EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW  |  CONTEMPORARY DANCE  |  WHERE ARE THEY NOW

Gierre J. Godley: The Choreographer Who Reimagined Snow White to Confront Beauty and the LGBTQ Experience

In 2017, "CHRISTOPHER" used the Brothers Grimm to interrogate beauty and obsession. Nearly a decade later, Gierre Godley is still building — as a Bessie Award-winning performer, a company founder, and a mentor to the next generation of male dancers.

By Dance Mogul Magazine  |  Originally featured June 2017  |  Updated and expanded 2026

Gierre J. Godley — Choreographer, Founder of PROJECT 44 | Photo By: Jeff Smithwick Photography

In June 2017, Dance Mogul Magazine spoke with choreographer Gierre J. Godley about "CHRISTOPHER," a season production from his company PROJECT 44 that used the Brothers Grimm's Snow White as a lens to examine beauty, obsession, and the specific pressure popular culture places on the LGBTQ community. It was ambitious, layered work built through a residency with the NYU Tisch Summer Dance Series and Topaz Arts — the kind of production that signaled Gierre wasn't interested in easy contemporary dance, but in art that made audiences confront something.

Nearly a decade later, that same ambition has carried Gierre from Queens rehearsal spaces to a Bessie Award-winning stage, and from directing his own dancers to teaching the next generation across three institutions. Dance Mogul Magazine is revisiting his story because his path — founder, choreographer, performer, and now mentor — is a complete picture of what building a sustained career in contemporary dance actually looks like.

The 2017 Interview: Inside "CHRISTOPHER"

PROJECT 44 in "CHRISTOPHER," 2017 | Photo By: Esp by Mike

Dance Mogul: What was the inspiration behind this season's production?

Gierre Godley: Through the lens of the Brothers Grimm's Snow White, CHRISTOPHER looks at beauty & obsession and the implications that popular culture has on them in regards to the LGBTQ community.

Dance Mogul: What do you hope audiences take away from it?

Gierre Godley: Our goal is to make the audience aware (or remind them) of the control popular culture seems to have on our ideas of beauty. I believe that many people are aware, but for some reason still, subscribe to those thoughts.

Dance Mogul: What are you looking to do with your art form in 2017?

Gierre Godley: In 2017 and moving forward I want to approach my art as an overall experience. Challenging myself to explore new mediums and in turn hopefully cultivating & broadening my audience, collaborator, and dancer reach.

Dance Mogul: Is there anyone you would like to thank for helping you with the production?

Gierre Godley: CHRISTOPHER was partially created by a residency & support from the NYU Tisch Summer Dance Series and Topaz Arts in Woodside. A special thanks to Pam Pietro, Susan Hamburger, & the entire NYU Tisch Dance Faculty, our major contributors: The Wroth Foundation, Dr. Rick Ellsasser, and Gary & Gladys Godley. Last but not least, I want to definitely thank my dancers (Cesar, Ethan, Alex, Maxwell, Drew, Mat, Gildas, & Ryan) and my collaborators Lara de Bruin (costumes), Rob Ross (Lighting), & Carlton Ward (set design) for all of their artistic contributions to the work.

PROJECT 44 in "CHRISTOPHER," 2017 | Photo By: Esp by Mike

From Arkansas Training to Founding PROJECT 44

Gierre J. Godley began his dance training in Arkansas under C. Michael Tidwell and Arleen Sugano, with additional study at the Ailey School. He went on to earn a BS in Biology with a Dance Minor from Millikin University and an MFA from NYU's Tisch School of the Arts — an unusual academic path for a choreographer, and one that shows up in the analytical, thesis-driven way productions like "CHRISTOPHER" are built. In 2010, while still building his own performance career, Gierre founded PROJECT 44, a Queens, NY-based all-male dance company created as an artistic platform to showcase the beauty of male artistry, a mission statement that has remained consistent across the company's entire run.

Under Gierre's direction, PROJECT 44 went on to premiere full-length work at Danspace Project — one of the most historically significant venues in modern dance — in a joint bill with Mari Meade Dance Collective, funded through a community Kickstarter campaign that covered space rental, costumes, dancer stipends, and production costs. His choreography for PROJECT 44 has received the NECF Choreography Award and the Echo Choreography Award, along with funding from the Queens Council on the Arts and the Peg Santvoord Foundation — the same kind of institutional support that helped bring "CHRISTOPHER" to the stage in 2017.

Where Is Gierre J. Godley Now?

In the years since "CHRISTOPHER" premiered, Gierre has continued building on multiple fronts at once — as a performer, an educator, and an advocate for other dancers. He has performed in "Then She Fell," the Bessie Award-winning immersive theater production by Third Rail Projects, one of the longest-running and most acclaimed pieces of immersive performance in New York. Alongside that performance work, Gierre has taught on faculty at The College of Mount Saint Vincent, Suffolk County Community College, and the Connecticut Dance Center, extending the same mentorship instinct that shaped PROJECT 44 into formal academic settings.

That mentorship instinct has also taken institutional form through T.E.A.M. (The Emerging Artists Meet-Up), a peer-to-peer networking group Gierre produces for emerging artists, and MEN (Move-Experience-Network), a pre-professional and professional showcase built specifically to uplift male artists while helping them build connections across the field. As an art advocate beyond his own company, Gierre has curated and adjudicated numerous regional festivals, granting cycles, and showcases — work that extends the same platform-building philosophy he described in 2017 wanting to broaden his "audience, collaborator, and dancer reach."

PROJECT 44 itself remains active as Gierre's primary artistic platform, continuing to develop and present new choreographic work under his direction. The company that started as a way to showcase male artistry in Queens has, over more than a decade, become the throughline connecting his choreography, his teaching, and his advocacy — proof that the "overall experience" he described wanting to build his art around in 2017 was never limited to a single stage or a single production.

Why Gierre Godley's Story Matters to Dance Mogul Magazine

Dance Mogul Magazine exists to inspire self-empowerment and preserve the legacy of dance culture across every genre and identity within it — and Gierre Godley's work with PROJECT 44 is a direct example of dance being used to confront real cultural pressure rather than simply entertain. "CHRISTOPHER" took on beauty standards and their specific impact on the LGBTQ community through the structure of a fairy tale — the kind of layered, purposeful choreography this publication was built to spotlight alongside the full range of dance styles it covers.

His ongoing commitment to mentorship — through T.E.A.M., MEN, and faculty positions across three institutions — mirrors exactly the kind of community-building this publication was founded to document and encourage. Documenting his full arc, from a 2017 Exclusive Interview through a decade of institutional growth, is precisely the legacy preservation work Dance Mogul Magazine exists to do.

It also matters because Gierre represents a model too rarely highlighted in dance media: the choreographer who stays rooted in a single company and a single community for over a decade, building institutions — an award-winning repertoire, a mentorship network, faculty positions — that outlast any individual production.

The Story Continues

Gierre J. Godley's 2017 interview with Dance Mogul Magazine captured a choreographer using an all-male company and a reimagined fairy tale to say something real about beauty, obsession, and the LGBTQ experience. Nearly a decade later, that same purposefulness has carried him onto a Bessie Award-winning stage, into college dance faculties across two states, and into the role of mentor for the next generation of male dancers coming up behind him.

Dance Mogul Magazine will continue documenting choreographers like Gierre — the ones who build a company, stay with it for over a decade, and use every stage along the way to say something that matters.

Gierre Godley PROJECT 44 CHRISTOPHER Contemporary Dance LGBTQ Dance Then She Fell Bessie Award Male Dancers NYU Tisch Where Are They Now Dance Education

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