On Tuesday at lunch, members of the M-A dance team grouped up with football players to perform short dances on the green for ‘Dancing with the Stars,’ one of several spirit events happening this week.
Senior Annabel Baxter performed with Joe Posthauer and reflected on her experience. She stated, “We practiced last Thursday for about an hour and a half and then met at flex time right before lunch today to go over it with the cut music.” Deciding to dance in groups of four instead of two made the process easier, and although some people were nervous, “most were actually excited about it and went all in.” She continued, “It was super funny to teach the boys the dances because simple moves that I can’t even remember learning were just so impossible for them to pick up. We also had to work a lot on the memorization because the boys kept forgetting what we had just done.” Looking back, Baxter said she thinks the best part was “performing at lunch and getting to watch the other groups.” She stated, “It ended up being way more successful than I had thought when we initially started planning for it in leadership. I loved watching the guys get so into the dance and coming up with choreography.”
Laila Thomson-Wainer, who performed with Petelo Vatuvei, also reflected on her experience, stating that “It definitely took longer than anticipated. We started at 7 and ended up leaving at 8:30 [p.m., when practicing] and still didn’t finish. But it was definitely fun to test the guys.” She continued, “A lot of the football guys were nervous to do it. We even had one guy quit mid-way through.” She gave her opinion on working with non-dancers, saying that “teaching someone with no dance background was definitely interesting. They caught on pretty well. They have their own interpretation of our moves which is fun to watch.”
Dom Paga, who partnered with Kayla Blau, “didn’t know what [he] was getting into, to be honest.” He claimed that his group “stayed up until 3 a.m. one night” learning the dance. The only dance experience Paga had prior to Dancing With the Stars was Polyfest, from when he lived in New Zealand, “which is a big deal in New Zealand and we spent months practicing.’’
Connor Gentile stated that while “the dance is short, getting the actual moves down the first time is the hardest part.” Even though Gentile had little dance experience, he “wasn’t that nervous because [he] knew [they] were all going to be terrible.”
Junior Nicole Knox, who performed along with Andrew Steere, Mateo de la Cruz, and Paige Viotti, stated, “We all decided to get together for an hour-ish after dance team and football practice to choose the songs and choreograph together. We didn't practice it again until the day of the performance at brunch.” Knox explained how she “had a lot of fun coming up with the dance and performing. While I'm close with Paige, I actually didn't know the guys super well. I met Mateo the day we started choreographing, and although we have been going to school together since forever, I was never super close with Andrew so it was fun to meet and become better friends with people.” She reflected on how she “didn’t feel the pain of trying to look for guys who were willing to do it,” as Thomson-Wainer’s committee in leadership was asking guys and organizing groups. She stated, “It was actually really fun to choreograph with the guys! They were really outgoing, funny, and willing to try new things which made the experience awesome.”
Knox, de la Cruz, Viotti and Steere were dubbed the winners. Other events this week are a teacher lip sync battle on Thursday, and Ninja Warrior on Friday.