CultureMap QA

America’s favorite new reality TV dancers confess before coming to stage near you

Anyone who watches So You Think You Can Dance can attest to the talent and versatility of the contestants. But the dancers in season 12 seemed especially capable — and captivating.

The live tour featuring the show's top 10 contestants — who were split into "Stage" and "Street" teams to fit their preferred styles — kicks off at Verizon Theatre at Grand Prairie on October 13.

In advance of that, CultureMap spoke with winner Gaby Diaz and finalist Virgil Gadson about their experiences with the show, how they were able to adapt to different styles, and what we can expect from them in the future.

CultureMap: As dancers, I can imagine that you have no real expectations of fame. What was it like going from being a normal person to a celebrity almost overnight?

Gaby Diaz: We kind of lived in this bubble during the show. We all lived in apartments together, and we were in rehearsals the majority of our time, so we didn’t get too much time to go out and see people and have people recognize us. But the few minutes of free time that we had and did go out, it was weird.

Virgil Gadson: Since the end of the show, pretty much everywhere I went, people recognized me on the street, when I’m in the supermarket, or even when I’m driving in the car. But it’s cool; it’s great.

CM: Virgil, where does your enthusiasm and positivity come from?

VG: It comes from my parents — and especially my mom. She always taught me to be respectful and positive and just to live life to the fullest, not to have any regrets and just to enjoy everything and that everything is a learning experience.

CM: Gaby, your way of tap dancing seems to bring something completely new to the style. How do you approach that?

GD: I try to take what I’ve learned from all the other styles of dancing and incorporate that into my tap style. Not a lot of people know much about tap, so you have to make it visually appealing rather than difficult step-wise, because people don’t really appreciate that on television. So it was more about my arms and my performance and using the stage rather than doing complicated, small fast steps.

CM: What was it about tap that originally attracted you to it?

GD: I think it’s really underrated, and it’s a style that not everyone can do. So if you can do it, stick with it. It was like that little edge that I had over people who couldn’t tap because it’s difficult to pick up.

CM: Both of you were able to succeed greatly in styles that were not your own; why do you think you were so successful?

VG: I think it’s because of background training, all the different genres and styles that we had to train in to be on the show. If you want to be on the show, you have to be versatile, and it really helped us to prepare.

CM: Did you ever surprise yourself with how well you were able to do a different style?

GD: I think that happened every week. You kind of hope for the best and just put yourself in the piece 100 percent. If you give the choreographers everything you’ve got, they really work with you to make sure you look good and represent them well because they want their piece to look good too.

They don’t want you to go on stage feeling uncomfortable. So if you give them all your energy and effort, they work with you to make it as comfortable as possible.

CM: Do either of you have a favorite choreographer?

VG: Not really — all of them were great. This season, there were some new choreographers who came in, and I think we all learned so much from them, and it was a challenge at the same time. But it was amazing; they are all so unique and we learned from each and every one of them.

CM: What has been your favorite part of the experience so far? Least favorite?

GD: My favorite part was probably the finale episode, getting to do my favorite routines again on that stage for the last time. It was really emotional. My least favorite part was seeing people go home every week.

VG: That bond that we all had being on the show with the street dancers and the stage dancers, that was one of my favorite parts, just us all coming together.

CM: Gaby, you’re going to be part of Jennifer Lopez’s Las Vegas show. Will you be with the show for its entire run? Have you lined up any other gigs after that?

GD: I’m doing J. Lo’s show, but we’re not sure how long or when; that’s still in the works. But after that — I don’t know! You’ll have to check back in with me and see what I’m up to.

CM: Virgil, have you lined up any other gigs after the tour is over?

VG: Oh, I know what I’m going to do! I’m going to start choreographing more, directing, producing, do some more film and television, and hopefully have my own Broadway dance show.

CM: What can we expect from the tour? Will you be doing the same routines from the show or some new stuff?

GD: We’ll be doing a lot of the favorites from the show. There are some new surprises in there, some fun numbers. We each get a little solo, a little longer than we got to do on the show. It’s a high-energy show; it moves quickly.

VG: It’s very entertaining and explosive.

Virgil Gadson and Gaby Diaz performing on So You Think You Can Dance.

Movie Review

Comedy all-stars Jack Black and Paul Rudd can't save Anaconda sequel

Photo by Matt Grace

Jack Black and Paul Rudd in Anaconda.

In Hollywood’s never-ending quest to take advantage of existing intellectual property, seemingly no older movie is off limits, even if the original was not well-regarded. That’s certainly the case with 1997’s Anaconda, which is best known for being a lesser entry on the filmography of Ice Cube and Jennifer Lopez, as well as some horrendous accent work by Jon Voight.

The idea behind the new meta-sequel Anaconda is arguably a good one. Four friends — Doug (Jack Black), Griff (Paul Rudd), Claire (Thandiwe Newton), and Kenny (Steve Zahn) — who made homemade movies when they were teenagers decide to remake Anaconda on a shoestring budget. Egged on by Griff, an actor who can’t catch a break, the four of them pull together enough money to fly down to Brazil, hire a boat, and film a script written by Doug.

Naturally, almost nothing goes as planned in the Amazon, including losing their trained snake and running headlong into a criminal enterprise. Soon enough, everything else takes second place to the presence of a giant anaconda that is stalking them and anyone else who crosses its path.

Written and directed by Tom Gormican, with help from co-writer Kevin Etten, the film is designed to be an outrageous comedy peppered with laugh-out-loud moments that cover up the fact that there’s really no story. That would be all well and good … if anything the film had to offer was truly funny. Only a few scenes elicit any honest laughter, and so instead the audience is fed half-baked jokes, a story with no focus, and actors who ham it up to get any kind of reaction.

The biggest problem is that the meta-ness of the film goes too far. None of the core four characters possess any interesting traits, and their blandness is transferred over to the actors playing them. And so even as they face some harrowing situations or ones that could be funny, it’s difficult to care about anything they do since the filmmakers never make the basic effort of making the audience care about them.

It’s weird to say in a movie called Anaconda, but it becomes much too focused on the snake in the second half of the film. If the goal is to be a straight-up comedy, then everything up to and including the snake attacks should be serving that objective. But most of the time the attacks are either random or moments when the characters are already scared, and so any humor that could be mined all but disappears.

Black and Rudd are comedy all-stars who can typically be counted on to elevate even subpar material. That’s not the case here, as each only scores on a few occasions, with Black’s physicality being the funniest thing in the movie. Newton is not a good fit with this type of movie, and she isn’t done any favors by some seriously bad wigs. Zahn used to be the go-to guy for funny sidekicks, but he brings little to the table in this role.

Any attempt at rebooting/remaking an old piece of IP should make a concerted effort to differentiate itself from the original, and in that way, the new Anaconda succeeds. Unfortunately, that’s its only success, as the filmmakers can never find the right balance to turn it into the bawdy comedy they seemed to want.

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Anaconda is now playing in theaters.

movies film