Dancing King

So I have to write about the House Manager at the Arden Theatre, Thomas Choinacky. He apprenticed last year and has returned to house manage a few shows as needed. He's a great house manager by the way. Our shows almost always started on time or just a couple minutes late which is a pretty big feat. The cast kept complimenting me and I had to correct them because I can't start the show without a cue from the House Manager.

Anyway, he's a great house manager but he also started this project in May where he decided to dance at a public spot in Philly, every day for the month of May. He's not a trained dancer so he just made up his own moves. He had a CD player that randomly selected one of ten songs that he would dance to. He filmed each dance and put it on YouTube. I haven't quite figured out how to upload YouTube videos so here's a link to a video of him dancing by (and in) the fountain by the Natural Academy of Sciences:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1FVgw91Ruc

Now, admittedly, it's a bit weird what he's doing but yet there is also a sense of playfulness about it. How often do we just stop and dance? When was the last time you splashed in a fountain? And really, he's not hurting anyone, he's just dancing.

I also love the fact that he picked something creatively wacky and just did it every day. He kept doing it through June until he had to leave for Washington, DC but he'll be back. He started a group with two other Arden apprentices called the Anthology Project. I look forward to see what other projects they come up with. Until then, I may just have to dance more, perhaps not in public but we'll see.