Post by Admin on Feb 14, 2021 22:06:11 GMT
hen Maddie Ziegler hangs out with pop megastar Sia Furler, their favourite thing to do together is to watch pimple popping videos on YouTube, eyes glued to the screen as they wait for the pus to explode. “It sounds so weird, but it’s literally our obsession,” she says gleefully. “We'll just watch those for hours and hours.”
The pair are extremely close and have been ever since Sia cast her in the music video for her huge hit “Chandelier” when she was 11. The Australian singer first spotted Ziegler, now 18, on Lifetime’s long-running reality series Dance Moms, which follows aspiring dancers and their pushy mothers. She was the standout star of the show, a gifted dancer with natural talent from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, who made her TV debut when she was just eight. But it was her collaborations with Sia (six more videos, a Grammy performance, concert appearances) that turbocharged her budding career.
While Sia is famously camera-shy, preferring until recently to hide her face behind outlandish wigs, Ziegler has effectively become her public alter ego and creative muse, bringing a wild and playful energy to their dance routines. “I'm very honoured that she trusts me,” she says from Los Angeles, exuding an air of sweet-natured calm as we talk over Zoom. Perhaps she’s had enough of being someone’s public alter ego for today though as she’s chosen to switch her camera off. “I don't feel much pressure in terms of being her face for performances because I did it at such a young age and every time I’ve worked with her, it’s just so fun. We are like family.”
If that doesn’t sound intense enough, Ziegler revealed in 2019 that Sia had become her godmother. “I go over to her house all the time and just jump on her trampoline,” she says. They’re neighbours, too – she lives nearby with her boyfriend, the singer Eddie Benjamin. And they’ve teamed up once again for a project that’s about sisters, Furler’s brainchild and directorial debut, Music, a film where Maddie stars as the titular character, a 16-year-old on the autism spectrum. Her life is thrown into turmoil when her grandmother dies and her wayward sibling Zu (Kate Hudson), a recovering addict, returns to take care of her.
Before the film was even released, the trailer attracted an onslaught of controversy on Twitter. The singer was accused by people in the autism community of being “ableist” by casting the neurotypical dancer as someone on the spectrum. Furler fired back that if she was guilty of anything, it was “nepotism”, adding that she had hired “13” neuroatypical actors in other roles. “I can’t do a project without her [Ziegler],” she insisted on Australian TV show The Project. “I don't want to. I wouldn't make art if it didn't include her.”
The pair are extremely close and have been ever since Sia cast her in the music video for her huge hit “Chandelier” when she was 11. The Australian singer first spotted Ziegler, now 18, on Lifetime’s long-running reality series Dance Moms, which follows aspiring dancers and their pushy mothers. She was the standout star of the show, a gifted dancer with natural talent from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, who made her TV debut when she was just eight. But it was her collaborations with Sia (six more videos, a Grammy performance, concert appearances) that turbocharged her budding career.
While Sia is famously camera-shy, preferring until recently to hide her face behind outlandish wigs, Ziegler has effectively become her public alter ego and creative muse, bringing a wild and playful energy to their dance routines. “I'm very honoured that she trusts me,” she says from Los Angeles, exuding an air of sweet-natured calm as we talk over Zoom. Perhaps she’s had enough of being someone’s public alter ego for today though as she’s chosen to switch her camera off. “I don't feel much pressure in terms of being her face for performances because I did it at such a young age and every time I’ve worked with her, it’s just so fun. We are like family.”
If that doesn’t sound intense enough, Ziegler revealed in 2019 that Sia had become her godmother. “I go over to her house all the time and just jump on her trampoline,” she says. They’re neighbours, too – she lives nearby with her boyfriend, the singer Eddie Benjamin. And they’ve teamed up once again for a project that’s about sisters, Furler’s brainchild and directorial debut, Music, a film where Maddie stars as the titular character, a 16-year-old on the autism spectrum. Her life is thrown into turmoil when her grandmother dies and her wayward sibling Zu (Kate Hudson), a recovering addict, returns to take care of her.
Before the film was even released, the trailer attracted an onslaught of controversy on Twitter. The singer was accused by people in the autism community of being “ableist” by casting the neurotypical dancer as someone on the spectrum. Furler fired back that if she was guilty of anything, it was “nepotism”, adding that she had hired “13” neuroatypical actors in other roles. “I can’t do a project without her [Ziegler],” she insisted on Australian TV show The Project. “I don't want to. I wouldn't make art if it didn't include her.”