> 01:01:31.410
And I was just miserable.

01:01:31.410 --> 01:01:33.400
And I started crashing to the ground,

01:01:33.400 --> 01:01:35.610
and people were coming and helping me.

01:01:35.610 --> 01:01:37.487
Instead of being like no, I'm not gonna let you help me,

01:01:37.487 --> 01:01:38.903
I just started hugging them.

01:01:40.152 --> 01:01:43.053
And I would be hugging like three or four people at once,

01:01:43.053 --> 01:01:45.370
and they would all be lifting me up.

01:01:45.370 --> 01:01:49.940
They'd lift me up and stand me up, and instead

01:01:49.940 --> 01:01:52.490
of rejecting them I was just kind of like okay,

01:01:52.490 --> 01:01:54.100
I'm just accepting this.

01:01:55.330 --> 01:01:58.287
I was just really upset about my situation,

01:01:59.870 --> 01:02:02.020
but also just everything that has happened.

01:02:03.383 --> 01:02:06.800
(light electronic music)

01:02:11.370 --> 01:02:14.423
It was like I was just surrendering when I realized

01:02:16.790 --> 01:02:18.020
I don't really want to mess with people.

01:02:18.020 --> 01:02:22.103
I just want to express these feelings and these ideas.

01:02:25.540 --> 01:02:28.010
You know, I imagine that people might be a little upset

01:02:28.010 --> 01:02:29.170
by that.

01:02:29.170 --> 01:02:32.030
Some people are, like how could you do that to people,

01:02:32.030 --> 01:02:34.120
like isn't that mean?

01:02:34.120 --> 01:02:35.920
Come on, there's at least a couple people in here

01:02:35.920 --> 01:02:37.363
that think it's really mean.

01:02:38.930 --> 01:02:40.252
I want to know who they are.

01:02:40.252 --> 01:02:42.520
I think you're awful.

01:02:42.520 --> 01:02:43.753
Okay.

01:02:43.753 --> 01:02:44.710
(laughing)

01:02:44.710 --> 01:02:46.123
This guy behind you, here.

01:02:48.010 --> 01:02:49.940
I think it's kind of manipulative.

01:02:49.940 --> 01:02:52.060
You think it's what?
Kind of manipulative.

01:02:52.060 --> 01:02:53.190
Manipulative.

01:02:53.190 --> 01:02:55.420
Ahh, okay.

01:02:55.420 --> 01:02:59.423
Um, well, I kind of want to talk about that a little bit.

01:03:03.129 --> 01:03:04.920
You know, like "Regarding the Fall" was a question

01:03:04.920 --> 01:03:08.260
and some of the questions were asked in a wrong way.

01:03:08.260 --> 01:03:11.230
And that there are failures to it that happened

01:03:11.230 --> 01:03:13.170
in order for me to dig further into it,

01:03:13.170 --> 01:03:15.590
I had to go down paths, every dead end.

01:03:15.590 --> 01:03:17.860
And out of that mistake came the concept

01:03:17.860 --> 01:03:18.950
of the neutral palette,

01:03:18.950 --> 01:03:22.460
which is that you never see me like just all,

01:03:22.460 --> 01:03:24.083
all out and out fall.

01:03:25.930 --> 01:03:30.350
Bill realized that he was in some ways being manipulative

01:03:30.350 --> 01:03:34.783
of people because he was putting them into a crisis moment,

01:03:35.790 --> 01:03:40.790
so he decided that a better way to continue to investigate,

01:03:41.170 --> 01:03:43.880
because he was very interested in how people

01:03:43.880 --> 01:03:48.360
were responding to him, was not to present himself

01:03:48.360 --> 01:03:50.260
as something flashy

01:03:50.260 --> 01:03:53.773
that would very obviously draw attention.

01:03:58.760 --> 01:04:01.297
I mean this shit is just beyond like reasonable,

01:04:03.820 --> 01:04:06.140
it's almost like so strange,

01:04:06.140 --> 01:04:07.040
one, for him to do it,

01:04:07.040 --> 01:04:08.790
two, for me to accept him doing it.

01:04:10.086 --> 01:04:11.320
You know, it's just uh,

01:04:11.320 --> 01:04:13.270
I'm sitting there going oh my God,

01:04:13.270 --> 01:04:16.120
he actually fucking gave me a drink of water.

01:04:16.120 --> 01:04:18.250
At that point I had surrendered myself

01:04:18.250 --> 01:04:20.910
to whatever other people thought I needed,

01:04:20.910 --> 01:04:23.250
and this was like probably the height of that,

01:04:23.250 --> 01:04:25.020
somebody actually feeding me.

01:04:25.020 --> 01:04:29.033
Like that is just, that really gets to the core of help.

01:04:30.250 --> 01:04:31.910
You know, you will have people who will, you know,

01:04:31.910 --> 01:04:36.150
try to feed you in your real life and you'll be offended,

01:04:36.150 --> 01:04:37.927
but in your performance you embrace it

01:04:37.927 --> 01:04:39.493
and you try to understand it.

01:04:40.880 --> 01:04:43.590
It's like I am out there interacting with phenomena

01:04:43.590 --> 01:04:45.513
that extend throughout my whole life.

01:04:46.410 --> 01:04:48.620
And the people that are representing those phenomena

01:04:48.620 --> 01:04:51.970
are individuals, but I don't look at them

01:04:51.970 --> 01:04:56.800
as good or bad people based on how they act.

01:04:56.800 --> 01:05:01.800
I look at them as individuals that manifest phenomena

01:05:05.410 --> 01:05:07.910
that occur to me whether I'm performing or not.

01:05:10.880 --> 01:05:13.080
The phenomenology of disability

01:05:13.080 --> 01:05:16.370
that Shannon explores comes out

01:05:16.370 --> 01:05:19.880
of an experience of repeated patterns of interaction.

01:05:19.880 --> 01:05:22.150
He sees the same things and experiences

01:05:22.150 --> 01:05:25.040
the same things over, and over and over again.

01:05:25.040 --> 01:05:28.480
That's burdensome, but what it also does

01:05:28.480 --> 01:05:33.480
for someone who as thoughtful as Shannon is it pushes him

01:05:34.010 --> 01:05:36.268
to want to name those things.

01:05:36.268 --> 01:05:38.270
(upbeat jazz music)

01:05:38.270 --> 01:05:40.770
Imagine if I get up, I get dressed, I go outside,

01:05:40.770 --> 01:05:43.200
I throw on my tunes, jump on the board and start

01:05:43.200 --> 01:05:45.240
to like bop down the street.

01:05:45.240 --> 01:05:46.200
And as I go down the street,

01:05:46.200 --> 01:05:49.170
pushing on my crutches, everyone turns to stare.

01:05:49.170 --> 01:05:50.670
A lot of people stare directly at me,

01:05:50.670 --> 01:05:53.705
but even more people turn after I pass.

01:05:53.705 --> 01:05:56.663
So I continue on down the block and a cab pulls up,

01:05:56.663 --> 01:05:57.496
(car horn honking)

01:05:57.496 --> 01:05:58.997
"Hey, hoo, what do you call that?"

01:05:58.997 --> 01:06:01.980
And before I can even answer, the car's gone.

01:06:01.980 --> 01:06:02.960
I get to the bus stop.

01:06:02.960 --> 01:06:03.793
I sit down.

01:06:03.793 --> 01:06:05.050
A perfect stranger comes along

01:06:05.050 --> 01:06:07.850
and looks at me and says, "Sorry."

01:06:07.850 --> 01:06:09.410
And then another person comes

01:06:09.410 --> 01:06:11.090
and sits down on the bench, and then the guy looks

01:06:11.090 --> 01:06:12.443
at me and goes, "Hey, what happened to you?"

01:06:12.443 --> 01:06:14.637
And I'm like, what happened to you?

01:06:14.637 --> 01:06:16.460
And he's like, "No, I mean the crutches."

01:06:16.460 --> 01:06:18.440
And I said, everybody has crutches;

01:06:18.440 --> 01:06:21.440
some of them you can see, some of them are invisible.

01:06:21.440 --> 01:06:23.550
He goes, "Come on, man, what happened to your leg?

01:06:23.550 --> 01:06:24.800
I bet it was your ankle.

01:06:24.800 --> 01:06:26.530
I broke my ankle once."

01:06:26.530 --> 01:06:28.893
And he continues to tell me his whole story.

01:06:30.450 --> 01:06:33.240
Then the bus pulls up, the bus driver opens the door

01:06:33.240 --> 01:06:35.470
and says, "Hey, come on, buddy, I got ya.

01:06:35.470 --> 01:06:36.707
You can do it."

01:06:38.780 --> 01:06:41.040
I get off the bus and there's a store.

01:06:41.040 --> 01:06:42.520
I'm looking a the store and I realize

01:06:42.520 --> 01:06:44.450
that the thing I need to get, there's two places

01:06:44.450 --> 01:06:46.270
that sell it and one of them's maybe having a sale.

01:06:46.270 --> 01:06:47.250
And I can't remember which one.

01:06:47.250 --> 01:06:48.560
And as I'm standing there I notice

01:06:48.560 --> 01:06:50.780
there's a woman holding the door open for me,

01:06:50.780 --> 01:06:52.800
waiting for me to go into the store,

01:06:52.800 --> 01:06:54.470
but I'm still trying to decide.

01:06:54.470 --> 01:06:57.240
And she's holding it longer, and she's looking at me.

01:06:57.240 --> 01:06:59.820
And her face changes, are you coming to the door?

01:06:59.820 --> 01:07:03.620
And I get this little bit of a backlash eye roll,

01:07:03.620 --> 01:07:05.000
but I go into the store anyway.

01:07:05.000 --> 01:07:06.910
And I find the item I want, and I go to the register.

01:07:06.910 --> 01:07:09.730
The cashier says, 'Hey, man, did you break your ankle?

01:07:09.730 --> 01:07:11.700
I broke my ankle once."

01:07:11.700 --> 01:07:13.000
And that's just one day.

01:07:13.000 --> 01:07:14.010
It's not even a whole day.

01:07:14.010 --> 01:07:15.530
It's just one errand.

01:07:15.530 --> 01:07:19.010
And these things all are cumulative, day after day, week

01:07:19.010 --> 01:07:23.253
after week, month after month, year after year after year.

01:07:27.724 --> 01:07:30.150
(light piano music)

01:07:30.150 --> 01:07:33.550
Disability always demands a story.

01:07:33.550 --> 01:07:36.170
Non-disabled people are never required

01:07:36.170 --> 01:07:39.280
to give an account of themselves in the same way.

01:07:39.280 --> 01:07:40.752
What happened?

01:07:40.752 --> 01:07:43.694
To my hip?

01:07:43.694 --> 01:07:45.506
I was born with a disease.

01:07:45.506 --> 01:07:47.639
It's a really long story, but my hip is not round.

01:07:47.639 --> 01:07:49.000
Really?
Yeah.

01:07:49.000 --> 01:07:52.260
Most of us simply learn to manage this.

01:07:52.260 --> 01:07:54.260
We have a standard answer.

01:07:54.260 --> 01:07:56.993
We get it out of the way and we move on.

01:07:58.100 --> 01:08:02.030
So that he's turned this into a performance piece,

01:08:02.030 --> 01:08:06.950
into an art form where he evokes this question,

01:08:06.950 --> 01:08:10.453
this interrogation is absolutely brilliant.

01:08:13.240 --> 01:08:15.980
It's a language, and it's a tool,

01:08:15.980 --> 01:08:18.970
and it's a way of seeing, but it's not a sort

01:08:18.970 --> 01:08:21.440
of guidebook to do's and don'ts of dealing

01:08:21.440 --> 01:08:23.190
with disabled people who need help.

01:08:25.220 --> 01:08:30.220
What I actually encourage is to abandon assumptions.

01:08:33.136 --> 01:08:36.686
(light electronic music)

01:08:36.686 --> 01:08:38.410
Get down to The Studio at the Opera House

01:08:38.410 --> 01:08:40.380
because there's an amazing performer

01:08:40.380 --> 01:08:42.230
from Brooklyn coming out called Bill Shannon.

01:08:42.230 --> 01:08:44.120
And the night is called Spatial Theory.

01:08:44.120 --> 01:08:45.870
It's had rave reviews.

01:08:45.870 --> 01:08:48.100
You know that I was doing these performances

01:08:48.100 --> 01:08:50.460
where I was having these interactions with people based

01:08:50.460 --> 01:08:54.970
on their ideas of who I was, people were responding to it,

01:08:54.970 --> 01:08:56.447
you know, interested in it.

01:08:56.447 --> 01:08:57.875
(audience applauding)

01:08:57.875 --> 01:08:59.594
Yeah, yeah.

01:08:59.594 --> 01:09:02.760
And it became necessity to communicate it to audiences.

01:09:02.760 --> 01:09:05.760
So welcome to this evening's presentation of Spatial Theory.

01:09:06.681 --> 01:09:09.098
(vocalizing)

01:09:16.370 --> 01:09:18.090
(audience applauding)

01:09:18.090 --> 01:09:20.970
Okay, now I'm gonna sit down and talk a little,

01:09:20.970 --> 01:09:23.400
go over some video of some street performance work,

01:09:23.400 --> 01:09:26.930
where I perform simple utilitarian tasks in public

01:09:26.930 --> 01:09:31.047
and sort of begin to look at people look at me.

01:09:31.047 --> 01:09:34.047
(upbeat jazz music)

01:09:35.210 --> 01:09:36.043
So I said you know what I'm gonna do,

01:09:36.043 --> 01:09:38.053
I'm just gonna pick up a bottle.

01:09:39.580 --> 01:09:40.630
I'm just gonna pick up this bottle

01:09:40.630 --> 01:09:44.010
in pubic. It's a utilitarian task a very simple task.

01:09:44.010 --> 01:09:45.270
And you're gonna see, this is me.

01:09:45.270 --> 01:09:46.103
I'm the hero.

01:09:46.103 --> 01:09:47.277
This is the villain, right.

01:09:48.387 --> 01:09:52.080
And that's a random babushka from a Russian marketplace,

01:09:52.080 --> 01:09:54.100
so here's the reach for the bottle,

01:09:54.100 --> 01:09:55.900
which could be like the initiation

01:09:55.900 --> 01:09:58.000
of what I call projective narrative.

01:09:58.000 --> 01:10:00.260
So her story about me picking up the bottle

01:10:00.260 --> 01:10:02.610
is like way deeper than my own story

01:10:02.610 --> 01:10:03.630
of me picking up the bottle,

01:10:03.630 --> 01:10:06.732
which is basically a high mid, low mid split reach.

01:10:06.732 --> 01:10:07.620
(audience laughing)

01:10:07.620 --> 01:10:11.340
She's looking at it like will the man pick up the bottle?

01:10:11.340 --> 01:10:16.340
I cannot go on to my destination until I know

01:10:16.600 --> 01:10:19.223
if the man will pick up the bottle.

01:10:20.090 --> 01:10:22.870
Now, if you watch the purse area here,

01:10:22.870 --> 01:10:26.384
you're going to see this hight of the conflict

01:10:26.384 --> 01:10:28.320
reach a cataclysmic point.

01:10:28.320 --> 01:10:30.547
Watch the purse, get it, get it, get it.

01:10:30.547 --> 01:10:31.761
Ohhh.

01:10:31.761 --> 01:10:34.890
(audience laughing)

01:10:34.890 --> 01:10:39.180
A psychosomatic reaction to the height

01:10:39.180 --> 01:10:41.249
of the arc of her narrative.

01:10:41.249 --> 01:10:42.550
(audience laughing)

01:10:42.550 --> 01:10:45.290
And what I've noticed in, this next little moment

01:10:45.290 --> 01:10:48.360
here is what I call fate of distraction at the top

01:10:48.360 --> 01:10:51.171
of the stairs, fate of distraction right here.

01:10:51.171 --> 01:10:52.590
Whoa.

01:10:52.590 --> 01:10:57.590
Okay, I don't, I mean when it happened I was like terrified,

01:10:57.990 --> 01:11:00.193
like oh no, she's going down on the stairs.

01:11:01.680 --> 01:11:03.410
You can see my good samaritan impulse,

01:11:03.410 --> 01:11:05.780
I mean I'm ready to like dive down after her,

01:11:05.780 --> 01:11:08.290
so I'm not like out here just like accusing people

01:11:08.290 --> 01:11:10.490
of like being stupid for trying to help other people

01:11:10.490 --> 01:11:12.400
in need because I do it myself.

01:11:12.400 --> 01:11:14.640
And then there's final reckoning, you'll see it here,

01:11:14.640 --> 01:11:16.373
this look of like, right here.

01:11:18.530 --> 01:11:21.186
She's like you know, I almost died looking at you.

01:11:21.186 --> 01:11:22.922
(audience laughing)

01:11:22.922 --> 01:11:25.620
(audience applauding)

01:11:25.620 --> 01:11:27.960
I think Bill understands people's reaction

01:11:27.960 --> 01:11:31.410
to disability more than most people do,

01:11:31.410 --> 01:11:34.370
and he knows he's being misunderstood.

01:11:34.370 --> 01:11:39.370
And he can reach in and like bloop, here it is,

01:11:39.890 --> 01:11:41.080
you see that.

01:11:41.080 --> 01:11:43.830
So this next relationship I call peripheral fluctuation.

01:11:43.830 --> 01:11:45.540
So peripheral fluctuation is the kind of thing

01:11:45.540 --> 01:11:47.023
where your periphery is like right here, right,

01:11:47.023 --> 01:11:49.030
you can see my field of vision.

01:11:49.030 --> 01:11:51.830
Then you have like peripheral over here, right,

01:11:51.830 --> 01:11:54.493
so then as soon as my periphery starts to move

01:11:54.493 --> 01:11:56.070
towards a full field of vision,

01:11:56.070 --> 01:11:57.570
it's like peripheral function.

01:11:58.950 --> 01:12:00.428
No, I wasn't looking.

01:12:00.428 --> 01:12:02.393
(audience laughing)

01:12:02.393 --> 01:12:03.510
All of those things, were things

01:12:03.510 --> 01:12:06.130
that I could recognize in my life in different ways,

01:12:06.130 --> 01:12:08.410
and oh yeah, I do that or I know that.

01:12:08.410 --> 01:12:11.280
And and yeah, that's not,

01:12:11.280 --> 01:12:13.240
that's not understood by everybody.

01:12:13.240 --> 01:12:15.120
This next relationship I call Gesture of Help.

01:12:15.120 --> 01:12:18.020
A gesture of help is very different than real help.

01:12:18.020 --> 01:12:20.090
Real help, you know, like put me over your shoulder

01:12:20.090 --> 01:12:21.160
and carry me up the stairs.

01:12:21.160 --> 01:12:25.520
A gesture of help is like I'm gonna help her help me

01:12:26.420 --> 01:12:27.290
up the stairs.

01:12:27.290 --> 01:12:28.310
(audience laughing)

01:12:28.310 --> 01:12:31.020
Now normally for me, I go like up the stairs,

01:12:31.020 --> 01:12:32.451
but she's going sideways.

01:12:32.451 --> 01:12:34.140
(audience laughing)

01:12:34.140 --> 01:12:35.790
I'm like where are you taking me?

01:12:36.720 --> 01:12:38.503
I'm going to another dimension.

01:12:41.620 --> 01:12:44.880
People who haven't experienced these interactions,

01:12:44.880 --> 01:12:46.800
people who move through the world with sort

01:12:46.800 --> 01:12:49.640
of ordinary bodies don't necessarily understand

01:12:49.640 --> 01:12:53.560
what Bill is talking about, but it's that intervention

01:12:53.560 --> 01:12:58.072
with the video technology, that's when people get it.

01:12:58.072 --> 01:13:01.239
(audience applauding)

01:13:13.098 --> 01:13:16.480
(light electronic music)

01:13:16.480 --> 01:13:18.650
People say, they'll write about me, Bill Shannon,

01:13:18.650 --> 01:13:20.010
you know, he's this great dancer, right,

01:13:20.010 --> 01:13:22.690
it's too bad that, you know, he tricks people

01:13:22.690 --> 01:13:24.440
into helping him on the street.

01:13:24.440 --> 01:13:26.770
You know, or he does things where he falls to the ground

01:13:26.770 --> 01:13:28.723
so that, so that people help him.

01:13:30.060 --> 01:13:33.509
So it has this sort of notion that, that I'm getting people

01:13:33.509 --> 01:13:36.560
to do these things as if they don't do them already,

01:13:36.560 --> 01:13:39.460
whether, well, no matter what I'm doing, they're doing it.

01:13:41.410 --> 01:13:44.410
(upbeat jazz music)

01:13:51.803 --> 01:13:53.280
What's it for?

01:13:53.280 --> 01:13:54.329
it's a trio of video projects,

01:13:54.329 --> 01:13:58.450
called "Window, Bench & Traffic."

01:13:58.450 --> 01:14:02.990
And those projects are my sort of way of addressing

01:14:02.990 --> 01:14:07.690
a basic problem about dancing in the street,

01:14:07.690 --> 01:14:09.480
which is my dancing in the street

01:14:09.480 --> 01:14:10.860
is never seen by audiences,

01:14:10.860 --> 01:14:13.411
it's only seen by people who happen to be there.

01:14:13.411 --> 01:14:16.828
(light electronic music)

01:14:18.790 --> 01:14:21.210
He could've just kinda gone down some easy route

01:14:21.210 --> 01:14:23.860
of making some really entertaining dance shows.

01:14:23.860 --> 01:14:26.520
People would love the sort of flippancy

01:14:26.520 --> 01:14:30.150
and the superficial level of the virtuosity that he has.

01:14:30.150 --> 01:14:30.983
And he didn't.

01:14:32.897 --> 01:14:35.020
The mad scientist in him is brewing something,

01:14:35.020 --> 01:14:36.290
he's just, you know, he's brainstorming

01:14:36.290 --> 01:14:39.149
for his next big form of expression.

01:14:39.149 --> 01:14:42.066
(percussive music)

01:14:57.200 --> 01:15:00.690
Moving into a series like "Window Bench Traffic"

01:15:00.690 --> 01:15:05.360
solves one problem that Bill had when he

01:15:05.360 --> 01:15:09.750
was doing his click and point edited video talks.

01:15:09.750 --> 01:15:13.740
And that is that people could see him picking and choosing,

01:15:13.740 --> 01:15:15.150
which, in fact, he was.

01:15:15.150 --> 01:15:18.340
He might have captured four hours of film

01:15:18.340 --> 01:15:21.020
and found the three seconds that really illustrated

01:15:21.020 --> 01:15:22.040
his point.

01:15:22.040 --> 01:15:24.350
And people might say well, there's a,

01:15:24.350 --> 01:15:26.430
there's a manipulation that's happening there

01:15:26.430 --> 01:15:27.460
because you're freezing,

01:15:27.460 --> 01:15:31.720
you're stopping does it really unfold that way?

01:15:31.720 --> 01:15:33.333
Well, let's find out.

01:15:34.540 --> 01:15:35.530
There's a fabric.

01:15:35.530 --> 01:15:36.740
There's a social fabric.

01:15:36.740 --> 01:15:40.010
There's a a landscape of gazes, and approaches

01:15:40.010 --> 01:15:44.410
and subtleties around how humans look at each other,

01:15:44.410 --> 01:15:46.680
and pass each other, and the body language

01:15:46.680 --> 01:15:48.070
and the patterns that take place.

01:15:48.070 --> 01:15:51.530
And I really wanted to prove that the spectacle is there,

01:15:51.530 --> 01:15:52.940
I don't have to use anything.

01:15:52.940 --> 01:15:54.670
It happens no matter what I do,

01:15:54.670 --> 01:15:57.653
whether it's my real life or I'm in a performance.

01:16:03.758 --> 01:16:06.530
(upbeat dance music)

01:16:06.530 --> 01:16:11.270
Window was people would be viewing the performance

01:16:11.270 --> 01:16:14.060
through a window in a building on a square,

01:16:14.060 --> 01:16:16.010
and then the audience in the window

01:16:16.010 --> 01:16:19.140
would see the performance, not only directly,

01:16:19.140 --> 01:16:20.210
but also through the camera

01:16:20.210 --> 01:16:22.810
so they could see up close how people were reacting.

01:16:24.230 --> 01:16:26.790
It's an extension of his own investigations

01:16:26.790 --> 01:16:30.240
into how people treat those who are disabled,

01:16:30.240 --> 01:16:32.870
and we often don't know, you know,

01:16:32.870 --> 01:16:34.573
until we see it on screen.

01:16:36.540 --> 01:16:39.290
Bill realizes there are a two different audiences,

01:16:39.290 --> 01:16:42.400
the people who have been watching see a guy

01:16:42.400 --> 01:16:45.490
who's clearly capable, whereas people

01:16:45.490 --> 01:16:47.780
who have been walking by, what they have

01:16:47.780 --> 01:16:50.770
is crutches equals fragile.

01:16:50.770 --> 01:16:52.510
Everyone who sees that thinks they know

01:16:52.510 --> 01:16:55.160
what they're seeing, but they're interpreting it

01:16:55.160 --> 01:16:56.750
so differently that it's

01:16:56.750 --> 01:16:58.600
like they're two different realities.

01:17:00.470 --> 01:17:03.930
Bench was before the time of the GoPro, you know,

01:17:03.930 --> 01:17:06.060
he attached cameras all around him to

01:17:06.060 --> 01:17:08.373
give a 360 degree view.

01:17:10.519 --> 01:17:13.623
I remember doing a 360 in a suitcase thing.

01:17:14.570 --> 01:17:17.363
The hidden cameras were a way to get an honest reaction.

01:17:18.846 --> 01:17:20.679
You all right?

01:17:22.834 --> 01:17:24.001
You all right?

01:17:27.120 --> 01:17:30.460
Everyone would see all of these reactions behind him,

01:17:30.460 --> 01:17:32.123
his wake, basically.

01:17:33.550 --> 01:17:36.040
People literally stop on their tracks.

01:17:37.219 --> 01:17:40.190
That happens all the time.

01:17:51.366 --> 01:17:54.449
(upbeat dance music)

01:18:05.000 --> 01:18:06.850
Stage it in the middle of the back.

01:18:09.220 --> 01:18:11.710
Traffic, we put that on wheels

01:18:11.710 --> 01:18:14.263
and it becomes a lot more elaborate.

01:18:25.820 --> 01:18:27.220
The audience boards a bus.

01:18:30.620 --> 01:18:33.230
There's a DJ on the bus.

01:18:33.230 --> 01:18:36.600
The DJ would pipe music that Bill could hear

01:18:36.600 --> 01:18:39.229
and that the audience in the bus could hear, too.

01:18:39.229 --> 01:18:42.312
(upbeat dance music)

01:18:56.705 --> 01:18:58.330
He took his audience into the street.

01:18:58.330 --> 01:19:00.163
He took his audience on a goddam ride.

01:19:00.163 --> 01:19:02.830
(all laughing)

01:19:02.830 --> 01:19:05.460
And I was on the bus like dude, this is fucking genius.

01:19:05.460 --> 01:19:06.886
It was so cool.

01:19:06.886 --> 01:19:07.719
It was so exciting, like you really felt

01:19:07.719 --> 01:19:08.859
like you were with him.

01:19:08.859 --> 01:19:10.109
Whooo, whooo!

01:19:14.806 --> 01:19:17.520
(all laughing)

01:19:17.520 --> 01:19:19.790
It's interesting enough to be called art,

01:19:19.790 --> 01:19:21.680
but it's got this, you know, spectacle

01:19:21.680 --> 01:19:24.510
of showmanship kind of quality and you're not looking

01:19:24.510 --> 01:19:25.750
at the Empire State Building,

01:19:25.750 --> 01:19:28.023
you're looking at somebody who's living art.

01:19:33.371 --> 01:19:34.204
Hi.

01:19:35.620 --> 01:19:36.920
It's hot out today, right?

01:19:38.545 --> 01:19:40.134
I'm trying to figure you out with the crutches

01:19:40.134 --> 01:19:42.540
and the, and this.

01:19:42.540 --> 01:19:43.660
Yeah?

01:19:43.660 --> 01:19:44.493
What?

01:19:44.493 --> 01:19:45.860
How is this?

01:19:45.860 --> 01:19:46.730
How is what?

01:19:46.730 --> 01:19:49.001
You ride on this and what do you do with these?

01:19:49.001 --> 01:19:51.551
With these, I try, I flap them, I try to get air.

01:19:52.622 --> 01:19:53.455
Like wings?

01:19:53.455 --> 01:19:56.193
Like that, like they catch air and then I can kind of fly.

01:19:57.363 --> 01:19:59.470
You need a parachute then.

01:19:59.470 --> 01:20:00.303
I need a what?

01:20:00.303 --> 01:20:01.136
A parachute.

01:20:01.136 --> 01:20:02.130
I do need a parachute.

01:20:02.130 --> 01:20:03.890
Thank you.
Stay well.

01:20:03.890 --> 01:20:06.840
You, too.
Flap your wings, Crutch!

01:20:09.023 --> 01:20:12.106
(upbeat dance music)

01:20:14.090 --> 01:20:16.460
Traffic is so spontaneous

01:20:16.460 --> 01:20:21.120
that we get to see not only those disability phenomena,

01:20:21.120 --> 01:20:25.770
but we get to see relationships develop on the spot.

01:20:28.091 --> 01:20:29.363
Oh no, please.

01:20:29.363 --> 01:20:30.900
Please, you first.

01:20:30.900 --> 01:20:31.733
I gotta go that way.

01:20:31.733 --> 01:20:33.148
And you're in the way anyway.

01:20:34.453 --> 01:20:36.661
You're on a cane or what?

01:20:36.661 --> 01:20:37.828
Uh, or what.

01:20:39.877 --> 01:20:41.403
And, or what.

01:20:41.403 --> 01:20:43.360
Are you okay?
Yeah, I'm fine.

01:20:43.360 --> 01:20:45.126
You need some help with those papers?

01:20:45.126 --> 01:20:45.995
Oh, no thanks.

01:20:45.995 --> 01:20:46.896
No, you're okay?

01:20:46.896 --> 01:20:48.245
All right.

01:20:48.245 --> 01:20:49.691
Bye.

01:20:49.691 --> 01:20:50.524
What happened?

01:20:50.524 --> 01:20:51.735
You sprain your ankle?

01:20:51.735 --> 01:20:55.695
Well, that's a good guess, but it's not my ankle.

01:20:55.695 --> 01:20:57.854
Are you all right?

01:20:57.854 --> 01:20:59.670
What happened to you?

01:20:59.670 --> 01:21:02.753
(upbeat dance music)

01:21:09.755 --> 01:21:12.210
Ah, that's failure.

01:21:12.210 --> 01:21:15.520
But even when I, even when I fail I try to keep it smooth.

01:21:15.520 --> 01:21:17.300
You all right?
Yeah, I'm cool.

01:21:17.300 --> 01:21:19.740
I, I look good, don't I?

01:21:19.740 --> 01:21:20.800
I look good, right?

01:21:20.800 --> 01:21:21.633
On the ground.

01:21:22.890 --> 01:21:25.591
Yeah, I'm, I don't really need help, but if you want

01:21:25.591 --> 01:21:27.697
to help me, you can.

01:21:27.697 --> 01:21:28.590
Okay, you wanna help me, all right, cool.

01:21:28.590 --> 01:21:29.700
Here we go, Shannon.

01:21:29.700 --> 01:21:32.123
I don't need this help though.

01:21:32.123 --> 01:21:33.590
No, listen, I don't need the help,

01:21:33.590 --> 01:21:34.423
but I really appreciate it.

01:21:35.530 --> 01:21:36.800
All right, brother.

01:21:36.800 --> 01:21:38.197
Thank you, brother.

01:21:40.558 --> 01:21:41.391
Huh?

01:21:42.697 --> 01:21:44.323
You're handicapped on your foot?

01:21:44.323 --> 01:21:47.060
it's my hip isn't round on both sides.

01:21:47.060 --> 01:21:47.960
Oh, I didn't know that.

01:21:47.960 --> 01:21:48.793
I would have picked you up.

01:21:48.793 --> 01:21:50.640
I thought you were just playing with me.

01:21:50.640 --> 01:21:51.640
Well, it's both, actually.

01:21:51.640 --> 01:21:54.280
I'm playing and I have hips that aren't round.

01:21:54.280 --> 01:21:55.308
Yeah.

01:21:55.308 --> 01:21:56.141
So it's, it's in between.

01:21:56.141 --> 01:21:57.110
You know, it's like wearing glasses.

01:21:57.110 --> 01:21:59.750
When you take them off, if you're not blind, you know,

01:21:59.750 --> 01:22:01.580
like I can walk but not very far.

01:22:01.580 --> 01:22:02.610
I respect that, man.

01:22:02.610 --> 01:22:03.443
Oh, thank you, man.

01:22:03.443 --> 01:22:04.580
I've got tons of respect for you,

01:22:04.580 --> 01:22:07.153
just your whole vibe is just amazing, man.

01:22:07.153 --> 01:22:09.125
Will you take a donation or something?

01:22:09.125 --> 01:22:09.958
What's that?

01:22:09.958 --> 01:22:10.820
Will you take a donation?

01:22:10.820 --> 01:22:11.653
A donation?

01:22:11.653 --> 01:22:12.820
Yeah, sure.

01:22:12.820 --> 01:22:13.926
I love donations.

01:22:13.926 --> 01:22:15.326
(all laughing)

01:22:15.326 --> 01:22:16.830
Oh, man.

01:22:16.830 --> 01:22:17.850
Wow.

01:22:17.850 --> 01:22:18.752
Thank you.

01:22:18.752 --> 01:22:19.585
Thank you, sir.

01:22:19.585 --> 01:22:20.950
Wow, that's, that's a blessing right there.

01:22:20.950 --> 01:22:22.154
Yes.

01:22:22.154 --> 01:22:24.737
(all cheering)

01:22:26.989 --> 01:22:30.322
That's the street, baby, right there.

01:22:40.820 --> 01:22:43.430
You watch people and their reaction to him

01:22:43.430 --> 01:22:45.410
as a person being on crutches,

01:22:45.410 --> 01:22:48.283
they automatically assume that he needs help.

01:22:49.410 --> 01:22:52.843
When in fact, he's helping them help him.

01:22:54.590 --> 01:22:56.640
And he's been able to take that and turn it

01:22:56.640 --> 01:23:01.041
into something magic.

01:23:01.041 --> 01:23:02.196
There he is.

01:23:02.196 --> 01:23:03.363
Wave everyone.

01:23:08.725 --> 01:23:11.808
(upbeat dance music)

01:23:22.567 --> 01:23:25.230
And there is a section in Traffic where he

01:23:25.230 --> 01:23:29.383
is on a staircase and he is clearly acting as a performer.

01:23:30.580 --> 01:23:35.260
He is dancing, he is twirling, he is performing

01:23:35.260 --> 01:23:39.173
in a way that lets us know, the has exceptional abilities.

01:23:41.440 --> 01:23:45.973
And then into the frame walk these two men.

01:24:06.437 --> 01:24:09.187
(laughing)

01:24:14.750 --> 01:24:19.100
And they step into offer him this help, but what they

01:24:19.100 --> 01:24:22.363
do is completely disrupt a moment of pure performance.

01:24:32.740 --> 01:24:36.453
That's the power of the habits of interpretation we have.

01:24:37.480 --> 01:24:41.360
It's so abundantly clear that these guys have no idea

01:24:41.360 --> 01:24:42.980
and they're acting on assumptions

01:24:42.980 --> 01:24:45.173
that don't fit the situation.

01:24:46.910 --> 01:24:48.350
There it is.

01:24:48.350 --> 01:24:49.960
And the audience gets it,

01:24:49.960 --> 01:24:51.960
whether they have any background or not.

01:24:53.056 --> 01:24:56.223
(audience applauding)

01:25:21.493 --> 01:25:24.243
(all chattering)

01:25:45.598 --> 01:25:49.150
And now listen, this is really, really important.

01:25:49.150 --> 01:25:49.983
Be yourself.

01:25:52.170 --> 01:25:55.313
Be yourself, don't try, don't fake, don't fake the funk.

01:25:56.320 --> 01:25:58.000
Be you.

01:25:58.000 --> 01:25:59.060
That's how this happened.

01:25:59.060 --> 01:26:00.710
You think everybody was like when I first did

01:26:00.710 --> 01:26:02.160
my moves on crutches, you know how bad

01:26:02.160 --> 01:26:04.040
I looked trying to dance on crutches the first time

01:26:04.040 --> 01:26:05.320
I tried to dance on crutches?

01:26:05.320 --> 01:26:06.512
You wanna see it?

01:26:06.512 --> 01:26:07.345
Yes, yes.

01:26:07.345 --> 01:26:08.290
You wanna see what it looked like in the beginning?

01:26:08.290 --> 01:26:10.393
This is what it looked like in the beginning.

01:26:14.958 --> 01:26:17.125
(humming)

01:26:20.179 --> 01:26:22.030
Then I started to do one of these.

01:26:22.030 --> 01:26:24.760
I started to go woop, boom, da, woop, boom.

01:26:24.760 --> 01:26:26.450
Then I was down here.

01:26:26.450 --> 01:26:28.983
The next thing you know I was doing this.

01:26:28.983 --> 01:26:31.087
(grunting)

01:26:31.087 --> 01:26:36.087
(all cheering)
(upbeat orchestral music)

01:27:34.957 --> 01:27:36.920
And so this camp is very special.

01:27:36.920 --> 01:27:37.940
It's special to me.

01:27:37.940 --> 01:27:40.310
This is the first time I've ever met any kids with Perthes,

01:27:40.310 --> 01:27:42.650
so it's really an honor and a pleasure to be here.

01:27:42.650 --> 01:27:46.020
And I really am touched to be invited here,

01:27:46.020 --> 01:27:48.360
and I wanted to thank you all very much and let you know

01:27:48.360 --> 01:27:51.120
I support you and the parents here in the struggles

01:27:51.120 --> 01:27:52.810
that you go through, and the tough choices you have

01:27:52.810 --> 01:27:55.310
to make every day.

01:27:55.310 --> 01:27:58.070
You know, you live with this and, and you struggle,

01:27:58.070 --> 01:28:00.400
and you know, I, I feel you.

01:28:00.400 --> 01:28:01.480
I feel your pain.

01:28:01.480 --> 01:28:02.313
I know I had,

01:28:02.313 --> 01:28:03.980
my parents had to deal with it,

01:28:03.980 --> 01:28:06.690
and so I just feel really blessed to be here

01:28:06.690 --> 01:28:08.540
and thank you so much, all of you.

01:28:08.540 --> 01:28:11.707
(audience applauding)

01:28:22.843 --> 01:28:25.760
(light jazz music)

01:28:39.660 --> 01:28:43.323
There's a necessity to capture moments in time,

01:28:45.160 --> 01:28:47.650
an importance to recognize somebody

01:28:47.650 --> 01:28:49.373
that created his own art form.

01:28:52.090 --> 01:28:55.370
That didn't attempt to be anyone else,

01:28:55.370 --> 01:28:58.240
didn't attempt to dance like anyone else,

01:28:58.240 --> 01:29:02.130
somebody that absolutely personified the potential

01:29:02.130 --> 01:29:03.623
of his own physicality.

01:29:07.870 --> 01:29:10.200
I think he represents hip hop,

01:29:10.200 --> 01:29:13.970
and he represents skateboarding, and he puts 'em together

01:29:13.970 --> 01:29:16.423
in a way that is a one of a kind.

01:29:33.080 --> 01:29:34.080
Look at that shit.

01:29:36.680 --> 01:29:40.550
Our general response is about people who use crutches

01:29:40.550 --> 01:29:44.520
is the story that to use crutches is to be miserable,

01:29:44.520 --> 01:29:47.500
to use crutches is to be awkward, to use crutches

01:29:47.500 --> 01:29:49.660
is to be pitiable.

01:29:49.660 --> 01:29:53.410
And his performances re-script, re-narrate,

01:29:53.410 --> 01:29:57.218
re-tell every single one of those stories.

01:29:57.218 --> 01:30:02.218
(crowd cheering)
(light jazz music)

01:30:24.697 --> 01:30:28.410
He's an agent provocateur that's really the essence

01:30:28.410 --> 01:30:30.100
of his character to some extent.

01:30:30.100 --> 01:30:32.513
It's like oh, you think so?

01:30:33.880 --> 01:30:35.835
I'll show you, you know.

01:30:35.835 --> 01:30:39.502
(speaking foreign language)

01:30:41.647 --> 01:30:43.940
(crowd cheering)

01:30:43.940 --> 01:30:48.540
He's brought so much to the world because he has shared

01:30:48.540 --> 01:30:51.150
and taught, let's learn to question the assumptions

01:30:51.150 --> 01:30:54.393
that we bring and let people teach us about who they are.

01:31:00.120 --> 01:31:02.960
What he's doing, I don't think people have caught up

01:31:02.960 --> 01:31:04.147
to that yet, man.

01:31:04.147 --> 01:31:05.920
And when they finally catch on,

01:31:05.920 --> 01:31:08.260
he's like on to something else.

01:31:08.260 --> 01:31:11.247
And I think that's, the way great artists should be.

01:31:11.247 --> 01:31:14.164
(light jazz music)

01:31:24.517 --> 01:31:27.684
(audience applauding)

01:31:37.820 --> 01:31:39.800
There's the dangerous word of inspiration,

01:31:39.800 --> 01:31:42.330
and there's a dangerous world of inspiration porn

01:31:42.330 --> 01:31:44.247
that we talk about now particularly of

01:31:44.247 --> 01:31:46.400
disabled people looking at disabled people

01:31:46.400 --> 01:31:48.167
and going, "That's so inspiring."

01:31:50.580 --> 01:31:54.023
I'm not here to inspire you just by my very being,

01:31:57.000 --> 01:32:01.948
but I'm okay for you to be inspired by me if you change.

01:32:01.948 --> 01:32:04.865
(light jazz music)

01:32:21.727 --> 01:32:24.727
(upbeat jazz music)

01:32:59.708 --> 01:33:03.125
(light electronic music)

01:34:48.935 --> 01:34:52.352
(light electronic music)

01:36:10.109 --> 01:36:13.526
(light electronic music)