DANCE +

THIS IS DANCE + RACHAEL MARKARIAN

Rachael Markarian is a dancer, actor, choreographer, and author whose résumé runs from two Super Bowl Halftime Shows and world tours with Rihanna, Katy Perry, and Chayanne to Captain America: Brave New World, Top Gun: Maverick, and Netflix’s Sweet Magnolias. But the story that stayed with me wasn’t a credit, it was what happens when you’re at the top of one field and have to start over at the bottom of another. What does it take to build the room you aren’t being invited into, and what do you do when the door finally opens two days before the shoot?

Here’s what we’re exploring:

• The transition from in-demand pro dancer to actor, and the humbling reality that “because I said so” belief only gets you so far

• A booking story that nearly slipped away

• How she wrote The Dancer’s Edge, from a little student workbook to a four-act guide on mindset

This one’s for anyone who’s ever had to start over, or been told “we’ll get the next one” and kept going anyway. Rachael’s answer: advocate for yourself, create the opportunity if nobody hands it to you, and be ready for the “yes” before it arrives.

Watch the full episode here.

Show Notes:
Connect with Rachael on IG

Buy Rachael's book: The Dancer’s Edge

Listen to Joe’s episode

Listen to Nick’s episode

Listen to Liana’s episode

For more DANA

For coaching with me, join the WTMM COMMUNITY

To shop for GOODIES & SERVIES

Watch and Subscribe on YOUTUBE

Stay connected with us on IG and TikTok

THIS IS DANCE + BOBBY AMAMIZU

Bobby Amamizu is a dancer, educator, and choreographer whose résumé runs from Cirque du Soleil's original Viva Elvis cast to The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, and Etoile, But the story that stayed with me wasn't a credit, it was a 17-year-old at an open call getting stopped mid-combo and asked, "Who are you?" What does it actually take to get kept in the room, and what do you owe the people standing next to you once you're in it?

Here's what we're exploring:

• The Fame audition where Marguerite Derricks stopped the music, called Bobby out by name, and told him she couldn't hire him if he kept dancing like a soloist, "so I can't hire you if you're gonna dance like that"

• A case study in Networking that is literally money in the bank

• What it meant to be trusted with a 5am ballet class before an 8am call, part of the job of keeping a company of dancers ready to be as authentic as the story asked them to be

This one's for anyone who's ever had to prove they could be trusted with more than their own moment. Bobby's answer: show up exact, show up for the people beside you, and let the work speak before you do.

Watch the full episode on YouTube.

Show Notes:

Connect with Bobby on IG

For coaching with me, join the WTMM COMMUNITY

To shop for GOODIES & SERVIES

Watch and Subscribe on YOUTUBE

Stay connected with us on IG and TikTok

THIS IS DANCE + WHAT WE OWE EACH OTHER

Dani Vitale is a Choreographer, Creative Director, + Movement Coach who by September of this year had already wrapped four films and two tours. But what stuck with me in this conversation wasn't the résumé, it was her definition of loyalty: to the dancers she leads, to the truth about hard jobs, and to the people she loves through loss. What do we actually owe the people around us, and what happens when we pay up?

Here's what we're exploring:

• The one thing Dani never bent on when she started choreographing: dancer rates and conditions, because "once you lose the support from dancers... you can't gain that back"

• Why she pushes back on "choreographer vs. dancer" and thinks of it instead as one team doing one job: movement

• The gap between what happens on a brutal set and what gets posted after, and why she'd rather "report the facts" than romanticize the process

This one's for anyone who's ever had to decide what they're actually willing to bend on, at work, on a team, or at home. Dani's answer is the same in every direction: tell the truth, and show up.

Watch the full episode here.

Show Notes:

Connect with Dani on IG

Learn more about Dancers Alliance

For more DANA

For coaching with me, join the WTMM COMMUNITY

To shop for GOODIES & SERVIES

Watch and Subscribe on YOUTUBE

Stay connected with us on IG and TikTok

This is DANCE + CONFLICT AND TEAM DYNAMICS

I've been sitting with this idea that wherever you put art, money, a deadline, and a hierarchy in the same room, conflict is coming. That's not a flaw in the system, it's actually a good thing! What I want to answer with this conversation is this: How do we navigate inevitable conflicts and criticisms in a way that neither the people or the product suffer?!

Here’s what we’re exploring:

• Why art, money, deadlines, and hierarchy each carry their own built-in opportunity for conflict, and why that center overlap is where teams actually fracture

• The trap of "it should be different" and how it quietly drains my empathy out of a room full of talented people

• A simple mental tool I use to get unstuck: asking whether the opposite of my assumption is just as likely to be true

• The best teammates know how to do two things: Give constructive criticism + receive constructive criticism

This one's for anyone who's ever felt small on set, or big on set, and let that feeling run the show. Empathy isn't the soft option here. It's the thing that turns conflict into better work.

Watch the full episode on YouTube.

Show Notes:

For more DANA

For coaching with me, join the WTMM COMMUNITY

To shop for GOODIES & SERVIES

Watch and Subscribe on YOUTUBE

Stay connected with us on IG and TikTok

This is DANCE + Makenzie & Phillip Chbeeb

Makenzie and Phillip Chbeeb are the dynamic duo behind the new Netflix coming-of-age dance comedy movie, “Best of the Best” (Premiering September 18, 2026). In this episode, we unpack what it means to choreograph across cultures, across dialogue, and three weeks postpartum. If you’re into being impressed, this episode is for YOU!

Three weeks after welcoming their first child into the world, they walked straight into their first pre-production meeting of their on Best of the Best, a film that asked them to hold two things at once: honor the specificity of Western hip hop and South Asian dance forms like Kathak, and build choreography that could survive dialogue, alt takes, and lines that changed on the spot. What they found, again and again, was that the tightest constraints produced the most original ideas.

We explore:

• The shoes-on, shoes-off problem between Chicago footwork and Kathak, and the jump-out-of-your-sneakers solution that turned a limitation into one of the film's best moments

• How they built "cushion" choreography, loop-able movement with matching in-and-out points, so a scene could breathe as long as a director needed and the music could be solved in post

• Making a Netflix film three weeks postpartum, and the very literal system they invented for handling a body and mind that felt, in Makenzie's words, "scrambled"

This one's for anyone who thinks creative limits are the enemy of good work. For Phillip and Makenzie, the limits were the work.

Watch the full episode here.

Show Notes:

Connect with Mckenzie on IG

Connect with Phillip on IG

Listen to Phillip’s episode

Listen to How Do Dancers Make Money?

Learn more about Feybl

For more DANA

For coaching with me, join the WTMM COMMUNITY

To shop for GOODIES & SERVIES

Watch and Subscribe on YOUTUBE

Stay connected with us on IG and TikTok

This is DANCE + Nathan Kim

The choreographer behind the newest Spider-Man, on how dance found him almost by accident.

Nathan Kim didn't grow up dreaming of being a choreographer. His meet-cute with dance happened almost by chance, with an open slot in an Afro Brazilian dance class, and one impossible-to-mark movement across the floor that cracked something open in him. From there, dance became the throughline of a career that's taken him behind the camera and back, from his early days shaping movement for Charli XCX, to leading the choreography team on Spider-Man: Brand New Day.

We explore:

• The happy accident that got him into that first dance class, and the moment mid-warmup when he stopped holding back

• The wild logistics of choreographing Spider-Man's biggest movement sequences, in-ears, hand cues, counts, and dancers who can't see what's coming from behind them

• Why "kill your darlings" hits different at a blockbuster budget, and how the ideas that get cut still ripple through everything that survives

This one's for anyone who thinks their path has to be a straight line. Nathan's wasn't, and it swung him to Spider-Man.

Watch the full episode on YouTube.

Show Notes:

Connect with Nathan on IG

Listen to our episode with Miquel Zarate

For more DANA

For coaching with me, join the WTMM COMMUNITY

To shop for GOODIES & SERVIES

Watch and Subscribe on YOUTUBE

Stay connected with us on IG and TikTok

This is DANCE + Teddy Forance

Coming to you LIVE-ish from CLI Conservatory, with the guy who built the place he wishes existed when he was 17 and googling "which college has a dance program for me."

Teddy Forance didn't set out to become a studio owner. He set out to dance, and he did, big: Madonna, Lady Gaga, Cirque du Soleil, the Oscars stage. But underneath all of it was a gut feeling that never went away. That there wasn't a space built for dancers like him. So with his brother Jonny, he built one. Literally, twenty seconds down the road from their mom's studio in Southampton, Massachusetts.

We explore:

• My new position at CLI: Director of Professional Development

• Why Teddy skipped college for a career that found him at 17, at NYCDA Nationals

• The "Costco math” behind 100 guest choreographers and a fraction of the cost

• The budget-and-schedule advice Teddy gives every dancer terrified to move to a big city

• What it feels like to watch five conservatory years soak into the walls of a building you built from nothing

This one's for anyone chasing a career nobody handed them a map for. Teddy didn't find the space that fit him, so he built it.

Watch the full episode on YouTube.

Show Notes:

Connect with Teddy on IG

Learn more about CLI

For more DANA

For coaching with me, join the WTMM COMMUNITY

To shop for GOODIES & SERVIES

Watch and Subscribe on YOUTUBE

Stay connected with us on IG and TikTok

This is DANCE + Fantasy Night

Coming to you LIVEish from CLI Conservatory, with a story I NEED to tell you while it’s still fresh in my mind. It's a tribute to my acting teacher Gary Imhoff, whose class taught me that losing can be winning, and that the greatest gift we can give is to support each other in the pursuit of our wildest dreams.

We explore:

• How Gary's class and this once-a-year tradition rewired my relationship to failure and gave me the confidence to finally call myself a choreographer

• The three rules of my Fantasy Night Party: no bystanders, you can't perform the thing you're known for, and everyone gets a standing ovation.

• What it felt like on the other side of singing all five verses of "Fast Car" in front of my friends…. I almost threw up.

This one's for anyone who desires to express themself in a way they haven’t yet… Consider this your permission slip.

Watch the full episode here.

Show Notes:

For more DANA

For coaching with me, join the WTMM COMMUNITY

To shop for GOODIES & SERVIES

Watch and Subscribe on YOUTUBE

Stay connected with us on IG and TikTok

This is DANCE + Nick Drago

Nick Drago holds the honor of being this podcast's very first guest — Episode 0.5, the audition episode, back when I wasn't even sure this whole thing would work. A dancer, writer, and producer with 20+ years in the industry (think La La Land, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, Glee, Dancing with the Stars, and about a hundred more), Nick is a walking case study in "just do stuff," imposter syndrome be damned. We sat down to talk about banter as a survival skill, the many different ways to "make the sausage," and why sometimes you just have to try the thing even if it might suck.

We explore:

• Was it false or REAL confidence that kept me going for 270+ episodes

• The bicep-flex technique nobody asked for, but everybody needed

• What Michael Rooney, Mandy Moore, and Kat Burns taught Nick about building choreography, and the attitude that keeps him in the game no matter who is calling the shots

This one's for anyone who needs a reminder that "just do stuff" is a mantra, not a mistake.

Watch the full episode on YouTube

Show Notes:

Connect with Nick on IG

Learn more about The Seaweed Sisters Show “Weed Oh No”

Listen to their episode

Listen to Mandy’s episode

Listen to Kat’s episode

For more DANA

For coaching with me, join the WTMM COMMUNITY

To shop for GOODIES & SERVIES

Watch and Subscribe on YOUTUBE

Stay connected with us on IG and TikTok

Marie Spieldenner is a self-proclaimed “substitue that stays”. She's assisted and/ or danced for todays biggest artists/ directors/ campaigns and she is a brilliant example of how supporting others can fuel support of yourself. We sat down to talk about support systems, psychology, and all about the gig that made her unshakable on set (spoiler, it’s almost certainly not the gig you think it is).

We explore:

• What it took to save a shot with a 40-person cast at 6 am

• The reward system of the entertainment industry

• The big-sister-little-brother dynamic with Robbie Blue that taught her the difference between feeling ready and BEING ready.

This one's for anyone who needs to be reminded of their worth.

Watch the episode here.

Show Notes:

Connect with Marie on IG

Learn more about The Seaweed Sisters Show “Weed Oh No”

Listen to their episode

Learn more about Fostering Dreams

Listen to Diana’s episode

Listen to Meisha’s episode

Listen to Taya’s episode

For more DANA

For coaching with me, join the WTMM COMMUNITY

To shop for GOODIES & SERVIES

Watch and Subscribe on YOUTUBE

Stay connected with us on IG and TikTok

This is DANCE + WEED OH NO! The live Q&A

Most companies build a show. The Seaweed Sisters built a whole world — a language, a color-coded family, a cloud that pops out babies — and then invited an audience into their room to ask about it. Jillian Meyers, Megan Lawson and myself were joined by our Executive Producer, live at the LA Theater Center on the closing weekend of Weed Oh No! for an open Q&A with the very audience that just watched them do it — thirteen years of Blue, Pink, and Green distilled into 80 minutes of Swinglish, upcycled sets, and a cloud rig that had to be talked down from an emotional breakdown it couldn't physically perform.

We explore:

• Why "Seaweed mode" isn't a switch any one of them can flip alone — it only exists when three sensibilities collide

• The luxury and terror of a year-long timeline after thirteen years of built-on-a-deadline shorties

• How two days of pre-tech taught them the difference between a 16-foot ladder and a 12-foot one, and saved a scene they'd already built an emotional ending around

This one's for anyone who's ever wanted to invite people into their room and just play.

Watch the full episode here.

Show Notes:

Donate to WEED OH NO!

Watch our past episodes:

Ep #15

Ep. #266

Watch Emily’s episode

Watch all the Seaweed Sister’s shorties

For more DANA

For coaching with me, join the WTMM COMMUNITY

To shop for GOODIES & SERVIES

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Stay connected with us on IG and TikTok

This is DANCE + Hurrikane

Most dancers battle to win. Alain aka “Hurrikane” Lauture battles because he is in love— deeply in love— with the music, with dance, and with the practice of acceptance. Listen in on his journey from being a kid from Port-au-Prince who only danced alone, to sharing stages with Madonna, MTV, Samsung, and winning battles like Juste Debout, Hip Hop Internationals, and Summer Dance Forever. Hurrikane joined me this week to talk about stillness as dialogue, how Maya Angelou changed his mind about judgement, and why he is NOT Locking…

We explore:

• Why he refuses to call it a battle — it's a game, it's play, it's "with" not "against"

• How stillness is a real-time negotiation with his own insecurities

• Why it took years to understand an early conversation with Don Campbellock

This one's for the love of all dance, and the context that makes it sticky for generations to come.

Watch the full episode here.

Show Notes:

Connect with Hurrikane on IG

Listen to Toni’s episode

For more DANA

For coaching with me, join the WTMM COMMUNITY

To shop for GOODIES & SERVIES

Watch and Subscribe on YOUTUBE

Stay connected with us on IG and TikTok

This is DANCE + DANIEL “CLOUD” CAMPOS

Most people find one creative medium and stay. Cloud Campos found dance — then learned stop-motion, animation, PLUS directing because he refused to let a story outrun his tools. He joined me this week to talk about premiering unreleased work at CLOUDFEST, real budgets, and the dog slide that had an entire room convinced it was rotoscoped.

Spoiler: it wasn't. It was muscle memory.

We explore:

• The festival Cloud built himself and WHY

• Why freestyle dance is the perfect training for stop-motion + why every filmmaker SHOULD learn stop-motion

• Emotionally, mentally, + physically what it costs to create Cloud’s worlds

This one's for the makers who hide their fingerprints in the details, hoping someone will find them.

Watch the full episode here.

Show Notes:

Connect with Cloud on IG

Watch “Macho Man”

Watch “Into The Cosmos”

Watch “Hey”

Watch “Todays The Day”

Read “Figure It Out!”

Try out “Magic Poser”

For more DANA

For coaching with me, join the WTMM COMMUNITY

To shop for GOODIES & SERVIES

Watch and Subscribe on YOUTUBE

Stay connected with us on IG and TikTok

This is DANCE + REBRANDING.

This episode is a masterclass in when and HOW to pivot using our very own podcast as the case study. I'm telling you why, why NOW, and HOW I moved from “Words That Move Me” to DANCE +

Here’s what you can expect from our pivot:

Same great content, new name, logo, iconography, and then some!

Spoiler: Rebrands are as much MIND MANAGEMENT as they are BRAND MANAGEMENT. Pivots aren’t just about new directions; they are an exercise in negotiating where you put your weight. They're a conversation with self (inward) and a statement of self (outward) that can expose a TON of unwanted feelings.

Get ready for all the juicy details:

• The moment I KNEW beyond a doubt that I needed to change the name of the podcast.
• How Toni Basil influenced the new title.
• Why I decided to SHIFT, not STOP.

271 episodes in. We're just getting (re)started.

Watch the full episode on YouTube.

Show Notes:

Hire Bree Reetz for your Brand Design!

Listen to DANCE + Will Loftis

Listen to DANCE + Toni Basil

For more DANA

For coaching with me, join the WTMM COMMUNITY

To shop for GOODIES & SERVIES

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Bret Easterling has spent his entire life (even pre-birth!) dancing, and his entire career building worlds on stage, on screen, and inside the communities that make dance possible. A producer, Juilliard-trained and award winning choreographer, former Batsheva performer, founder of LGBTQ+ nonprofit BEMOVING, and one half of the creative duo EICHTERLING, Bret joined me this week to talk about what it actually takes to make a dance film, why the logistics always threaten to swallow the artistry, and what happens when you let something be easy.

We explore:

• Bret’s new film “True Love Will Find You in the End”. WATCH IT HERE

• The Clown Car Theory of a creative process

• What gets cut and why, finding the ending no one planned, and what that says about following ease.

• Teaching as space-making: Why Bret is never really in the business of telling people what to do, and how the most important thing a teacher can do is make someone feel capable of discovering something new.

This episode is for anyone who's ever let logistics push the love of the work to the back seat, and those who need a reminder that the Joy of Dance is always there, waiting.

Watch the full episode here.

Show Notes:

Connect with Bret on IG

Watch “True Love Will Find You In the End”

For more DANA

For coaching with me, join the WTMM COMMUNITY

To donate to WTMM through our Fiscal Sponsor, THE DANCE RESOURCE CENTER

To shop for GOODIES & SERVIES

Watch and Subscribe on YOUTUBE

Stay connected with us on IG and TikTok

Tali has spent 20+ years at every level of the dance world, with credits ranging from Rihanna and P!nk to the West End production of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. She joined me this week to talk about what it really means to advocate for choreographers, why freestyle is one of the most advanced skills in the room, and how a single conversation got one of her clients double the offer.

Spoiler: Productions will lowball until someone teaches them not to. Tali's decided that's part of her job too.

We explore:

• Can we just be storytellers? Tali on representing Black and Brown choreographers in an industry that too often boxes them into Black and Brown stories, and why the chance to choreograph a fantastical world, post-COVID, felt like a gift.

• The pros and cons of freestylers showing up in more traditionally "choreographed" spaces.

• Production not batting an eye when she asked for double the rate for one of her clients: What that says about bottom-line culture, and why asking is always worth it.

This episode is for anyone who's ever watched an artist undercharge, underestimate themselves, or wait for permission to take up more space.

Watch the full episode here.

Show Notes:

Connect with Tali on IG

Join Tali’s Programme: “identity/ideas/industry”

Read the Choreographer’s Guild Handbook

Read The Choreographer’s Handbook

For more DANA

For coaching with me, join the WTMM COMMUNITY

To donate to WTMM through our Fiscal Sponsor, THE DANCE RESOURCE CENTER

To shop for GOODIES & SERVIES

Watch and Subscribe on YOUTUBE

Stay connected with us on IG and TikTok

Karen Chuang is a dancer, teacher, and choreographer based in Los Angeles who has toured with Taylor Swift, Lady Gaga, Nicki Minaj, Kanye West, taught across nine countries, and built a career that moves fluidly between the commercial and contemporary dance worlds.

Spoiler: Excellence alone won't get you (and *keep* you) the gig!

We explore:

The Jack Johnson T-shirt moment. A moment when the most important lesson of your career arrives in a phone call you never expected.

“Wherever you go, there you are.” The quote Karen has carried with her for years — and what it actually means to embrace a circumstance that isn't your ideal one, reframe it with intention, and then decide whether to stay or move yourself somewhere new.

Financial literacy for dancers. What Karen wishes dancers knew earlier about money, and how her approach to educating at conventions like Hollywood Vibe has shifted from when she first started, and why that evolution matters for the next generation coming up.

Being the cool auntie (or not). Karen reflects on what it means to be connected to her nephews not as a career success story, but just as family.

This episode is for every dancer who has ever been told to pick a style, a lane, or a world, and needed one person to show them what's possible when you don't.

Watch the full episode here.

Show Notes:

Connect with Karen on IG

Learn more about Hollywood Vibe

Learn more about Pathways in Motion

For more DANA

For coaching with me, join the WTMM COMMUNITY

To donate to WTMM through our Fiscal Sponsor, THE DANCE RESOURCE CENTER

To shop for GOODIES & SERVIES

Watch and Subscribe on YOUTUBE

Stay connected with us on IG and TikTok

Jackie Sleight is a choreographer, founder of LA Dance Magic, and founder and co-director of LA Jazz Company, and an example of what happens when a woman decides NOT TO STOP!

Spoiler: Your favorite dance teachers’ favorite dance teacher didn't get there by playing it safe.

We explore:

• Nine recessions and still standing. Why Jackie believes that choosing to do something else isn't failure; it's moving forward, and what it actually takes to stay in the dance industry through every economic wave that tries to knock you out.

• The clipboard moment. The story of Roland Dupree, the Wilshire Ebell, and the day Jackie showed up with a pencil and a clipboard, only to note the best worst thing that ever happened to her.

• Stop snooping, start leading. How Jackie spent years watching what other conventions were doing until she realized it was exhausting, inauthentic, and completely beside the point, and the decision to follow her own vision that became the backbone of LA Dance Magic, Educators Dance Collective, and the Los Angeles Jazz Company.

This episode is for anyone who has ever been tempted to look to the left and right instead of straight ahead and needed one person to remind them that nobody else can bring what you bring.

Watch the full episode HERE.

Show Notes:

Connect with Jackie Sleight on IG

Learn about LA Dance Magic

Learn about Jazz Company

Learn about the Dance Educators Collective

For more DANA

For coaching with me, join the WTMM COMMUNITY

To donate to WTMM through our Fiscal Sponsor, THE DANCE RESOURCE CENTER

To shop for GOODIES & SERVIES

Watch and Subscribe on YOUTUBE

Stay connected with us on IG and TikTok

WEED OH NO! The Seaweed Sisters' first-ever live show, premiering this June at the Los Angeles Theater Center with @latinotheaterco. TICKETS ARE ON SALE HERE

This week, special guest host Emily Wanserski — executive producer of the show — brings @TheSeaweedSisters together to pull back the curtain on how it all gets made. What the show actually is, what it feels like, and what you can expect when you walk into their bubble.

We explore:

• What WEED OH NO! actually is: A magical show-and-tell. A talent show. Weeds popping up in the world, except now you get to step inside one of their spaces. Expect the unexpected, and expect to be surprised by where you're sitting.
• How it gets made when there are no rules. No client, no single, no existing material. Just the Seaweeds and a whooolllee lot of silliness (and heart).
• What makes this moment different. Why everything the Seaweed Sisters have made in the last 12 years has been building toward this, and why a first time only happens once.

This episode is for anyone who wants to know what's waiting for them downtown this June before they walk through the door.

Because the Seaweed Sisters are inviting you into their bubble for the first time.

And they won't ever have a first time again.

Watch the episode here.

Show Notes:

Buy tickets to see WEED OH NO! June 5-14

Watch “Still Got It”

Watch “Racks”

Watch “Night at the Seater”

Connect with the Seaweed Sisters on IG

Connect with Emily on IG

Listen to our first episode with The Seaweed Sisters

Listen to our episode with Meg

Listen to our episode with Jillian

Listen to our episode with Taylor

Learn more about the Center for Provocative Thought

Book space at Elements Dance Space

Learn more about our Production Manager, Tatum

For more DANA

For coaching with me, join the WTMM COMMUNITY

To donate to WTMM through our Fiscal Sponsor, THE DANCE RESOURCE CENTER

To shop for GOODIES & SERVIES

Watch and Subscribe on YOUTUBE

Stay connected with us on IG and TikTok

This is my episode on what happens when someone makes falling off buildings look like an art form.

Marissa Labog is a dancer, stunt performer, filmmaker, and mom, and she joined me this week to talk about something I didn't expect: how stunts and dance are actually the same conversation, just with better padding.

Spoiler: the scariest part of doing something dangerous isn't the danger. It's skipping a step.

We explore:

• The stunt that had no rehearsal. What happened when Marissa landed in Mexico City with no prep, a third-story window, and a drainpipe, and why not having time to think might have been the whole point.

• Back to basics as a superpower. The day a group of veteran stunt performers all froze at once, and the simple method they used to get each other moving again. (Spoiler: it works for everything, not just stunts.)

• Building your own path vs. following someone else's. Why Marissa started UP Productions, what she wants female action heroes to look like, and her response to the guy at the Q&A who said he hated her movie.

This episode is for anyone who has ever stood at the edge of something terrifying and wondered if they were built for it.

Because if Marissa has taught me anything, it's that courage isn't the absence of fear. It's the evidence you've been collecting all along.

So, are you okay hitting the ground?

Show Notes:

Connect with Marissa on IG

Follow Upproductionz on IG

Subscribe to Upproductionz on Vimeo

Watch “When Kids Grow Up”

Listen to our Parents episode

Listen to our episode with Toni

Listen to our episode with Samo

For more DANA

For coaching with me, join the WTMM COMMUNITY

To donate to WTMM through our Fiscal Sponsor, THE DANCE RESOURCE CENTER

To shop for GOODIES & SERVIES

Watch and Subscribe on YOUTUBE

Stay connected with us on IG and TikTok