Upon entering the Knights of Columbus hall on Saturday night, to the song We are the Champions, Marie-Josée Corriveau and her dance partner, Jason Morel, were amazed by the turnout.
The duo were crowned the winners of season four of the TV dance competition show Révolution on Dec. 4, and Saturday night was the Pontiac’s chance to gather to congratulate them in person.
The evening began with emcee Cindy Corriveau introducing the couple, which followed by a few photo ops before the pair made their way around the room to greet everyone.
Warden Jane Toller then took to the stage, alongside Litchfield Mayor Colleen Larivière, MRC Interim DG Kim Lesage and Mansfield-et-Pontefract Mayor Sandra Armstrong, to present Corriveau with the Pontiac Paddle of Accomplishment, which Toller announced as “the highest honour that a person from the Pontiac can have.”
Toller then read a few words which were met by many rounds of applause, cheers and whistles.
“Your recent accomplishment winning the dance competition Révolution was just a preview into the wonderful talent and passion for dance that many community members have known from you since childhood,” Toller began. “We are especially proud of your advocacy work in regards to domestic violence, by using your art form to raise awareness of this very important issue,” Toller said, as she handed over the paddle.
Corriveau is the fifth person to ever receive it and when speaking with her later in the evening she said, “That was incredible. Huge. I don’t have enough words to express how grateful I am about [receiving] it. That was really a surprise to me, completely. I really feel so honoured.”
After the presentation, Litchfield Mayor Colleen Larivière had her turn at the microphone, congratulating Corriveau and Morel and giving her a gift on behalf of the municipality before telling Corriveau: “You are a prime example to what anybody can do. What you can do, everybody can. It just encourages the young people, the young women, the young men, to go for it.”
Larivière concluded by saying “We are Litchfield proud and we are Pontiac proud.”
Corriveau then spoke to the crowd, thanking everyone for coming. She admitted, humbly, that she was shy and “much better at dancing than speaking” so she was going to keep it short, but her message and appreciation was clear.“
Our way of thanking you is to present a dance for you tonight,” Corriveau said. “Thank you so much for the support, the messages, the shares, everything has not gone unnoticed. The Pontiac has been behind me since day one, thank you so much for that.”
Corriveau then gave a shout out to her sister, Natacha Corriveau, for being her dance teacher since the very beginning, before letting everyone know that her and Morel would be performing two dances. First, a dance for Annabelle St-Cyr, a student of Corriveau School of Dance, and friend, who very recently passed away. Corriveau said she knew that Annabelle would have been there that night, as she had been for many of Corriveau’s achievements, including the night that her and Morel were announced the winners of Révolution.“
We wanted to take a moment to dance for her,” Corriveau said. “And then after we will present our final piece that we did on Révolution.”
After a quick outfit change, Corriveau and Morel returned to the dance floor to perform the emotional piece for Annabelle, before performing Black Betty, a dance that helped secure their win on the show.
It ended with a standing ovation from everyone in attendance.
Their was a light lunch served and a cash bar available, with all proceeds being donated to the Knights of Columbus hall. The rest of the evening was then full of, of course, dance, with music courtesy of DJ Martin Leguerrier who donated his sound system, lighting and time to the event.
During our interview with Corriveau towards the end of the evening, she said immediately after winning the show it was straight into another busy schedule, nine to five practice for the upcoming Révolution tour which begins Feb. 9, she is still teaching dance and then there was Christmas in the mix, so it hadn’t truly sunk in yet that she and Morel had won.
“I have days where I’m like ‘oh yeah, I won’ but it feels so surreal. It’s difficult to explain but living with everyone and especially coming back to the Pontiac, it just feels very wholesome and it warms my heart. There’s like a reassuring feeling about it,” Corriveau said, adding that “Being here in the community and actually being able to celebrate it, is like a moment of realness. So thank you.”
Words spoken like a true champ.
To view video of the performances from Saturday night please visit our Facebook page www.facebook.com/Equitynewspaper
