A Chorus Line

"Well, it would be nice to be a star, but I'm not. I'm a dancer" -A Chorus Line

This weekend I was in TTG's production of A Chorus Line as a cut dancer. After the first scene all of us cut dancers could change and go out into the audience to watch the rest of the show for free (which was nice). I've seen the movie a countless number of times, I've listened to the cast recording over and over, and I saw the show on Broadway a few years ago. But this time the story struck a different chord in me. I know people who are obsessed with this show, and now I think I know why.

A Chorus Line is relate-able in every single way possible if you're a theater person, especially if you're a dancer. And for me personally, most specifically the end.

Cassie's number The Music and the Mirror is so close to home. "God I'm a dancer. A Dancer dances." And also "what I really don't want to do is teach other people how to do what I should be doing myself!" All I have to do is read these lines and they make me feel something. Because when you're in love with something so much that it's almost evolutionarily in your blood stream, you have no choice. You HAVE to do what you want to do. Without it, it's like you're cutting a limb off of your body, ignoring the bleeding wound, and attempting to continue functioning.

From the moment Paul hurts himself, until the very end of the show, it's the reminder of the reality of the business and the love that people have who are in it. Zach asks the question "What are you going to do when you can't dance anymore?" And it's hard to think about. Because when you love something so much, when you love to dance so much that you're willing to drive 30 minutes out to Dix Hills to be in a 12 minute scene with some of your fellow dance company friends, to share 12 minutes of joy and bliss with those friends, with the rest of the cast who you barely know, and with the audience, when you're willing to do all of that, then what can you do when you can't dance anymore? What will you find that will make you feel this way? Will there be anything else?