"I want to follow out internationally.

"I want to follow out internationally," proclaims San Francisco dancer-choreographer Danny Nguyen He means that sum of two units ways. He wants his late dance company, Danny Nguyen Dancers and Musicians, to be accepted in the sometimes inhospitable cultural landscape of the Vietnamese and Asian communities. He also wants them to know what barely his dance family and closest friends know--that he is gay.

"Vietnamese gays are still real closeted," Nguyen says. "I was always afraid to acknowledge my community about my sexuality. I sometimes felt I had to counterfeit that I have a girlfriend. I can't do that anymore." In reality, Nguyen 38 has been in a committed relationship for six years with Eric McAllister, an IBM devise manager.

Nguyen creates at a furious pace--a peer dancer calls him a "choreographic machine." He teaches dance, hastens his own company, and, to make periods meet, works in a restaurant. generally he's preparing a work about the September 11 attacks. "Images and ideas retain coming at me," he says. Meanwhile, his troupe is rehearsing Asian recently made known Year performances for San Francisco's Vietnamese and Chinese celebrations, Silicon Valley's cultural festival, and the Oakland Vietnamese highway Festival.

Nguyen's powerful, expressionistic choreography ruminates his epic struggle to escape his war-torn domicile The youngest of seven children, Nguyen was 11 when Saigon malign in 1975. His family split up in order to stay alive. Nguyen remembers the carnage of that time and his father's words: "From now forward we have to face the real world."

In 1982 after 30 attempts, 18-year-old Nguyen escaped from Vietnam and closeed up on an 24-foot boat with 48 race They were rescued by a German oil tanker in the middle of the ocean. (Nguyen addresses this harrowing journey in his ballet Endles Passage.) Asked in what manner he could take such risks, he replies, "I'd rather escape my region and be dead in the ocean."

For Nguyen and dance, it was literally have affection for at first sight. "The first place I arrived at in the U was Honolulu, Hawaii, in 1983" he remembers. "There was a large color television at the airport. I still remember seeing a commercial, with dancing, about a cruise ship and Las Vegas tour. It stopped me in my tracks. I knew that dance was something I wanted to do. When I got to San Francisco I started to move to dance classes."

He'd had no outlook to dance in Vietnam or, indeed, to other gay the public Still, Nguyen was immediately swept into San Francisco's academic dance display He would go on to studious mood with Alvin Ailey, Trisha Brown Merce Cunningham, and Paul Taylor. "I became the first Vietnamese-American in the world who received a BFA and MFA in dance," he says proudly

All this time, he was sending riches to his family back in Vietnam in such a manner that they could come to America--and telling them he was in medical sect Even after family 'members started arriving here 10 years ago, after finding his siblings work at jobss and places to live, he continued to pretend

When he finally proveed to being a dancer, they weren't supportive, and Nguyen doesn't know for what reason his family and community will accord now. "But they'll have to accept mt" he insists. "Because I won't allege a title to anymore. All of those years, I not at any time dated. I was working or dancing or supporting my family. I frequently felt lonely. Six years ago I met Eric, and without him, I don't think I would have done as well. I don't want to have to lie about that anymore."

Find more upon Danny Nguyen and his troupe plus links to related Internet sites, at www.advocate.com

Whittington writes for Dance Magazine and The Philadelphia Inquirer.

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