Iron Will: The Movie I Was Almost In

I became a pro belly dancer instead.

Did you know that the movie Iron Will¹ was supposed to have belly dancers in it? Yup, in that big Musher's Banquet scene where Will comes to gain entry into the dogsledding race, there was supposed to be more than singing…

I bleep you not. Belly dancers and dogsledders. Not a lot of people know that. Even fewer know that I was supposed to be in that scene.

Alas, I had made one of the most clueless, naive blunders of my life, so while everybody else went to the shooting location, I paced my parents' living room, wondering where my ride was.

Ditching me, that's where.

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December 1992
19 years old

I've never been in this restaurant before. I've only heard of it, last spring while sitting on the stairs of the university theater with my fellow dancers, awaiting our turn to rehearse onstage. Laurie had told me that, since I caught on so quickly to the Polynesian dances we had learned, that I should take belly dancing and then take her weekly performance slot at this Greek restaurant after she moved back to Minneapolis.

Since the start of the school year, I have received bwong after bwong on the head to reinforce her suggestion. In October, I finally threw my hands up. "All right, already! I get it, okay? I'll take belly dancing! Sheesh!"

So I did.

Turns out Laurie was right. This really is the way I was born to dance. Within weeks, my teacher invited me to join her performance troupe, so I've come to the restaurant with my dance partner, Diana, to find out if we can perform here, too.

Hala doesn't know we're here.

😈 Yet. 😈

When she first asked me to join the troupe, I told her about Laurie's suggestion. "Oh, yes," my teacher said. "I know that place. We ate there a few times. When I danced with their girl at the end of the show, the owners — they wanted me to perform there very much, but my husband said no."

Oh, did he...

🤔🧐😎

Diana and I have been plotting what to do about that. That's why we've come to the Greek restaurant for lunch today. Covertly. Shrewdly.

(Plus, if we fail and get turned down, nobody will be the wiser — shhh!)

Our plan is simple. If we can get hired here, we'll ask Hala to get up and dance with us at the end of our show. The three of us can perform one of her choreographies together. Then the next time, we'll invite her up for two dances...and then three…and then eventually, maybe her husband will see that it's okay.

After all, he doesn't forbid her to perform at the retirement home or all the other places where the troupe has danced, so maybe he'll see that, if we're all dancing together, there's nothing wrong with her performing at the restaurant either.

When the owner and his wife have a break, they sit down with us as promised. I tell them that Laurie sent me and why.

"Oh, we miss her so much," they gush. After a bit of banter about how she's doing, and about Diana's and my interest in performing, the owner's wife says, "We haven't had a regular dancer since summer when Laurie left, and we would love to have entertainment on the weekends again. Why don't you both come in on New Year's Eve? Our old dancer is doing a special holiday performance that night. You could get up at the end of her set and dance with her as your audition."

Hot-diggity-dog!

Diana and I finish our on-the-house baklava, clink our pop glasses together, and come back on New Year's in our matching costumes. After swirling our spangles around for a packed restaurant with Gina, their bubbly, blonde dancer, Diana and I are not only offered positions as their new house dancers. They are so impressed with us, we also get paid for our audition.

Hot-diggity-double-damn-dog!

They want us to each take a weekend night and dance solo, but we say that we love dancing together so much that we'd rather keep performing as a duo (soon to be a trio — shhhh). "We can't afford to pay you both on both nights," they say, to which we don't care. When we say that we would rather make the same amount of money but get to stay together and dance both Friday and Saturday nights, they agree.

Back in the dressing room, Diana and I also agree: it's not about making big bucks. I mean, getting paid to do what we love is awesome, but we're not used to receiving money anyway, so it won’t matter if we have to split it three ways (or less — we're still students, after all, and Hala should get paid more than we do). We just want to dance, and we want Hala to enjoy the freedom to perform with us like the American woman she has become.

So there, and neh!

After we get changed, the staff all toast us with another round of Ouzo (we're underage so Diana and I get Cokes). We hang out for the after-hours carousing. After all, we have just become staff, too, so we stuff ourselves full of moussaka and spanakopita, and have another round of flaming saganaki. ²

"Opa!" we shout, as we declare ourselves victorious!³

---

Yeahhhh...can you see it flowing down the pipe from where you sit?

You do remember how old we were, right? Nineteen and eighteen. And you remember what a clueless, sheltered nineteen I was?

I mean, c’mon! Just three months prior, I still blushed about being nekkid in front of other girls, and had never seen thong underwear in real life. Except for the occasional thimble full of Lambrusco on Christmas, I had never even drunk alcohol until the fall of my freshman year of college.

So at the start of my sophomore year, I was still a very green nineteen.

Idealistic.

Unworldly.

a.k.a. Idjits

Let's get this over with, shall we?

---

After New Year's Eve, Diana and I practically pee our pants while awaiting the next troupe rehearsal. Whole-body vibrating, we march in wearing ear-to-ear grins (and invisible gold medals which we have pinned upon each other).

There we announce to our teacher that we have been hired at the Greek restaurant, and hope she can come eat dinner on the weekend so that we can — wink-wink — ask her up to dance with us at the end of the show in a way that would be perfectly acceptable to her husband — nudge-nudge.

Needless to say, her reaction is not what we expected.

Hala: "I can't believe this! How could you do this to me? You stab me in the back!"

Me: “Wait...WUT?!?”

Diana: “Nooooo...kinda the opposite!”

Hala: "Well, if you want to stay in my troupe, you can't dance there."

Annnnnd I probably don't need to tell you how we react to her reaction.

Two huffy girls storm out. One huffy teacher slams the door on our glaring, teenybopper asses. Everybody shouts, "Ya done me wrong!"

Eventually, tempers cool off, which allows Diana the chance to re-explain to Hala our grand plot and our intentions in auditioning at the restaurant. Once Diana gives me the all-clear to call Hala, our teacher tells me that she understands. We’re welcomed back to the troupe, and she forgives us for the misunderstanding.

Okay, no.

She forgives Diana.

Remember that movie shoot I mentioned earlier?

---

January 1993
A couple weeks later…

Ohhhhhh, is our entire region a-buzz! The big-shots of Hollywood have descended upon the Minnesota Northland to film a Disney dogsledding flick. Some of the locals and students I go to school with in my university’s Theater Department have even gotten roles, including one with quite a prominent speaking part.

Apparently, the show also has a need for belly dancers, and the Northland can deliver: Gina with her dance friends, and Hala with her troupe.

On the day of the shoot, I’m home visiting my parents. Hala has said that our scene will be filmed two hours away, at some big resort in the woods. Since my parents' house is on the way, she offers to drive me after picking up Diana.

Awesome. I figure that two hours through the winter wonderland will be plenty of time to make nice with my teacher.

Hahahahahaha.

In my pretty-pretty makeup with my hair curled and my costume packed, I wait.

And wait.

And wait.

At fifteen minutes past the scheduled departure time, I call Hala's house. Her husband answers and informs me that she and Diana left for the shoot two hours ago.

I thank him and hang up.

Now I am PISSED. And deeply hurt.

I finish out my visit with the Parentals and then return to my on-campus apartment where I start sewing belly dance costumes like a fiend in preparation for all the weekends I will dance at that Greek restaurant.

And I will not feel one single, measly shred of guilt about it.

---

What I didn't know — and wouldn’t know for some months — was that I had been lied to, and not only about my teacher's “understanding and forgiveness” about the Greek Restaurant Caper. First, the shoot we were scheduled to attend took place downtown, not out in the Minnesota toolie bushes, so even if I had decided to bomb out there by myself, I would have gone to the wrong location.

But there was a bigger lie afoot.

A more important lie, which started an avalanche that never truly stopped crashing until my grand belly dance adventure at last disintegrated into rubble amidst the Great White Belly Dancer War of 2014. Considering the way I had been introduced to this dance style, and considering some of the obstacles, brushfires, and betrayals that pockmarked my career, somedays I’m amazed that I stuck it out for as long as I did.

What can I say? I love it. It is one of my most enduring passions, and it gave me some of the best friends I’ve ever had in my life - people who are My Pack, my chosen-family to this day, no matter how many different countries and states we live in.

Ultimately, my dancing would be destined to encompass so much more than belly dancing. But to figure that out, I would need to develop a relentless spirit, an un-shatterable jaw, and an iron will.

Up Next: If you want to dive into the dirt that happened in the wake of this movie shoot, you’ll have to head over to my NSFW publication that covers the more personal aspects of my history, Bella & the Beast:

“BELLY DANCERS SHOULD BE HAWT! (DON’T YOU DARE BE TOO HAWT)” - How I lost my teacher just when I needed her most and became that most dastardly of dancers: The 8-Week Wonder.

Or if you want to stay in these SFW dance history waters:
*ALSO* A BELLY DANCER - “She’s not a REAL belly dancer! There’s more Jazz Dance in her than anything". Let’s analyze that, shall we?

© 2021 Hartebeast

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So what is this larger sphere of dance?

1. Iron Will

Making of Iron Will - B Roll

2. Opa!

What is Ouzo? - an anise-flavored spirit

Moussaka - veg & meat casserole

Spanakopita - spinach & feta pastry

Saganaki - flaming cheese

Baklava - gooey, yummy, honey and spiced nut pastry

3. Becoming a professional belly dancer - do as we say, not as I did. Seriously. Just…don’t do it, yo! Or you know…do and uh…I hope you have way less trouble than I did! 🤣🤪🙃

Undercutting gets discussed a lot in the belly dance world. It’s a touchy subject. You can find a plethora of articles giving advice against it with a simple search. Here’s an alternative opinion - Undercutting: It’s All In Your Head.