‘Dancing On My Own’ is a song which transcends generations. It first appeared in a season four episode of Gossip Girl, shortly after the release of Robyn’s seminal album ‘Body Talk’ (2010), and in the last 16 years, the song has been featured in everything from frothy episodes of reality television to more prestigious dramatic fare. There’s an orchestral cover of ‘Dancing On My Own’ in one Bridgerton episode from the show’s second season, and the song is no less out-of-place when characters are dancing in period dress, yearning for each other from across the ballroom. In Swan Song, ‘Dancing On My Own’ symbolizes this eclectic convergence together, as Pat finally manages to reach his own catharsis by participating in such a display of collective joy. If aging is a kind of alienation, then dancing is its natural antithesis, a form of connection.
Lena Dunham’s Hannah Horvath once bravely drafted a tweet to the synthesized notes of the song’s electric opening, closing an early episode from the first season of Girls (2010). Having just learned that her boyfriend from college has since come out as gay, Hannah is trying not to spiral, embracing that spirit of change and potential that seemed possible in Brooklyn in the early aughts. She finally types after much consideration: “All adventurous women do.” The phrase is now something of a meme, a byword for ‘Dancing On My Own’ and the world of possibility that Robyn’s music manages to engender. When writer and artist Simon Wu named his 2024 collection of essays after the song, he explained how Robyn’s frequent emphasis on dancing “seems to suggest that it might also be like persisting, loving, alive-ing, running, building…It is a method of navigating desire and power.”
The song’s capacity to transform a feeling as alienating as rejection and render it into something much more defiant — this is part of Robyn’s power, and ‘Dancing On My Own’ is far from her only song with such intimate, emotionally fraught lyrics accompanied by as infectious of a synthpop beat. On an episode of the podcast ‘Song Exploder’, Robyn walks host Hrishikesh Hirway through the production of the title track from her 2018 album ‘Honey’. “I think we wanted it to feel like you were underwater,” Robyn says, referencing the song’s mix by producer Joseph Mount. “When you look down, there’s thousands of meters down to the bottom of the sea, this feeling of something opening underneath.” It’s there, in the farthest depths of feeling, that “the honey is sweeter,” Robyn croons in the song’s chorus.
Of course, there’s risk involved with this kind of intimacy; this is the experience keenly felt by dancer Merab in Levan Akin’s 2019 film And Then We Danced. Though the film’s wide release would also be marred by pandemic restrictions, and screenings in Tbilisi, where the film was set, were cancelled due to protests over the film’s openly queer material, Akin had accompanied his cast to the Directors’ Fortnight première at Cannes. And Then We Danced follows Merab (Levan Gelbakhiani), a traditional Georgian dancer struggling to understand himself, his burgeoning sexuality, and his own relationship to an art form which places such emphasis on heteronormativity.
Traditional Georgian dance requires a specific structure of the body, the clean geometry of right angles, straightened spines, sharp staccato timing. There’s a characteristic stiffness, owed to the dance’s origin in military formation, which allows the dancers to whirl like spinning tops; Merab is frequently chastised by his instructor Aleko for being “too soft”, too elegant, too flexible. Women must convey dignity, virginity, innocence, their gaze carefully averted to the floor; men, for their part, must be strong, masculine, stoic like soldiers. “You need to be more like a monument,” Aleko barks at Merab.
As Merab and his partner Mary perform their Adjarian duet again and again for Aleko, new dancer Irakli seems to effortlessly epitomize the masculinity that Merab still struggles to manifest. Even when Irakli (Bachi Valishvili) takes Merab’s place in his dance partnership with Mary, Merab is fascinated by him – particularly his carefree approach to dance and his playful relationship with authority.
As the dance troupe ventures into the Georgian countryside for a weekend getaway, Merab’s curiosity gives way to infatuation. The interest is seemingly requited; Merab and Irakli make small, tentative gestures of attraction toward each other, carefully unconsummated, until they are drunk and alone while their friends sleep in the next room. Golden light filters through a broad window; according to director Levan Akin, street lamps in Georgia already have a slight orange tint, which cinematographer Lisabi Fridell heightened within her lens.
Merab places a fluffy white papakha on his head with a dramatic flourish as the song ‘Honey’ is quietly cued: “No, you’re not gonna get what you need, but baby I have what you want,” Robyn sings, her voice soft and languid. Irakli takes a slow drag from his cigarette, watching Merab’s limbs become fluid and free. The beat thrums. It’s the kind of conversation that is shared without words; if their common language was once dance, then Merab is now inventing his own dialect of desire – one that is decidedly more liberated.
Both Akin and Gelbakhiani had previously bonded over their love of Robyn’s music throughout the film’s production; the ubiquity of her music has only intensified in the eight years since her last album. Still, Robyn has managed to influence nearly every major artist du jour, from Charli XCX (who featured her on the remix of Brat’s lead single ‘360’), to Lorde, to Carly Rae Jepsen; all artists who somehow turn their own vulnerabilities into something beautiful, the personal rendered accessible. A Robyn needle drop can never be inconspicuous. Rather, it is the centerpiece of a scene, demanding one singular spotlight center stage; it’s a dénouement, a catharsis: a call to action.
