The Dancer: The beautiful rise and tragic fall of Gerard Alexander

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Gerard loved to dance from an early age and found a mentor to shape his talent during his chaotic youth. Later Gerard was prominently featured in the 1999 book "Vital Grace: The Black Male Dancer." (Photographer Joanne Savio, choreographer Duane Cyrus)

This excerpt is posted with permission via the AJC.

The drugstore stood dark, its parking lot empty, as the two homeless men approached.

For them, it was a perfect time to pick up a few items. It didn’t matter that the store was closed. They were there to dumpster dive — to rummage through what other people consider garbage to try to find something salvageable.

Trey Nelson’s focus was on that task. Then he heard singing.

He looked up.

The lean older man who had joined him for the late-night foray along Atlanta’s North Druid Hills Road wasn’t just singing. He was dancing. And not just regular-person dancing. This was something else.

His dumpster diving partner was performing ballet pirouettes and graceful leaps in the parking lot.

“It was like I was watching a professional dancer on stage. That’s how good it was,” said Nelson, who remembered years of watching his sisters take lessons at the Atlanta Ballet.

He was amazed when the man — perhaps in his 50s, about 20 years his senior — slowly pulled one leg straight up in the air, resting his heel beside his ear.

“I saw that he was in his own element, in his own world,” Nelson said. “He was happy in that little space.”

In the past, the man had mentioned that he once had been an accomplished dancer. Now, Nelson could see that was no exaggerated tale from another person without a home, scratching out a life in one of Atlanta’s hidden encampments.

“He was one of us that got lost,” Nelson said. “A pretty good majority of us out there have many different talents and abilities and goals — and had something going for us at some point in life. And then something happened.”

Still, Nelson hadn’t heard the full, remarkable truth.

Gerard Alexander’s life once held extraordinary promise.

He was 19 years old when he earned a spot in one of the most iconic music videos ever made, which premiered in a prime-time special on CBS.

Seconds into the choreographed scene of Michael Jackson’s 1987 blockbuster music video “Bad,” the King of Pop and a group of dancers portraying his “tough guy” allies stare down neighborhood bullies. Jackson snaps his fingers and grinds out a couple of hip rotations. Then there’s the first big dance move.

Gerard — wearing sunglasses, a Kangol hat and a black and red tracksuit — slips in front of the most famous entertainer in the world and soars into the air, his legs in a perfect split. As the video rolls, he frequently reappears, sometimes gliding through moves alongside Jackson.

A ballet, modern and jazz dancer, Gerard would go on to perform with professional dance companies, tour in Europe, receive praise in The New York Times and grace the cover of a coffee table book on Black male dancers.

Fellow performers and choreographers called him a phenom. They were awed by his otherworldly flexibility. He had the physique and exacting discipline to make his body do what seemed impossible and the emotional intelligence to move audiences.

Some thought of him as a Black Baryshnikov, comparing him to one of the most famous male ballet dancers of the last century.

But while Gerard eagerly displayed his artistry and grace, he camouflaged deep wounds.

Gerard kept secrets.