Rising Above-the Kamal Singh Story

Kamal Singh came to ballet late by the standards of the profession and never considered hiding who he was to fit into it. He started training at 17, which most professional dancers would describe as too old to realistically build a career, and within a few years was performing as a soloist in Russia and appearing in contemporary productions in Wales. He wears his turban and maintains his kesh. He describes the moment he first danced in the center of a studio as a feeling of his soul jumping for joy. He had found his form.

The film follows him through rehearsals, fittings, performances, and the daily physical work of maintaining a dancer's body, all while living as an immigrant in the UK, missing his family in India, and navigating a professional world that has almost no precedent for someone like him. His teachers and collaborators speak about his talent with genuine admiration. His director calls him "the perfect dancer to embody light versus dark." Rising Above is a film about what it looks like to be the first, not because you set out to make history, but because you simply refused to stop.