In the 2000 film Billy Elliot, the titular character auditions for a scholarship in a ballet school. After performing an unconventional dance routine, one of the teachers asks him: “What do you feel when you’re dancing?” Billy answers: “Electricity.” This moment in the film, and later, in the hit stage musical, would inspire a generation of young boys dreaming of a life in ballet. One of which was Ballet Philippines Core Dancer Eduardson Evangelio, who played the iconic teenage boxer turned ballerina in a Malaysian performance in 2015.

“When I played Billy Elliot, I experienced a lot of firsts,” he shares looking back. “It was my first time traveling abroad. It was my first time performing solo on stage. I sang ‘Electricity’…and it was memorable for me because that was the very first time I ever felt the joy and fun of ballet.” Eduardson would follow up his debut with memorable musical roles in Filipino shows such as Ang Huling El Bimbo The Musical and Ibong Adarna.

In 2022, Eduardson joined Ballet Philippines as a core dancer. He has shown his extraordinary skills in multiple productions as The Nutcracker, Coppelia and Christmas Fairytales. The dancer mentions that he is particularly proud of his ability to leap high off the ground. While his athleticism is evident on stage, Eduardson states that he likes to prepare for a performance in a very specific way. “The number one [thing I do] before going on stage is pray,” he says with a smile on his face. “And as a dancer, we cannot [proceed with the performance] without a proper warm up. So the other thing I do is push ups. I always do it during the start of the prologue music. [I do] about 20 to 50.”

At the young age of 23, Eduardson is still uncertain where the future will take him. But for now, he’s gonna stick to what he loves best—being on stage. “I can’t say this is my calling yet, but I do love performing in general,” he says. “Whether it is singing or dancing or acting, [I love it] because it’s [a] medium where I can express myself. It is a joy to enter another world, where I can be someone that I can never become in real life. Stepping into the character’s shoes and telling their story, somehow helps me understand myself and others too.”