Authors: Kristi Lynn Davis
My two favorite dance studios were Steps and Broadway Dance Center, which were known for their top-notch jazz and tap teachers. Between the two, there was such a smorgasbord of classes that it was challenging to choose what to try. I sampled several before settling on a few favorites. Even the worst, I rationalized, succeeded in exposing me to new and different flavors.
For one class at Broadway Dance Center, we lined up at the ballet barre for the warm-up, and I nearly jumped out of my skin at what sounded like an explosive gunshot. I turned my head to see a jazz teacher who, if I didn’t know better, I’d swear was Sonny Bono whacking away on a hand-held tom-tom. The entire warm-up was done to the beat of his drum. “‘The Beat Goes On’ and on and on,” I lamented, recalling the Sonny and Cher song of the same name. Too intense for me. It felt more like an Indian pow-wow than a dance class.
An ex-Las Vegas showgirl taught me “tipping” and Vegas-style dancing. Up until that time, I thought tipping was something one only did at a restaurant or to cows in the country. In this class, I learned that it was a sexy, stylized type of walking where you moved sideways leading with your hip. “Kind of fun, but who am I kidding? I’m no showgirl, and I’ll never dance in Vegas,” I said to myself.
Much more my style was the jazz class I took with the famous, funky Frank Hatchett, who had a large group of loyal devotees and even sold his own line of jazz shoes. I excelled at his high-energy, high-kicking choreography, as I could kick with the best of them.
My most unpalatable experience was the jazz class at Steps that began with a warm-up so complicated and contortionist that I’d have needed several months of practice and my bones removed to do it. The easiest part was something along the lines of splits, backbend, wrap your leg around your neck, and tie it in a knot. The regulars had these frenetic and wildly unpredictable movements memorized, so the teacher didn’t bother demonstrating for a new person like me. She’d go out for a cup of coffee and casually saunter back halfway through the warm-up to find me flailing and flopping about, struggling to stay alive.
Steps should have had an agreement that the instructor had to actually be present in her classroom for so many minutes out of the hour-and-a-half to qualify as having actually taught the class. I should have asked for my money back, as a good chunk of the class I spent trying to use my dance ESP to figure out what the heck to do in her warm-up.
Natasha Baron’s jazz class at Steps, on the other hand, was so much fun I absolutely ate it up. She declared, “We dance so we can eat brunch!” Sounded like solid dance philosophy to me. Her class was challenging enough to help me improve without being too frustrating to enjoy.
I ended up having a few favorite teachers, all from Steps: Natasha Baron and Denise Webb for good old-fashioned jazz and Zena Rommett, who introduced me to floor barre—essentially ballet exercises done lying down on the floor. It was the perfect way to gently and safely wake up one’s muscles in the morning, particularly after a late-night margarita marathon. It was heavenly and relaxing, but still strenuous and toning and great for practicing perfect ballet technique and alignment.
Not only was I intrigued by the various instructors, but I was also mesmerized by the dance students, particularly those from local performing arts high schools. These whiz kids were a force with whom to contend. It appeared that all they did all day was take classes, and they were darn good at it. When leaping and jumping, they stayed airborne for so long, it seemed they were immune to the law of gravity. They could spin like a top and had muscles that knew no bounds of flexibility; they were Gumby in jazz shoes. These dance prodigies could have done the warm-up and dance combinations in their sleep. I was enthralled, intimidated, and thoroughly humbled.
Then there were the real professional dancers and the die-hard ballerinas (a.k.a. the “trinas”) who were all skin and bones and wore pointe shoes in every ballet class. New York ballerinas duct-taped their favorite, comfy ballet slippers if they were falling apart and wore their dance clothes until they were rags. It was hard not to spend much of my class time either marveling at the amazing dancers or looking with fascination out the studio windows at the hustle and bustle of Broadway below.
One day while at Steps, I overheard the excited whispers of girls peeking into a particular classroom. “There she is: Brooke Shields!” I was star struck. I patiently waited until this famous actress’s class ended, acting nonchalant and completely uninterested but secretly peering peripherally at her like a hawk honing in on its prey. Then, when she headed to the women’s dressing room, I discretely followed her. When she went into a bathroom stall, I took the one next to her. Why? So I could say I peed next to Brooke Shields, of course. The next time I saw Jenny, I said, “I peed next to Brooke Shields!” You never know the famous people you might relieve your bladder alongside while in New York City.
Although I was finally becoming more comfortable with the whole dance class scenario, I was also becoming more concerned that at about $8 a pop, this expense was really going to add up. Especially if I took one or more class a day. Fortunately, I learned that some of the big-name studios periodically offered work-study scholarship auditions, and one was being held at Steps just in the nick of time. As a scholarship student, you worked the front desk or did whatever other menial labor was needed in exchange for free dance classes. It was worth a shot.
I auditioned and, by the grace of God, landed one of the highly coveted scholarships. Incredible! No more worrying about paying for classes! My assignment was receptionist-type work at Steps II—their second, smaller, less-impressive, sister studio down the street. It felt a little like being shipped off to no man’s land, but I knew how lucky I was to have the opportunity, and I was not going to complain.
What left the biggest impression on me at Steps II was the sixty-some-year-old retired professional ballerina who wore a turban on her head and was still a die-hard ballet class attendee. Still continuing her craft. Still doing what she loved, even in her seventh decade of life. I hope I’m still taking ballet class when I’m an old lady, I projected into the future. But perhaps I’ll skip the turban.
*******
My fantasy life seemed to be falling into place: a nice apartment, free dance classes, and plenty of income, thanks to Celebration Magnifico, which was becoming a bigger part of my life than I had anticipated. As I learned the ropes, the idiosyncratic inner workings of the company became clearer and clearer. Bart, I discovered, was the head honcho, with his brother, Danny, playing second fiddle. Bart worked all the best parties at the nicest locations. The favorite dancers, therefore, got all the good gigs with Bart and got to travel a lot. Unofficially, this group became known by all the dancers as “the A-team.” The tier below these golden guys and gals was inhabited by “the B-team.” These performers worked fairly often but got the local, schlockier jobs led by Danny. The “Z-team” were the people who never worked except for New Year’s Eve when Bart and Danny practically had to pull strangers off the street to cover all the parties they’d booked. I got right into the A-team, which peeved some people, and rightly so.
Being a preferred dancer, I found myself averaging about $1000 a month, so it was smooth sailing, income-wise. I could easily pay my portion of the rent—three-hundred smackaroos—and still have lots of money left for bagels. While my weekends were now relinquished to Celebration Magnifico, having neither a boyfriend nor much of a social life, I actually preferred working to sulking alone in my apartment.
Instead of being holed up at home, I danced at weddings, corporate events, conventions, charity functions, parties, and elaborate New Year’s Eve celebrations. Once we even partied with patrons at a spooky mansion for an outrageous Halloween benefit. But our bread and butter came from the very lucrative bar mitzvah/bat mitzvah circuit. Being Jewish themselves, it made sense that Bart and Danny tapped into this familiar market. Hence, we made a multitude of trips out to the nether regions of Long Island—bar mitzvah country. I never had a clue where we were exactly, as I wasn’t driving, and I didn’t have a map. All I knew was I was thrown into a van with a bunch of tired and crabby dancers who, at the end of the long ride, would likely be accosted by a bunch of barely-teen boys.
These kids loved us, and if one kid had Celebration Magnifico at his bar mitzvah, then all his thirteen-year-old pals wanted us at theirs, too. I’m not sure if they found us entertaining so much as fair game for abuse (and, oh, they did love to push their boundaries, test the hormonal waters, and yank on our costumes), but no self-respecting parents wanted their son’s shindig to be out-partied by the festivities of their friends, so we saw a lot of the same kids over and over again.
In addition to keeping me in the black financially and sparing me from becoming a pitiful
shicksa
recluse, Celebration Magnifico exposed me to a variety of settings and eye-opening experiences. It was fun to see all the elaborate parties with gorgeous flower arrangements, balloon-sculpture monstrosities, and exquisite table settings. Our gigs were everywhere from the elegant Marriott Marquis located in the heart of Times Square and the Broadway theatre district to a no-frills, drab, gray banquet hall in the Bronx, where we served as entertainment for a wedding. Those dreary nuptials were particularly memorable because we traveled there via train through the infamous Harlem. Peering out from the safety of the boxcar, I was both frightened and curious as I watched homeless people crowd around trash cans aflame for warmth.
A local highlight for me was the bar mitzvah we performed for at the Copacabana, the famous nightclub on East 60th Street that Barry Manilow sang about in his 1979 Grammy Award-winning song of the same name. My life wasn’t too far off from that of the song’s protagonist: Lola, the showgirl “with yellow feathers in her hair and a dress cut down to there.” I was simply in love with dancing at this renowned hotspot and getting paid for it, no less.
Wherever and whenever we had a gig, there would be a specific meeting spot in Manhattan—generally in front of the home of one of the dancers, who had a list of people who were supposed to show up. We would gather on the sidewalk at the designated pick-up area until our van or limousine arrived. (Yeah, sometimes it was a limo–a nice bonus.) I got to experience all different parts of Manhattan at all hours of the day and night thanks to the varied pick-up spots. Sometimes we had to arrive at an ungodly hour like 5:00 a.m., if we had a morning start time and a long way to travel. Even in the “City That Never Sleeps” there are not a lot of people out and about that early in the morning (at least not a lot of people you would want to meet), so it could feel isolated and scary.
One such morning, a large and threatening-looking, highly inebriated, off-his-rocker man shouted at me from across the street as I waited for the other dancers. Like any typical New Yorker, I ignored him. He kept right on yelling. I continued to ignore him. His rantings grew louder and angrier. I became concerned, because I could sense the tension escalating like a boiling teapot ready to blow steam. “What do I do?” Recalling those National Geographic shows of animals in the wilderness who go into “fight, flight, or freeze” mode when they realize they are being stalked as prey by a bigger and stronger animal, I held my breath and stopped dead in my tracks figuring that, given his size and supposed speed, freeze was the logical option.
Next thing I knew, he was standing beside me, shouting defensively, “You too good for me, lady?” Ignoring him had obviously been the wrong choice, so I meekly responded, “No. I didn’t mean to make you mad.” Having been sufficiently validated, he nodded his head in approval and walked away. I breathed a sigh of relief, but the altercation made me anxious.
My favorite meeting spot was in front of this dumpy, twenty-four-hour Polish restaurant that served the most delicious homemade vegetable soup with thick slices of eggy Challah bread. We would sup on the scrumptious comfort food or take-out containers stuffed with chewy pierogis. If one had a hunkering for Polish delicacies at any time, day or night—even at 3:47 a.m.—this place was open for business. No wonder New York is considered one of the greatest cities on earth. The restaurant was my homey, albeit homely, safe haven.
When we arrived at our destination, we were shuffled off to our “dressing room,” which was inevitably some makeshift costume-changing area, usually at a hotel or country club. Surprisingly, the guys and girls weren’t separated; we were all just expected to change clothes in front of each other. I supposed this lack of privacy wasn’t such a big deal, as most of the men were gay, after all. But when it became routine for our bosses, our D.J.s, and our “Schleppers” (the Celebration Magnifico term for the guys who lugged costumes and equipment around) to also roam free-range, I felt a tad violated.
It was a real challenge to get into and out of myriad garments throughout the night without mooning someone or letting a nipple peek out. Thank God for that handy trick from the movie
Flashdance
where you take off your bra without removing your shirt: pull one bra strap down and slip arm out, do the same with the other strap and arm, and then pull the bra out one of the sleeve holes. I felt like Houdini slipping out of a straitjacket. With the bra out of the way, you could sneakily slide your costume top on underneath the shirt you were wearing. Take outer shirt off and voila! All dressed without going topless and giving the guys an eye-f. These attempts at modesty took enough extra effort that many dancers gave up and let it all hang out. I didn’t think I was getting paid enough for that. Still, I could see why the others didn’t worry about bearing their bits, as we changed in and out of costumes a lot throughout the event.