Canadian ice dancers Piper Gilles and Paul Poirier embrace ‘outsider’ role in Netflix doc

Canadian ice dancers Paul Poirier, left, and Piper Gilles are shown in this undated handout photo. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Handout - Netflix (Mandatory Credit)

Canadian ice dancers Piper Gilles and Paul Poirier have spent much of their careers skating just outside the sport’s centre of gravity.

They don’t train at the Ice Academy of Montreal (I.AM), the powerhouse that has come to dominate international ice dance.

They say they’ve never quite fit the sport’s preferred mould.

And even as they head into next month’s Winter Olympics as medal front-runners, Gilles and Poirier are doing so on their own terms – leaning into camp, creative risk and emotional openness.

“I think we’ve always kind of been outsiders and we’ve embraced it,” says Gilles in an interview.

They bring this renegade energy to “Glitter & Gold: Ice Dancing,” Netflix’s three-part docuseries that follows the sport’s top contenders heading to Milano Cortina.

Premiering Sunday, the series centres on three teams: American champions Madison Chock and Evan Bates are framed as favourites, France’s Laurence Fournier Beaudry and Guillaume Cizeron as wildcard challengers, and Gilles and Poirier as the unconventional Canadians.

When the series was first announced, fans on figure skating subreddits celebrated the rare spotlight on a team training outside the I.AM, long considered the sport’s pre-eminent Olympic factory.

At the 2022 Beijing Games, 11 of the 23 ice dance teams trained there.

Gold medallists Chock and Bates, as well as Fournier Beaudry and Cizeron, train at the I.AM too — and the documentary captures them working under the same roof.

Gilles and Poirier, who train instead at the Scarboro Figure Skating Club in Toronto’s east end, are happy to trace their own lines.

“We love our camp. We love our coaches. Sure, Paul and I could have gone to Montreal and fit that mould, but what’s interesting is we’ve chosen to go against what I guess some people think is the easy route, to go train with the best,” says Gilles.

“We have enough self-motivation and we’re motivated by our team. I think that’s such a unique story. I think people are so excited because there’s a need and a want for other camps to be successful, and we’re paving the way for even the new coaching camps that are coming up. We’re saying, ‘Hey, you don’t need to conform to this mould to be successful. Find your own path.’”

Directed by Kate Walsh, who previously helmed Netflix’s “Simone Biles Rising,” the series gives an intimate look into the stories behind each team.

At one point, Montreal-born Fournier Beaudry tearfully recalls being swept up in the fallout after Nikolaj Sørensen — her boyfriend and former ice dance partner — was accused of sexual assault.

She teamed up with Cizeron last year, acquiring French citizenship in November, after Sørensen received a six-year ban in 2024 from the Office of the Sport Integrity Commissioner for alleged sexual maltreatment.

An arbitrator overturned the suspension last year.

Sørensen has denied the allegations, which have not been tested in court.

Getting personal

Poirier gets personal too, opening up about coming out as gay in 2021.

“When I came out, it was received so positively from the skating community, from our fans, from so many people,” says Poirier.

“What Piper and I have learned as skaters is we create our best work when we bring our whole selves to the table — all of our feelings, all our experiences, all our emotions. I feel like that was just a natural step in that journey.”

One of the songs they’ll perform to at the Olympics is RuPaul’s “Supermodel,” which Poirier says both nods to the queer community and captures the duo’s “fabulous and sassy, and a little bit cheeky” ethos.

Gilles also shares her journey returning to action after being treated for Stage 1 ovarian cancer in May 2023.

She took a medical leave at the time to have her left ovary and appendix removed and has since received a clean bill of health.

She says the experience has given her and Poirier “a new perspective on life.”

“After my cancer diagnosis, I appreciated what my body does every single day, because when I couldn’t anymore, it was like, ‘Oh my gosh, this is hard.’ That’s a reality check,” she says.

“We take each competition and each moment as, like, this could be our last. We’re going into these Olympic Games like this could be our last. Let’s have an absolute blast.”

The duo’s willingness to skate against the current doesn’t stop at camp choices or choreography.

It has also put Gilles and Poirier on a collision course with the sport’s judging culture.

After receiving a curiously low score at last year’s Grand Prix Final in Nagoya, Japan — despite delivering one of their cleanest performances of the season — Gilles openly criticized the judges, even calling out the International Skating Union.

She told The Canadian Press at the time that although she felt some fear challenging the sport’s governing body, she was “proud about speaking out.”

That same unapologetic philosophy has guided their careers.

“We pave our own direction, and we pave a direction for people to follow. It’s a messy journey for us to be on and lead that way, but I think we take that in stride,” says Gilles.

“We’re proud of the dirt that we’ve collected over the years. Life is messy.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Jan. 30, 2026.