How This Professional Dancer Keeps Up With Her Training During COVID-19 Pandemic

Most actors in the film, television and theatre industry, find themselves relocating to New York City and Los Angeles to find work.

But as of June 17th, Los Angeles recorded 73,018 reported cases of COVID-19, and 2,907 total deaths.

So I talked with Eve Metsäranta, international actress/dancer based in Los Angeles, about how she’s been keeping calm, staying healthy, and catching up with her dance training during the coronavirus pandemic.

Read our conversation below.

Where are you currently spending your time in quarantine?

At my home in Los Angeles which luckily has a great location and nice amount of room. I also regularly go walking in the canyons and take trips to the beach areas and other locations with beautiful nature. I love the nature in California! It has given me so much life during the time of quarantine. It’s so nice to just go outside in the nature and be totally present and forget about all the things that are not really important at that moment.

How has the pandemic changed your way of life? How are you coping?

Obviously now I’m no longer traveling for work, but working from home. Since I work as a performer and all the performance work is now pretty much shut down, I’ve had so much more time in my hands to construct my own daily schedule, which has been wonderful. I tend to be super busy when the productions are going on, so this break has actually been a blessing for me since I have been able to slow down quite a bit.

I’ve been surprised how well I’ve been coping during this entire pandemic and pretty much almost lived my best life without a restricting schedule. Of course there have been days when I’ve had fearful and anxious thoughts about the future, but I’ve been mostly able to cast those thoughts down pretty quickly with some tools.

My heart goes out to all those people who have experienced personal hardship, death and illness because of this virus. This situation is not affecting everyone at the same level and I think it’s very important that we take it seriously and respect and treat each other kindly, especially the people with devastating effects in their lives.

Did you lose any contracted performance work due to the pandemic?

Yes, I have lost contracted performances as well as performance opportunities. Since the film industry is shut down, I’m no longer able to work on set. The theatre company that I’m part of had to cancel a lot of shows and is not booking any shows before September. The dance company that I work with also lost our contracted performances from the time of quarantine. Some of those performances we were able to still manage online and got paid for, but some of them are now moved to the next season.

Do you still have any other sources of income that are helping sustain you through this crisis?

Yes, I still work with the dance company that I’m in, Los Angeles Choreographers & Dancers. We just work from home at the moment and have rehearsals via Zoom which has been an interesting experience. Our rehearsals definitely look different at the moment! We are also like many other companies, starting to offer free open dance classes via Instagram Live on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays at 12pm PST. We will soon have all of the info on our Instagram @lachoreographersanddancers.

Have you had to file for unemployment? Have you had any success?

No - and actually I’m not really able to do that. As an immigrant I’m in a challenging situation where filing for unemployment would put my immigration status in danger since I have specifically come to the country to work with a visa.

As a professional dancer, how are you keeping up with your training? Any online classes you enjoy taking?

Like I said, I’m still rehearsing with our dance company, so every Tuesday and Thursday morning we are doing a company warmup and ballet barre together in our living rooms via Zoom. I live in a building that was built in the 1960s, so I have carpet in all of the bigger spaces in the apartment, which is a bit of an added challenge when taking dance classes, since it’s really hard to do turns and some other movements on it.

I do yoga and other fitness classes like barre and HIIT (which I love!) every day via AloMoves. I love their classes! The app has over 1000 classes and new ones coming up all the time and it is super cheap, only 20$ /month. I’m an advanced yogi myself and I love that they have really challenging and sweaty classes to choose from. Also, some of their classes are taught by dancers and the workouts modify from dance classes. So I’ve been pretty disciplined and consistent with keeping my body in shape. I love eating healthy and working out every day, it’s pretty much my lifestyle!

When it comes to dance classes, I’ve focused on the ones designed for small spaces, because I have limited space and I’m not interested in moving big pieces of furniture out of the way. The other day I took a class with a San Francisco-based contemporary dance company called Kristin Damrow & Company. I really enjoyed their contemporary class made for small spaces. Their classes are on YouTube. My best friend in Finland highly recommended The Dutch National Ballet classes on YouTube as well, so I think I’m going to try those classes next since on carpet I can do ballet barre with socks on and it’s still just an added challenge for the muscles and turnout. I especially love taking pre-recorded classes, because then I can take them anytime. I actually haven’t taken any classes myself via Instagram Live - for me personally, the screen is too small and lot of the classes are held during the morning. I usually like to train later in the day.

What are your biggest concerns with the theatre industry moving forward?

My biggest concern is the decreased amount of work before the industry is able to fully reopen.

What is helping you stay positive during this time?

My faith! I’m a believer and it’s been wonderful to be able to have a lot of quiet time with God and studying the Bible which gives me so much life! Also other things like being able to enjoy the nature, being healthy and all the wonderful people in my life.

Eve Metsäranta is a professional dancer and an actor born and raised in Finland and residing and working is Los Angeles. She is a graduate of the musical theatre conservatory program at The American Musical & Dramatic Academy in New York and Los Angeles and she studied and graduated as a professional dancer in Copenhagen, Denmark. Her favorite film credits in leading and critical roles include Ruby in the short film “The Forgiveness” and Sheila in the short “Waiting for Samuel”. She is a company member of The American Immersion Theater in the Los Angeles Troupe with credits including “Murder at the Masquerade” (Jessica Flesher), “Most Wonderful Crime of the Year” (Melissa Meelisa) and “Totally 80s, Totally Murder” (Trish Hughs). Eve is also currently finishing her third season as a company dancer and performer in the Los Angeles Choreographers & Dancers / Louise Reichlin & Dancers with credits including “The Patchwork Girl of Oz” (Margolotte/Glinda/Hopper/Princess Ozma) and “Jewish Child’s Story” (Rebecca at the Well/Miriam).

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