Once star-struck girl, Dublin native now member of Irish dance troupe
Courtney D’Angelo remembers the first time she saw “Riverdance.”
The year was 2005. The 8-year-old Dublin native had recently begun taking lessons at the Regan Academy of Irish Dance in Hilliard. Her teacher, Katie Regan, was a former dancer in “Riverdance,” the popular touring production that highlights the dance traditions of Ireland.
That year, for the show’s stop in Columbus, Regan temporarily rejoined the ensemble — and D’Angelo was among those who attended a performance at the Palace Theatre.
“We went to see her and the show, and that blew my mind,” said D’Angelo, now 20. “Even as a kid, I was able to put the connection, like ‘My dance teacher is onstage.’ “
This weekend, “Riverdance” will return to the Palace for five performances Friday through Sunday.
This time, however, the roles will be reversed: D’Angelo,who joined the show in November, will be featured in the cast, and Regan-Donovan (as she is now known) plans to be in the audience cheering for her.
“I’ll be there for the opening night and hopefully another one — if not backstage hanging out with them,” Regan-Donovan said.
One of three children of Tony and Colleen D’Angelo – their other children are Christoper, 23, and Catie, 16 – Courtney was drawn to dance at an early age, beginning with ballet and tap.
“She was definitely coordinated,” said Colleen D’Angelo, whose family has an Irish heritage. “She always had good rhythm, and rhythm is extremely important in Irish dance.”
The family regularly attended the annual Dublin Irish Festival, which featured Irish dancers.
“She would go up there, and she would just stand in front of the stage and try to dance,” said Tony D’Angelo, who works in television as the general manager of WSYX (Channel 6), WTTE (Channel 28) and CW Columbus.
His elder daughter was drawn to the performers.
“The biggest thing for me, I think, was the excitement and the impact of how powerful it was, and watching these beautiful girls and really strong guys wearing these amazing costumes with their hair done up,” Courtney D’Angelo said. 8 p.m. Friday, 2 and 8 p.m. Saturday, 1 and 6:30 p.m. Sunday $39 to $84
At age 6, Courtney started studying Irish dance at Dublin Dance Centre; at 7, she switched to the Regan Academy (now known as the Regan Rankin Holland Academy of Irish Dance).
And, when she was 8, Courtney began participating in Irish-dance competitions nationally and abroad.
“She’s just a shining star onstage,” Regan-Donovan said.
In the summer of 2015, D’Angelo was accepted to participate in a week-long “Riverdance” “summer school” in Dublin, Ireland; the next year, she was invited to join the show for a tour in China, which started in November and included stops in Beijing, Macau and Shanghai, where the show was received enthusiastically.
“People would stop us to take pictures and try to talk to us,” said D’Angelo, who entered Ohio State
University in 2015 and continues to take online classes.
After the China tour concluded in February, D’Angelo stepped into the current U.S. tour; dancers are signed for one tour at a time.
“Since she was 8, her main goal and dream was to dance for ‘Riverdance,’ “Colleen D’Angelo said. “The No. 2 would be to dance for ‘Riverdance’ at the Palace Theatre in Columbus, Ohio.”
The show is divided into two halves: The first set of dances spotlights the heritage of Irish dance; the second, its subsequent global reach.
“Act I is very early Irish and all about our early worship of the elements, and it finishes with ‘Riverdance,’ which is the story of water and life,” executive producer Julian Erskine said. “Act II is all about emigration. … It starts with what we call the ‘American Wake,’ which was an Irish phenomenon that was in the 1800s, when we had our famine.”
D’Angelo, who will be seen in dances throughout the show, points to “Reel Around the Sun” as a favorite.
“They have dry ice everywhere, so it’s kind of mysterious,” D’Angelo said. “It talks about how we’re children of Ireland and we’re children of the sun.”
Much of the program remains unchanged from tour to tour, but D’Angelo also enjoys a dance added in 2015: “Anna Livia” (a reference to a character in Irish author James Joyce’s novel “Finnegans Wake”) boasts a cappella “hard shoe” dancing done by an all-female group.
“It clicked, and it’s a beautiful number,” Erskine said. “It’s unusual to see girls doing hard shoe because we’re used to the boys doing hard shoe and the girls doing soft shoe.”
D’Angelo said that her fellow dancers include performers from Ireland — and from Australia, England, Russia and throughout the United States. Many grew up with “Riverdance,” just as she did.
“Most of us have,” D’Angelo said. “For Irish dancers, it’s kind of a given.”