Gotta Dance I
n recent years, director and choreographer Jerry Mitchell has honed two Broadway-destined shows in Chicago, Kinky Boots and On Your Feet. This winter he is back with another: Gotta Dance, inspired by a real-life pro- basketball franchise’s auditions for a hip- hop dance crew comprised of people older than 60. We talked to four of the show’s cast members—newbies and Broadway vets alike—about the moment in their lives when they decided they just “gotta” go for the acting life.
ALEXANDER AGUILAR AS FERNANDO
Growing up in Oswego, Illinois, a western suburb of Chicago, Alexander Aguilar knew from an early age that dancing was in his future.
“I am a die-hard, lifelong Michael Jackson fan,” Aguilar says during a break from a Gotta Dance rehearsal in New York. “From the first time I saw him dance when I was probably three years old, I knew I didn’t want to do anything else. I spent hours and hours and hours studying footage of Michael Jackson and wanting to be him.”
Following that ambition, Aguilar eventually attended the Chicago Academy for the Arts high school in the city’s River West neighborhood, commuting all the way from Oswego. “I traveled like four hours every day to get there—two hours there, two hours back.”
JOANNA JONES AS KENDRA
If Gotta Dance opens in New York in the spring as planned, it will mark Joanna Jones’s Broadway debut and the fulfillment of a lifelong goal. “I’ve been singing my whole life,” says Jones. “Even when I was a little girl, I vividly remember being like, ‘I’m gonna be a singer. This is what I’m doing.’” The California native sang in school plays as a girl, and after attending what she calls “a very rigorous drama program” in high school, she majored in musical theater at UCLA. While there, Jones appeared on NBC’s a cappella competition program, The Sing-Off, with a group called the Backbeats, which took third place in the show’s second season; the following year, she was cast in the Michael Jackson tribute show, Thriller Live, on London’s West End. She has also performed in L.A. with buzzy cabaret group For the Record. In Gotta Dance, Jones plays Kendra, a coach for the dance team who becomes annoyed when her grandmother, played by Tony winner Lillias White, shows up to audition. “Grandmother comes into the scene, and Kendra is just, like, very snippy and impatient with her,” she says. Jones may have had an enviable ride so far in her career, but that doesn’t mean she’s never had doubts. “In this business, it’s so easy to be in and out of work a lot,” she says. “The times when I don’t have a job, I’m automatically like, What am I doing with my life? And you sort of reevaluate for a second. But those are the moments when I’m like, Joanna, get real. What else would you be doing with your life? Nothing else would be able to fulfill me in this way and keep me ticking.”
Aguilar’s older brother, Adrian, is also an actor; in 2013, the two performed together, playing brothers in the two-man musical Double Trouble at Chicago’s Porchlight Music Theatre. While Adrian has largely made his career in Chicago, Alexander headed straight for New York after college.
“I love Chicago, and I love performing there, and I always hope that I’m welcome to come back,” Aguilar says. “But I always knew that I wanted to see if I could cut it with the best of them. I always wanted to do new Broadway shows, to be the first person [to play a role].” When the company heads east, Gotta Dance will become Aguilar’s second show to reach Broadway, after Lysistrata Jones. “I just have that type of personality, where if I were an athlete, I would have wanted to play in the NBA or the NFL. I’m kind of a slave to my own ambition.”
GOTTA BE BOLD ACT OUT Do as the Gotta Dance crew does, and put yourself center stage. PIVEN THEATRE WORKSHOP
With courses for all skill levels, the Piven Theatre Workshop pushes students to get in touch with their creative impulses over six weeks. “Improvisation, Games and Risk
Taking” sounds like the perfect way to try something new. 927 Noyes St, Evanston, IL (847-866-8049,
piventheatre.org/classes). $225.
BLACK BOX ACTING CLASS Black Box offers multiple levels of training for those really committing to their craft. It provides year-round, five-week courses plus a more intensive training program: a 100- day conservatory with admission based on audition. 2625 W North Ave (323-487-2691,
blackboxacting.com). $395 and up.
MOTH STORYSLAM
Put your skills to the test and head to the Moth StorySLAM, a storytelling competition held across the U.S., bimonthly in Chicago. Hopeful
night’s theme. Various locations (
themoth.org). $8–$25.—Lisa White
performers put their names in a hat, and a chosen few compete with pre- vetted five-minute tales on the
December 2015–February 2016
TIMEOUT.COM/CHICAGO 31
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