When Jig arrived on screens in 2011, it became an instant sensation in the Irish dance world and to this day remains one of our community’s most iconic cultural artefacts. Produced and directed by Sue Borne, the documentary is a comprehensive dive into the world of competitive Irish dance. It’s not only a snapshot of the sparkling gowns, big hair, and mesmerising choreography, but also the sweat, tears, and passion that fuel those dancers.
We laughed, cried, and held our breaths as eight dancers from around the world prepared for and competed at the 40th CLRG World Championships held in Glasgow in 2010. One of those little girls who was spotlighted was Julia O’Rourke from Long Island, New York. The film charts her transformation from studio to stage, including her teacher rhythmically commanding that she “Pick it up! Pick it up! Pick it up!”, and the tear-jerking moment where she clinched her first World title. Now she is all grown up, and so much has changed since then (and not just the wig styles and poodle sock lengths).
Julia joins our Zoom call fresh off the tour bus, sporting a simple grey zip-up jacket, wavy hair from the aftershocks of hairspray and teasing, and false lashes, beaming under a face full of stage makeup. Since last December, she has been a cast member with A Taste of Ireland and has quickly become a standout dancer in the show. Her vibrant performances are autographed with an infectious energy and charm, from her effortless turnout and springy ankles to the gracefulness in her feet as she glides across the stage.
In fact, after training for the entire summer, she made her lead debut just this past September. “I’m still trying to process it all,” she says, “but there’s so much to learn from this company, and the dancers that are in it are incredibly inspiring.”
“When they told me that I was a potential winner for the World Championships I was genuinely shocked“
Julia first became infatuated with Irish dance when her best friend in kindergarten performed a step for the class show and tell. The eager five-year-old begged her parents to enrol her in lessons, so she found her way to the Petri School of Irish Dancing (now Doherty-Petri School of Irish Dance) in New York under the instruction of sisters Lisa and Karen Petri where she has remained ever since. It was only five short years later that Julia was scouted to take part in Jig.
As a young girl of 10-going-on-11 preparing for her first ever World Championships in 2010, Julia recalls not truly understanding the gravity and intensity of the competition. So it was to her great surprise when her teachers approached her and her mother about taking part in a documentary. The story goes that the producers and directors of Jig asked around Scotland to find out the two dancers most favoured to win the Girls U11 age group, the youngest in the competition. The resounding consensus was Brogan McCay and Julia O’Rourke.
“When they told me that I was a potential winner for the World Championships I was genuinely shocked,” Julia says. “I was like, ‘Am I trying to win the Worlds right now?’”
That was just the start of it all. Julia shares how enjoyable the production process was. The cameras that followed her around simply faded into the background of her training. The filmmakers didn’t overstep any boundaries, gave her space on competition day, and most importantly let her be herself.
The documentary reached theatres in the United States in June the following year. Once the North American National Championships rolled around a few weeks later, the first major competition since the film’s release, Julia recalls getting her first taste of stardom.
“Everyone in the dance world had seen the movie at this point, and I was still just a little 11-year-old running around, maybe 12 at that point,” she says. “I was watching one of my friends and I turned around and there was a line of people out the door waiting for a picture, an autograph — and I was so confused.”
Despite being so young, Julia became one of the original icons of the Irish dance world. She is also part of the generation of dancers that were among the first to build online presences and gain notoriety on social media, as Instagram was first launched in October 2010. Although Julia waited until she was a bit older before joining any platforms, once she was there her accounts blew up instantly.
Grappling with the realisation that so many people knew who she was and wanted to follow her was a big weight on such young shoulders. “It was very overwhelming at first, knowing that the entire Irish dance community had eyes on me at such a young age,” she says.
“I think pressure really got me“
Now 25, Julia could not imagine her life without Jig. She considers the experience a blessing in disguise, learning to navigate nerves and expectations while developing a strong sense of self. This theme would follow her throughout the rest of her competitive Irish dance career that was only just beginning to blossom.
However, the journey, Julia shares, was anything but linear. Following Jig, she dropped in the ranks. “I think pressure really got me,” she admits. “Just knowing in my head that the only place that I could go was down was something that was very difficult to deal with at the time.”
After coming in fourth place at the 2012 World Championships, Julia suffered from a major back injury. Saddled with a series of stress fractures and a massive cast, she could not step into the studio for an entire year. When she returned to the Worlds stage in 2013 she placed 24th, the lowest ranking she had ever received in a competition. Although she knew that she wasn’t in her best form and was equipped to handle the upset, she came back searching for a way to reconnect with dance.
Shortly following the Worlds, her school merged with TCRGs Gavin, Seaneen, and Caoimhe Doherty, a combination that Julia wholeheartedly believes brought life back into her. “I felt the urge to just put everything into dancing again, spend my life in the studio, get back to where I was, and just completely transform my dancing. And that’s exactly what I did.”
During the summer of 2013, she spent every day in the studio on FaceTime calls with Gavin and Seaneen creating steps. With a newfound fire in her feet, Julia skyrocketed back to the top of the podium at the 2014 World Championships. Not only does she count this as the biggest accomplishment of her dancing career, but also one of the most significant milestones in her life. “It was the most work I’ve ever put into anything,” she affirms.
After that she went on to place first and second at the next two World Championships. She also bagged another win in 2017, what she thought at the time would be her final time dancing on the World stage. She was wrapping up her senior year of high school, looking ahead to college and deciding to focus on her studies. So she hung up her shoes and picked up a bachelor’s degree in exercise science from Hofstra University.
“I wanted to keep challenging myself, improve all around as a dancer, and also be able to show people the progress I’ve made”
However, a few years after finishing her course, Julia felt the itch to lace up her shoes again, so she casually returned to the studio “practising and just messing around at classes”. Suddenly, she found herself faced with the urge to be the best dancer she could be again.
“I wanted to keep challenging myself, improve all around as a dancer, and also be able to show people the progress I’ve made,” Julia says. “I believe when this feeling swarmed over me, both my teachers and I knew it was time to get back on stage.”
One thing led to another (she says very modestly), and her teachers signed her up for the 2022 Mid-Atlantic Region Oireachtas: “To everyone I told I wouldn’t be back, I was wrong,” she wrote on Instagram after winning the Senior Ladies competition.
Coming back into the competitive Irish dance world after all those years was not an easy process. She initially began training with the intention to compete at the 2023 World Championships in Montreal, but unfortunately sustained another injury. Even so, it was during this process that she started to feel the pressure.
“I felt as if the world would be comparing me to my old self, to 18-year-old me. I’ve aged so much. I feel it in my body and my legs. I get more tired, I get more sore. I get injured quicker. And so many things happen just with age. When I’m 18, I’m young and I can just bounce back from everything. Coming back was a lot more difficult than I imagined it would be.”
“The whole reason that I came back into dancing, came back into this competitive state, was because I just absolutely love this sport so much”
Even before then, Julia had hoped to make her overseas debut at the 2023 All Ireland Championships, but couldn’t bring herself to the stage the day of her competition because of nerves. “After a while,” she says, “I decided that I just really wanted to change my mindset. The whole reason that I came back into dancing, came back into this competitive state, was because I just absolutely love this sport so much. So what does it matter what I get? What does it matter what other people think of me?”
Equipped with a new mentality, a new dress, and all the love in her heart for Irish dancing, Julia returned to the 2024 World Championships in Glasgow, the same place where she danced on the World’s stage for the first time all those years ago in Jig. This year, she also had an extra special audience member cheering her on: Brogan McCay, her fellow co-star and competitor. Julia shares that since the film, she and Derry girl Brogan have always stayed in contact and make an effort to see each other any time they are in the same area. “I am so grateful that dancing and Jig have given me a true lifelong friend,” she says.
Coming back to this competitive space years later, no longer a little girl but a young woman, Julia was very much aware of all that changed, both in the larger dance community around her and within herself.
“Until you actually experience it, I don’t think anybody realises how much changes in seven years. I know the dancer I was at 18, and I am not that dancer anymore. So much has changed in my body, so much has changed in my style, my dancing. The dance world has changed and it was so much to adapt to. To even be competitive in this incredibly talented group of senior ladies was just jaw-dropping to me.”
Nevertheless, she found her footing, and after a seven-year hiatus, secured a spot on the podium in fifth place. On Instagram, Julia shared a heartfelt post studded with pictures of her globe, her teachers and friends, and a particularly emotional reaction video featuring Julia holding on tight to a teddy bear.
“7 years ago I announced what I thought to be my last World Championships, today I’m bringing home my 8th globe,” she wrote. “This week I kept getting asked the question, ‘Why did you come back to dance?’ Simple answer is, I love dancing with my whole heart. I craved the feeling of flying again, and I never have felt more beautiful than I do when I’m on the big stage.”
Julia considers the comeback alone, fabulous results aside, the second biggest accomplishment of her dance career. But now she’s ready to hang up her competitive shoes — again. “We’ll see in seven years if I change my mind again,” she says with a cheeky grin, “but as of right now, I’m very happy with the way I ended and I’m proud of myself for getting it done.”
Her star power may have started when she was just a kid, but Julia’s Herculean climb back to the top of her game proves that she continues to be an inspiration to the Irish dance world. Even to this day, she still can’t wrap her head around the idea of being a role model to young dancers all across the world.
“It is one of the best and most rewarding feelings in the entire world to know that they have watched the movie so many times and say that I’m the reason that they started dancing or I’m the reason that they’re motivated to win the Worlds. And it’s crazy to hear that I could have such an influence on the younger generation.”
Now, having stepped away from competition, she has found her rhythm bringing joy to others as a professional dancer with A Taste of Ireland. Ironically, Julia admits, she never believed she was a good fit for professional dancing.
“Truly, I’ve never really thought about dancing professionally, ever. I never tried for any of the big shows, and I didn’t really think that I was going to be good at it. I never had any experience in other types of dance. I didn’t know how to act. I didn’t think I would be good on the road.”
Yet, when Ceili Moore, long-time friend and company manager, reached out to Julia last year to join the show for a two-week Christmas tour in New York City, she decided to give it a shot. “As soon as I got there,” she says, “I was hooked, completely hooked, and I couldn’t get enough of it.”
“Just remember why you’re here. Remember why you started”
Julia returned to the cast in May of this year for a four-week tour and was honoured when, at the most recent North American National Championships, the show’s producers officially asked her to train in as a lead dancer. It’s something that she says her younger self, the little girl who danced across the silver screen, could not have imagined. Now Julia is in the full swing of the company’s autumn tour across the United States and will be on the road until about Christmastime.
Off the stage, Julia shares that she just completed the CLRG Grade 11 exam and wants to somehow find the time to squeeze in Grade 12, hoping to take the TCRG certification exam in the near future. She also casually mentions that she has applied for a physician assistant master’s degree program to start next year, but wants to see how the rest of the tour plays out. “If I’m having too much fun, I might just do it for another year,” she says with a familiar whimsy.
As she charges full steam ahead towards this next chapter, Julia looks back and reiterates that she wouldn’t change a single thing about her dancing career, with all its ups and downs. It makes for a better story, she says. Learning to handle these highs and lows with grace, she comes back full circle to that bright-eyed, 10-year-old girl. The beginning of Julia’s journey is forever enshrined in film, but she continues to live that dream and carry that passion as she dances through life.
“Every single moment, every single point in that journey, even though I knew other people were going to have judgements, in my head I learned to switch my mindset into thinking it really doesn’t matter what other people have to say. Just remember why you’re here. Remember why you started.”
Photography: Karaleigh Irene Desmond/ Annelyn O’Rourke
Design: Colleen Falco
Words: Siobhan Cooney
Editor-In-Chief: Hollie Geraghty
