GREAT FALLS — Hollywood can seem like worlds away from Montana. However, former Great Falls dancer has bridged the gap between our town and the Academy Awards.
Anna Marra grew up in Great Falls and attended both Mountain Shadows School of Dance and Missouri River Dance. Her interest in pursuing dance as a career sparked at a young age.
She recalled, “I was really lucky for the timing of high-level professionals coming into the field and just kind of being planted in my town. I think that the Air Force base is kind of fantastic for that."
Marra explained, "A ballerina who married a pilot who was just freshly retired, having a baby, was relocated to Great Falls. She kind of exposed me in junior high. It was like, oh my gosh, this is like a real thing. People can be this amazing and athletic!”
She talks highly of the unique traits that training in a small town brought her: “Because it was a small place to train, the age range was broader. So I feel like that was so fantastic for just like figuring out how to work with other people.”
Marra continued forward, graduating college with a degree in dance and now pursuing it full time.
During 2021, right in the middle of the pandemic, she got the opportunity to work on the production of Guillermo del Toro’s "Pinocchio" as the choreographer.
Since the pandemic was in full swing, production had to be creative in how to work together on the film.
“Normally you might do a soundstage, but it was all through video, and you know, Zoom meetings,” she explained.
During the March 12th, 2023, Academy Awards, the film won the Oscar for Best Animated Feature.
Marra first heard that the film won the next morning when a friend texted her the news.
Although she does not get an Oscar of her own, she is able to go see the Oscar at the studio.
Overall, Anna’s message is for the youth in Great Falls to follow their dreams.“It's important for kids to hear that they can like go be an artist or do something creative professionally."
