‘John Cranko’ Director on His Biopic of the Famed Choreographer, Starring Sam Riley, as Trailer Debuts Ahead of Market Premiere at AFM (EXCLUSIVE)

On Wednesday, world sales agency Beta Cinema hosts the market premiere of " John Cranko ," starring Sam Riley, at the American Film Market in Las Vegas. Variety speaks to the director Joachim A. Lang ahead of the screening and debuts the film's international trailer (below).

The film, based on true events, follows in the footsteps of John Cranko as he arrives in Stuttgart in 1960 to be guest choreographer at the German city's ballet company. A South African by birth, he had previously worked in London, but his tenure at the Sadler's Wells Ballet had been jeopardized after he was prosecuted for committing a "homosexual act" in a public place, which at that time was outlawed in the U.K.

The film follows Cranko as he is made director of the Stuttgart ballet company and fights to revolutionize the art, culminating in a triumphant visit to New York, after which Time magazine commented, "He may, in fact, be ballet's finest storyteller." It also looks at the darker, tormented aspects of his life, such as his debilitating bouts of depression, outbursts of anger, his chronic sense of loneliness and abandonment, abuse of alcohol and suicide attempts.

Riley, known for "Control," "Rebecca" and "Maleficent," plays alongside Hanns Zischler ("The Theory of Everything"), Max Schimmelpfennig ("Stella – A Life") and Lucas Gregorowicz ("Pagan Peak"). The film also features performances by dancers from the present day Stuttgart Ballet company, including Elisa Badenes, Friedemann Vogel, Rocio Aleman, Jason Reilly and Henrik Erikson.

The DOP is Philipp Sichler, and the producers are Till Derenbach and Michael Souvignier from Zeitsprung Pictures. Sandra Dujmovic coproduces for SWR.

Lang's most recent film, "Goebbels and the Führer," is on release in the U.S. through Samuel Goldwyn Films.

What drove Lang to write and direct a film about Cranko was not just a desire to make a film about the choreographer and his ballet company, it was a wish to "make a true ballet movie," he tells Variety. "So far, we haven't really had true ballet movies. Most of the other films that have to do with ballet, like 'Black Swan' or 'The White Crow,' actually focus on other topics. Relationships or other subjects are at the core of what those movies are about, and there's not really a true ballet movie that's about the art form of ballet itself."

In the film, Lang seeks to weave together Cranko's life and art. "It's not just about his life, it's not just about his art, but it's basically trying to combine both," he says. "It's supposed to be more than a biopic. More than simply a film about the artist John Cranko, it's about the big issues of life: suffering, love, friendship, the time we have left ... about dying, about all these kinds of things."

Nevertheless, Cranko was a singular individual, Lang says. "I think he's one of the great artists of the 20th century and he really created pictures of being a human like almost no one else. He painted with human bodies and emotions like no one else could.

"I see him a bit like Mozart or Amy Winehouse, or all the [other artists] who died too early. He was one of those who lived so fast, who lived only for their art, and who created something extraordinary, but then suffered in their private lives quite substantially at the same time. Those who died much too early and could have achieved probably much more if they had more time."

The film includes references to religion. In one scene, Cranko is asked, "For whom do you create your art?," and he replies, "For God." Some shots evoke Renaissance paintings depicting Christian iconography such as the Holy Communion, the Last Supper or the crucifixion. His success with the ballet company is referred to as the "Stuttgart Ballet Miracle." "It's about his quest for completion or perfection in religion as in art," Lang says.

These religious references chime with the idea of how art helped Germany redeem and resurrect itself following the horrors of the Third Reich. "John Cranko comes to post-war Germany and meets this traumatized society. There's a simple explanation for why he is so successful [in Stuttgart], and that's because he brings humanity back into dance and art in a country that really suffered a lot, where there was no humanity for quite some time before he came."

His next film, he thinks, will be about Jesus Christ, he says.

Lang has been heavily influenced by the work of German playwright Bertolt Brecht. His PhD thesis was on Brecht, he was the artistic director of the Brecht Festival for eight years, and his films include 2018's "Mack the Knife – Brecht's Threepenny Film." This has influenced how he sees art. "I want to show what is beneath the surface, by looking behind the scenes, so to speak," he says. "I tried to show this through the eyes – the reflection in the eyes in the movie – and also the clowns [that appear in some scenes]. They are obviously not real, but they show something that is more real than the superficial pictures we are seeing.

"We thought about calling the movie 'With the Eyes of John,' or 'In the Eyes of John,' because he saw more than what is superficially real. He saw what is behind that. And that's what made him so great."

Incorporating the professional dancers within the cast brought challenges but Cranko's approach to dance helped with this. "They are different forms of art that we have to bring together here. My ambition really was to make a true ballet movie, and therefore I had to do it with true ballet dancers, not actors who pretend to be dancers.

"But the good thing about John Cranko's kind of ballet is the dancers are already kind of actors. They act quite a lot on stage. They do not only dance with their bodies, they have to act. They are true, comprehensive artists, and they can already act. Of course, we had to also coach them. They are not perfect actors, but they are comprehensive artists who can also do that with a bit of coaching. And that's why I think it worked so well in the film because they are used to this kind of acting in the form of ballet that they perform in Stuttgart."