Curtain comes down on Carlow dance school, MC Stage Academy after 23 years

MARIE Cashin, managing director of MC Stage Academy (formerly known as MC Dance), realised it was time to move on from teaching dance when kids started referencing TikTok dance moves that she didn’t know about.

“It became part and parcel of realising I was just growing out of it a little bit,” she explained in an interview over coffee.

Her creative and teaching energy was exhausted during the Covid-19 pandemic, when she could only offer dance classes online, then outside and in pods.

“It was crazy,” Marie said. “Dancing on Zoom … I just would never want to do it again.

“I was very, very nearly coming out of the whole industry, to be honest with you.” 

She rediscovered her love for dance when she linked up with Michael Florin Cahill, who runs an event management company called Evento Ireland. She’ll start working for it when the school winds down.

Her eyes lit up at the prospect of new, creative horizons and the chance to work in a team. “When you work for yourself so much, it’s just hard to know when to stop.” 

Marie grew up dancing in Carlow at Carlow Stage School, now known as Spotlight. “That was the only thing you could really do in Carlow back in the day,” she said. 

She went on to be the first Carlow person to graduate from the College of Dance in Dublin, which was “kind of cool”, she said.

Dance college was equal parts fun and tough. “You got to dance every day. It was amazing.” And yet she commuted to Dublin every morning and remembered “standing in the dark with my muscles aching” waiting for the bus at 6.30am every morning.

After completing the two-year course, she went through the rite of passage of all college graduates, figuring out what do to next. Thankfully, she said, her parents were supportive, if not a bit skeptical.

“When you go back to 23 years ago, it was a little bit different. But they were very supportive. I think they were happier when I went into teaching because it was, like, ‘okay, well, she can make a living out of this’.” 

She literally and figuratively “took the leap” to open her own school in 2003 after working in several dance and stage schools in the south-east.

Teaching was “very different then because then all of a sudden you had responsibilities instead of just dancing yourself,” said Marie. It took her a few years to find her feet. “It was difficult at times because you were just kind of in a car driving everywhere.

“I want to say it definitely took five years to really, really find its groove, you know. As the school got more developed, then that became the core of my work,” she said.

But she is proud that it consistently did well as a business, surviving the financial crash years which closed so many businesses in the region. “The business side was always really tough to do. I managed it, but it was tough at times.” 

During the Covid years, Pamela Earl, who had started dancing with Marie when she was three years’ old, became a tutor at the school. Pamela, who has a degree in psychotherapy and dance movement, is now poised to open her own school and carry on Marie’s legacy.

“In the last six years, she gave me massive help with everything; I’m not sure I would have even kept going without her.” 

It was getting harder to go it alone ‒ “you feel like you need someone eventually.” Pamela is ‘that student’, said Marie. “She was always an amazing dancer and at the same time so kind at heart, so caring towards the kids. When she was training, she just listened to everything. It was always just ‘give me more’, you know?” 

Pamela’s kindness and openness were key values that Marie wanted to have in the school. “We always say ‘just shine as yourself’ and every child just gets to be themselves on stage, be individual. We always say bring your crazy vibes, whatever that is.

“That was our main goal, you know? It was never to be the best dancer.” 

Marie said she never felt like she was in competition with Spotlight Stage School and instead modelled the school on Jesters Stage School in Kilkenny, where she worked for a while after college. Jesters has since closed down, but Marie took on board its ethos that “every child gets to be included, every child gets to see the front row” into her own school.

Spotlight’s ambitions to be on the Late Late Toy Show “was their thing,” explained Marie. “I’ve huge respect for them.” 

 Her approach evolved over 23 years of teaching. “What I figured over maybe the last ten years is that we don’t even have to dance all the time. We can chat if we want. We can have a laugh. We can tell jokes.” 

“Dance is only a part of it. It’s the social skills that the kids learn with each other and how to actually just talk to each other. Even if they learn how to be confident, that was a huge thing.” 

Choosing to be as inclusive as possible can bring its challenges, she admitted, “but it’s just about having a lot of patience, I think”.

Last year, one of her students, Eimear Hennessy, who has Down Syndrome, featured on the RTÉ Junior TV show Dizzy Deliveries, which teaches children how to communicate using Lámh, a way of communicating that uses hand signals and speech. Pamela uses Lámh to communicate with some of the students.

Marie has recorded “no major disasters” in the past 23 years, apart from bits of sets falling down mid-show, and has many highlights to look back on, such as seeing past pupils return to perform in some of the shows she has choreographed.

Last Saturday, 20 June, in the GBS Theatre at Carlow’s Visual, Marie staged MC Stage Academy’s last show, billed as The Final Curtain Call, celebrating 23 years of the academy and its musical journey.

Marie said she hadn’t originally planned for this to be the last show. “It was, weirdly enough, only a few months ago that I decided to end this,” she reflected.

The reaction to her announcement has been very positive and she has been inundated with nostalgic comments online from former students.

Marie rests easy knowing that her students will find a new space to express their individuality in Pamela’s new school. 

“It’s not a complete end of the road, in a way,” she says.