Choreographer Damien Jalet on How Netflix’s Emilia Pérez Uses Dance as a “Tool for Resistance”

On the surface, Netflix’s new film Emilia Pérez doesn’t sound like a natural fit for dance: The plot follows a violent drug cartel leader in Mexico who hires a lawyer to help plan a faux death in order to start a new life as a woman. Yet Damien Jalet’s choreography plays a major role in revealing the characters and the brutal world they live in. Here, ahead of the film’s November 13 release on Netflix, Jalet discusses how he collaborated with cast members, including Zoe Saldaña and Selena Gomez, to create movement that “raises the heartbeat of the film,” as he puts it.

How did you get involved with Emilia Pérez?
I was in Mexico, actually, and had just got news that one of my tours was canceled because of a COVID wave. I was completely upset and told my partner it would be amazing timing for a cinema project. Less than 24 hours later, I got a call from director Jacques Audiard’s assistant. So there was a kind of a crazy alignment and evidence that it was meant to be. Yet the evidence quickly disappeared when I read the script—there was no real musical moment where they could dance. We had to invent it. And we had to find a dance language that would be right for this film, this reality, this context of violence.

Did you have any particular movement inspirations?
In Mexico, you have a lot of street performers at traffic lights, and they have, like, 50 seconds to do their act and then to collect the money. So it’s entertaining, it’s uplifting. But underneath, there’s a real survivor energy, and a real sense of urgency. That’s something that I really wanted to inject in the film.

How did you integrate dance into this story in a way that felt authentic?
It’s only when I got to know the cast that it came together. Because, obviously, dance can be a help, but it can also be an incredible obstacle for the actors. There is something about the visceral engagement you have when you dance—it can’t lie.

For example, with Karla Sofía Gascón, I think with her, a choreographic score would get in the way of her acting. A lot of the work we did with her was much more postural and about her physical transformation from [the cartel boss] Manitas to Emilia.

Then with Zoe, her way to be convincing is to get physical. Actually, there’s a gala scene that was not initially supposed to be truly a dance scene. It’s only when I understood how far Zoe could go that I stopped everybody during one meeting and I said, “Listen, I’d love to try something with her. Can you guys actually change the music?”

And Selena had a physical viscerality too—she would take movement really seriously, and really, really try to polish everything to make it as close as possible to how I envisioned it.

With both Saldaña and Gomez’s characters, dance functions as a way of releasing pent-up rage.
Dance is used as a tool for resistance a lot in this film—a little bit like a weapon. In the gala scene, Zoe’s like a blade. She’s cutting heads with her gestures. With Selena’s character, there was really this cathartic sense of “What do I do with this anger? I’m going to dance it, and let it explode.” And it felt right for Selena, who is often presented as a polite, gentle girl, but she totally has that badass headbanging anger also in her.

How have people reacted to the film so far?
The film is getting so many accolades and now is a contender for the Oscars. But there’s very little recognition for dancing in cinema. I’ve been watching a lot of films recently, and I see how much choreographers contribute. Dance is doing so much right now. We need to do more to fight for acknowledgment.