| Before Crusher |
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| Gates trained at an early age to be a dancer as well as an actress. One of her teachers was a ballerina, and the other had been in the circus. "I grew up thinking most ballerinas knew how to ride the unicycle, tap-dance and do hand-springs". |
"I've had primarily a theatre background. I've trained as a dancer since I was a child doing all sorts of circus as well as ballet, taptoe and acrobatics". |
| Gates met improvisation and mime authority Jacques LeCoq just before graduating. |
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"I saw him do a lecture at Harvard and I thought he was quite brilliant and I decided that was what I wanted to do. I went to France and worked on my own bits of street theatre and studied with him in school for a few years. We worked constantly in juxtapositions. One explored immobility in order to better understand movement. One explored silence in order to better understand sound and language. It was theatrical research involving many mediums. Just living in a foreign country where you have to speak and think in another language just cracks your head open! It was both terrifying and freeing and suddenly I was taking more risks in acting." |
"I've had primarily a theatre background. I've trained as a dancer since I was a child doing all sorts of circus as well as ballet, taptoe and acrobatics".