On something of a whim, thanks to having an evening when I wasn’t working and nothing was planned, Prairie and I decided to head down to an event I’d just stumbled across earlier in the day: Dance Off 2006.
Dance Off is an annual competition held in the Seattle area for people who want to prove that they have the heart and soul of a dancer, even though they do not have the training of a dancer.
When we made it downtown and started wandering down Post Alley we were a little concerned that we wouldn’t be able to make it in, as the line just kept going, and going, and going…
…however, we figured it was worth taking a chance and grabbed a spot at the end of the line. I wandered off to snap a few shots, and suddenly saw Prairie heading towards me to tell me that I’d just missed my chance to get a ticket! There’d been someone working their way down the line handing them out, but since I wasn’t in line…oops. Ack! Mere moments later, though, I spotted the girl who’d been passing out tickets, and she spotted me. “You! You were taking pictures!” she said, and handed me a ticket. Once again, all was good with the world.
After a few minutes waiting the line started moving, and we worked our way into the Market Theatre. Seats were filling up fast, but we ended up finding two perfect seats over on the far right side of the auditorium with a nice unobstructed view of the stage. While people were filling in, one of the official photographers was taking audience shots near us, and I took a moment to ask if I’d be okay taking shots of the show as long as I didn’t use flash. She assured me that that should be fine. Perfect!
The lights went down, and host Susie Simpkins came on stage to welcome us to the show and tell us a little about Unexpected Productions, the improv theater troupe housed at the Market Theatre. Turns out they’re having a 30-hour improvathon fundraiser that Prairie and I are considering heading down to for a few hours tonight.
Once the introductions were done, it was time to start dancing!
First up was Jason Ryan. A hip-hop flavored beginning that moved to a hick-80’s midpoint and ended with something resembling interpretive dance to a Björk song wearing naught but a skin-toned leotard and oversized fig leaf. Overall, hilarious, and Prairie’s second-favorite of the night.
Next was MP3 (Movement to the Power of Three), the champions of last year’s Dance Off. Like last year (which I’ve only seen in 6), MP3 boasted a wide range of music clips and a ton of quick-changes into different costumes. Lots of cheers and fans in the audience, and I figured that there was a very strong chance that they’d take the 2006 championship as well.
Third in the lineup was JJ Pox and the Attempted Flower Pots. This was the shortest and most un-choreographed set of the evening. Very enthusiastic and exuberant, but not much beyond that.
The Rejects came next. They opened quite strongly, with a pseudo-line dance (chaps made from cut up jeans over bright pink spandex leggings distract a bit from the country theme, admittedly) and costume changes rivaling MP3s, but ran into slight difficulties later in their set when a song didn’t switch over when it should have and they ended up having to improvise for about a minute and a half in the middle of their set. They recovered pretty quickly, but the last half of their set wasn’t quite as tight as the opening minutes. Still a strong showing, though.
Fifth was Darlene, a duo whose routine was entirely Nintendo based. They came on stage in costume as Mario and Link, and Mario even appeared in both “normal” and “super” incarnations. All the music was also straight out of the Nintendo games, as was much of the choreography, to the delighted laughs and cheers of much of the crowd.
Last — but certainly not least — was National Pleasure. They quickly became the favorites for both Prairie and me with a combination of dance, humor, and history, adapting the Cold War into a series of quick vignettes narrated by Marilyn Monroe. Really funny, and our strong favorites (bumping Jason Ryan into second place for Prairie, and MP3 into second place for me) — really, you can’t go wrong with Nikita Kruschev and Fidel Castro scheming to the tune of “Be Prepared” from Disney’s ‘The Lion King’!
Once all six teams had strutted their stuff and everyone took a final bow, we all filed into the lobby area. On our way through the doorway everyone was handed a penny, which we then dropped into one of six collection tins, each one labeled for one of the six teams. Prairie and I swung out into the lobby while many of the crowd went straight for the bar. We were having fun watching everyone — as far as we could tell, we might have been the only audience members who didn’t know any of the Dance Off contestants!
After a few minutes for the pennies to be counted, Susie pulled a chair behind the concessions counter (being used as a DJ stand in this instance) and was handed The Envelope. She tore it open…and announced the winner, with sixty-six votes…
…National Pleasure!
Much whooping and hollering as the winners came forward to claim their trophy, heartfelt congratulations from the rest of the contestants, and Prairie and I made our way out the door to work our way home.
All in all, a really fun night — not at all bad for a spur of the moment, “this sounds like it could be fun” event. And we may be back tonight for some of the Improvathon (though, due to prior commitments, we just can’t make a stab at staying present and awake for the full thirty hours).
Here’s the full photoset from the evening. Dance!
“Prelude And Overture- Camelot” by Orchestra from the album Camelot (1967, 3:11).