Thursday, February 4, 2010

Dixie is Born

For several months I have been toying with an idea derived from a long standing desire, to become a burlesque dancer. I have always wanted to be one, though I wasn't ever really aware that that was what it was I truly wanted. I've been an actress for over 10 years and a dancer for most of my life. Pursuing acting has been a downhill spiral with very stressful results... especially here in New York City, but the one thing I am a virtuoso at is reinventing myself. So, a few months ago, it happened. I went to a burlesque variety show at Fontana's here in NYC, a show called Honi Harlow's Hideaway, and as I sat there I realized, this was what I had wanted, this was what I was equipped for. Dancing, comedy, and acting all in one, expressed through the body to music for the benefit of the audience. To tantalize and delight. To bring joy. I went to several more shows. Blown away each time, noticing the styles of the different performers, the nuances that made them who they were and the subtleties in their performances.


My appetite was now engulfing my entire life, everywhere I looked were girls dancing and expressing all sorts of things! Now, my mind made up, I went trolling the Internet to stumble across the New York School of Burlesque. There were two prerequisites: 1. pay $15.00 and 2. Come up with a name no one else in the performance industry had. I enrolled. That following Thursday I found myself in a studio with a red headed bombshell named Gal Friday in leopard print pants. Feeling a little conscientious I decided that my new dancing identity would not be able to feel this unless it was part of the act so I walked to front of the room and put on the brightest, reddest lipstick I owned. My Southern roots reached deep into the earth while I steadied my hand tracing my lips with the angled tip of my Benefit "Frenched" red. I heard her name rise up into my mind. Dixie Rising was born.

2 comments:

  1. I'm following this on my Google reader. I can't wait to find out what shenanigans Miss Dixie gets up to!

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