I’m so excited to bring you this conversation with Gabriella Papadakis. With her ice dance partner Guillaume Cizeron, Gabi is the 2022 Olympic champion, the 2018 Olympic Silver Medalist, and a five-time World Champion. She’s been taking a break from competition the last two seasons, skating in shows with Guillaume and exploring life away from the rink. Gabi has been vocal about support for opening up dance to teams of any gender, and in 2023, she and Madison Hubbell shared a video of them building a program together. We talked about partnering and improv, the process of coming out as queer, and the pressure put on women skaters to conform to rigid standards of femininity. This was such a delightful conversation and I really hope you enjoy it!
00:00 - Welcome and Introduction
02:43 - Transition from Competition
02:54 - Exploring Choreography
04:50 - Improvisation Techniques
05:58 - Choreographing for Lorine Schild
07:16 - Deciding to Choreograph
08:07 - Skating with Madison Hubbell
11:02 - Dynamics in Same-Sex Pair Skating
14:57 - Gender Roles in Performance
19:58 - Evolving Ice Dance
21:51 - Discussing Sexuality Publicly
27:58 - Gender Presentation in Skating
34:10 - Authenticity in Performance
36:08 - Vision for Future of Ice Dance
40:38 - Confronting Appearance Pressures
44:46 - Critique of Competition Makeup
47:49 - Impact of Appearance Focus
53:13 - Addressing Mental Health in Sports
56:33 - Closing Thoughts on Ice Dance
Thanks again to Gabi for being so open and thoughtful! You can see clips of her recent show skating on her Instagram @gabriellapapadakis and via On Ice Perspectives.
Transcript: docs.google.com/document/d/1x...
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