Fox Searchlight have denied suggestions by the ballet double of Natalie Portman that the star did hardly any of the dance scenes whilst filming Black Swan.
Sarah Lane, who dances for the American Ballet Theatre, recently claimed that only five per cent of the full body dance scenes in the film were done by Portman, with the rest performed by her.
“We were fortunate to have Sarah there to cover the more complicated dance sequences and we have nothing but praise for the hard work she did,” says a statement released by the studio. “However, Natalie herself did most of the dancing featured in the final film.”
Director Darren Aronofsky has also leapt to the defence of his star, saying: “Here is the reality. I had my editor count shots. There are 139 dance shots in the film. 111 are Natalie Portman untouched. 28 are her dance double Sarah Lane. If you do the math that’s 80 per cent Natalie Portman.”
He also admitted that digital techniques were used in two sequences to superimpose Portman’s face over Lane’s, saying: “There are two complicated longer dance sequences that we used face replacement [on].”
So there you have it: Portman is an actor and Lane is a dancer. The actor is also a dancer and the dancer is clearly not a mathematician. Glad that’s been cleared up.
