G is for gypsies.
No, not like hoop earrings, tell-your-fortune-for-silver gypsies. I mean the dancers. The Broadway chorus liners.
There is a Broadway documentary I enjoy watching, from the Ziegfeld Follies to Wicked, hosted by Julie Andrews and with fantastic photos and facts. Am I a geek? Yes. Am I happy? Yes. B'Way: The American Musical. If you're like me, you'll love it.
Now, the period I study and enjoy most-and hope to make a career out of acting in revivals from-is approximately 1960-1990's. Julie mentioned, in passing, while talking about A Chorus Line-one of my favorites-that the dancers were "the self-entitled gypsies". Maybe that was just a thing right then. Maybe now they call themselves something different. But I love the term and continue to use it, joyfully confusing some people.
I, myself, cannot dance to save my life. I plan to work as hard as I can in college to fix that. I'm willing to have a mental breakdown and lose 30 pounds and starve and swindle myself and work until I sweat blood to be able to dance. Theatre is my life, and not being a very good dancer isn't about to stop me. I don't intend to be fabulous, but I want to be able to hold my own in an ensemble role, at least.
Mainly, I suppose, there are 3 things you need to be able to do to be in a Broadway show. Sing, dance, act. I can act a little, dance a little, if I work at it. But my strength is singing. I adore belting out Barbra Streisand and switching to head voice to handle Betty Buckley. Sung-through musicals are brilliance for my kind. Absolute genius. Thank you, Andrew Lloyd Webber.
But the "dancing" musicals appeal to me too. Cats, A Chorus Line, Even a Little Phantom. I so do wish I could dance. I want to be that lithe, multi-talented girl walking down the streets of New York in my sweaty rehearsal clothes and have people look at me and wonder, "Is she some sort of actress?"
