Long Legs and Tall Tales: A Showgirl's Wacky, Sexy Journey to the Playboy Mansion and the Radio City Rockettes (11 page)

I was truly in loco-motion, dancing like a crazy woman and having a blast. This beat sitting in an office staring at the clock any day. People really get paid for this? Yes, and paid well by dance standards. Jenny and I got the job and and a promise of $100 each for parties in the New York City vicinity and $200 plus $25 per diem for parties where we had to fly somewhere and stay overnight. I didn’t even know what per diem was, but I felt like I’d hit the jackpot.

“Now I have to take you to Stage 1 for cheap stage makeup!” Jenny insisted. This store was showgirl heaven, and I bought all kinds of tacky, colorful shimmery eye shadow, eye pencils, and glitter gel. My face looked like a craft store gone bad, but it was a perfect complement to the outlandish Celebration Magnifico costumes. The downside to getting the gig was that we were required to provide a white unitard (a stretchy bodysuit that covers one from nearly neck to toes), black unitard, black character shoes, beige character shoes, flat jazz shoes, black trunks (a bikini-bottom-like undergarment), and white trunks. It was an enormous initial investment for a starving artist but, hopefully, Celebration Magnifico would help pay the bills, and at least I’d be dancing, even if a touch dirty.

*******

Many of the Celebration Magnifico costumes I’d found so enchanting were created by the same costume designer Miriam was using to outfit our Mirmdance production. Gareth, the master of material, was a gorgeous, gay, punk-blond, British bodybuilder who always wore a skimpy tank top and spandex pants to highlight his flawless physique. His design studio was smack dab in the middle of the meat-packing district over on 9th Avenue on the West side of Manhattan. Miriam sent me there for what was to become, unbeknownst to either of us, the most memorable costume fitting I would ever have.

Although previously unacquainted with this part of town, it became “udderly” obvious when I had stumbled upon the meat-packing district. A lump formed in my throat as I meandered past man after man in white butchers’ coats spattered with blood. They were hauling out slabs of animal carcasses to be turned into delectable steaks at some of New York’s finest restaurants, no doubt. I’m surprised I didn’t turn into a vegetarian that very day. This place made the Lower East Side/East Village neighborhood of Alphabet City (named for its A, B, C, and D Avenues) with its emaciated, toothless drug addicts who hung out in doorways of dilapidated buildings and glared at me as I walked by, feel like home sweet home. I was the only woman in sight as well as the only person devoid of blood stains. Learning that come darkness the meat-packing district turned into an underground world of S&M made the place that much more eerie. Animals slaughtered by day, humans whipped by night.

My heart pounded as I searched for the address on my notepaper, eager to extricate myself from the bovine body parts. Finally finding my destination, I ran up the stairs to the safety of the second-floor shop where I spotted Gareth surrounded by scraps of colorful fabric and fantastical costumes in various stages of completion. “I’m here for my fitting,” I announced shakily, still catching my breath from the shocking cow-corpse display. I ogled his bulging biceps as he placed the measuring tape around my body parts, which drooped in shame at their squishiness in comparison to his rock-hardness. Spandex could have no greater friend than Gareth to show off its stretchy, shape-revealing properties, but I wasn’t so sure I wanted my every nook and cranny and bulge accentuated.

Nevertheless, that is what happened. For not only would I be covered in material so form-fitting that a pimple on my rump would have been detectable to the audience, but the “Lucy’s Future” sea monster costume was so hideous that I contemplated swimming as fast and far away from Mirmdance as my squid appendages could muster. The costume consisted of black and white speckled spandex that covered my entire body minus my left leg and my midriff, which were exposed. “I have to show my stomach?” The arm pieces were long gloves with three- to four-foot long, spandex tentacles that hung off the fingertips. The headpiece was a spandex, squid ski mask of sorts topped with a tall pillow mimicking a squid body. “I could not look any uglier. Even another squid wouldn’t find me attractive. Why am I subjecting myself to this embarrassment?”

Fortunately, the other two costumes were more friendly: a pretty red dress for “99 Reasons to Wear Condoms” and a colorful, spandex (of course), short-sleeved, midriff-bearing (of course) top, leggings, and short, flouncy skirt for “Set Free.”

As the performance dates neared, the Mirmdance company gathered for a photo shoot to make a publicity poster. To my great dismay, Miriam chose to feature “Lucy’s Future,” so I had to wear the dreaded sea monster get-up. Thankfully, I was hidden in the back of the group photo. I felt a little better about my costume upon seeing Sharla, the star of the number, who was virtually naked, wearing only a tiny G-string and painted in silver body paint. I gasped. “Holy cow, she’s topless!” I whispered excitedly to Jenny, who was well aware of Sharla’s titillating presence.

All of us insidiously sensual squids strangled Sharla’s shimmering breasts in a tentacle entanglement and “Click!” the photo was snapped. The night after the posters returned from the printer, Jenny and I traipsed around Manhattan plastering them on walls next to posters of esteemed entertainers. I felt famous by proximity; in spite of looking absolutely grotesque in the picture, it was thrilling.

Mirmdance performed for three nights in October back at the Nikolais Louis Dancespace. The large room conveniently converted into a stage through the use of lights, temporary curtains, and folding chairs for the audience. Tickets were $8 each. People had to pay real money to see me perform. I was disappointed that I had no friends and family there to witness my debut as a professional modern dancer, but Jenny’s family attended and even Bart and Danny, our Celebration Magnifico bosses, kindly showed up to support Miriam and the rest of their employees.

My show should have been pretty easy with only three pieces to perform. “99 Reasons to Wear Condoms” came first and, for me, predominantly involved walking around and falling over in my red dress and black high heels. There was no music, only heart-wrenching narration about the spread of AIDS, coupled with images of people from various parts of the community hooking up and then keeling over from the dreaded disease. I successfully strutted and collapsed on cue. Dance numero uno: no problemo.

“Lucy’s Future,” however, was not even close to smooth sailing. My costume made me feel like a gargantuan goofball and turned the number into even more of an oceanic nightmare than it already was. Every time I did a backward somersault, and there were several, my stupid squid hat fell down over my eyes, and I had to keep pushing it back up so I could see. As if that weren’t aggravating enough, every blind attempt to get up off the floor was thwarted by my treading on my hand tentacles. The dance moved fast and furiously, and it was nearly impossible to keep up while fighting that darn squid costume. I wrestled with it the entire number. Perhaps Jacques Cousteau would have fared better under attack, but in my case, the sea creature won, tentacles down.

At least my last number, the finale of the show, left me dancing in my element—jazzy, smiling, and having fun. How ironic that it was called “Set Free,” which is precisely what I felt having finally and forever extracted myself from that wretched squid costume. This piece, my favorite, made it easier for me to let go of my crustacean frustration from the previous piece and genuinely feel joyfully liberated. I felt redeemed as I ended the night on a good note.

The greatest thrill was being reviewed by the
New York Times.
It was a mixed critique, but “Set Free” was praised for having “gusto.” Another review, in the
New York Native
, stated, “The ten dancers are affable, well rehearsed, and determined….” Only after reading our reviews in the paper did I have any inkling of what our dances were about. That’s the thing about modern dance; it always has a message, and it’s often a challenge to figure out just what that message is.

*******

Once the Mirmdance performance weekend was over, it was back to dance classes and auditioning during the week and Celebration Magnifico gigs on the weekend. I missed the regimen of the daily Mirm rehearsal schedule, but our funding had run dry, and I was forced to relinquish my short stint as a “real artist”—a modern dancer changing the world one “piece” at a time with sophisticated social commentary—for the commercial dancing that had the potential to pay the bills.

When I spotted an audition in
Backstage
for what looked like a promising dance show to be held in Japan, I was hopeful. Always up for traveling, I thought, “Why not give it a try? Japan could be interesting.” At the audition, we learned a short, choreographed combination and then were asked to do some improvisational dancing to sexy music. Having already done quite a bit of this type of dancing with Celebration Magnifico, I was on top of my game and comfortable.

I got the gig and was overjoyed until Jenny warned me, “Did you know that girls from America have been hired to dance in a what appears to be a legitimate show and then were sold into white slavery once they got to Japan?” My innocent little spirit was crushed. I didn’t know if any of what she told me was true, but my imagination went wild envisioning what would happen if I took the job, arrived in Japan knowing no one and speaking not a word of Japanese, was forced to go topless, and couldn’t afford a ticket back home. I would be stuck like a clump of white rice on a burnt frying pan. The company name, NBC Productions, sounded legit, like it was part of the National Broadcasting Company, but for all I knew it could have stood for “Naughty, Bare-Breasted Cuties.” I decided to pass on the offer and be more discerning about what jobs I considered in the future.

In addition to auditioning and working to pay the rent, I knew I needed to take oodles of dance classes if I wanted to be fit and competitive. Let’s face it: I was also determined to be prepared for the next show that required me to bare my belly or be vacuum-packed in spandex. Dance class is a world of its own, with its special structure, unwritten rules, internal drama, and colorful cast of characters. It can be extremely intimidating if you don’t know the code of conduct. There is proper etiquette, and you’d better follow it or you’ll be ostracized or trampled at best and kicked out of class at worst. Survival of the fittest dictated that I pick up on the protocol quickly.

First of all, most dance studios follow a standard class format. Each session is usually 1½ hours long and is traditionally broken down into three sections: 1.) a warm-up (stretching, calisthenics, strengthening, and balancing exercises) done in one place in the center of the room or at the ballet barre, followed by 2.) moving dance combinations (choreographed turns, leaps, and kicks) performed from one side of the room to the other and back again, either one at a time or in small groups, preparing you for 3.) a short, choreographed “combination” (a short dance routine). The process is not unlike athletes doing drills in preparation for the game.

Second, you must stand in a “window”—a space not directly in front of or behind another dancer—so everyone can see herself or himself in the mirror. Dancers have an interesting relationship with the mirror, which we spend an inordinately long and probably unhealthy amount of time staring into. It starts out innocently enough—we really do need to see ourselves to know if we are doing the moves properly. But at some point, the relationship gets a little warped, and we can’t help but stare at ourselves in anything reflective. “How do I look as I walk by this window of the United Bank and Bust? Do I look fat?” Bottom line: Don’t mess with a dancer and her or his mirror.

Third, one’s warm-up “spot” in the classroom is of vital importance. The teacher’s pets would always stand in the front row nearest the teacher and the mirror. It took some guts to man/woman the front line, and if you did, you probably wanted to show off. As a newcomer, you had to be either really brave or really stupid to take one of the premier spots, for it would surely cause a ruckus with the divas who had long ago staked their claim on that part of the room.

If you were somehow able to wrestle a spot away from the showoffs, you had better be fantastic at doing the warm-up, or risk looking like a dancing fool. Plus, the people in back were depending on you. I was neither brave nor stupid, so I learned to strategically place myself safely somewhere in the middle of the room. That way I had people in front to follow and also behind me if we faced the back at any point, and I could still see myself in the mirror well enough.

Fourth, when dancing combinations across the floor, you must make certain that you start on the right beat. “Get into groups of four, and go every eight counts. Pay attention, and don’t miss your entrance!” the teacher would demand as we herded ourselves to the edge of the classroom and scrambled into foursomes. God forbid if you stop the traffic flow and waste everyone’s time. More importantly, get it right or prepare to be stampeded like an oblivious tourist at the running of the bulls of Pamplona.

Fifth, if you talk during class, chew gum, or wear jewelry, expect to receive a public, verbal spanking from the instructor.

Lastly, regardless of how much or how little the teacher tortured or inspired you, always applaud at the end of class. The teacher earned the right to stand up front and is to be treated with respect.

Dance teachers, I discovered, are celebrities within the dance world and act as gurus with their own little following of devoted students. Each teacher has his or her own special style and warm-up, which is generally repeated verbatim at each class. The more often you attend the class, the more comfortable and proficient you become with the warm-up and the style.