comic dances in chairs, with legs doing silly things

[Paul Parish]

There's a kind of dance, probably big in vaudeville, where one or more dancers sit in a chair and do hilarious things with their legs altogether, to the music. A variant is done with puppets and puppets' legs, or with finger puppets and the fingers doing the legs. I believe there's one of these with Fred Astaire (, but I can't remember which movie. I guess ultimately it comes from the ballet teacher showing her combination with her hands (or feet) while sitting. (I guess "9-person precision ball-passing" qualifies as a variant with hands-- but right now I'm more interested in the versions with the legs.)

Probably Eddie Cantor did one, and probably Ray Bolger, and Tommy Tune with HIS long legs, how could that not have happened?

In San Francisco we just saw dv8's "To be Straight with you," which had one of hte most delightful of thse dances I've ever seen. one guy started it and others started joining in, and it caught on big time, just hilarious.

DO you have a favorite of these that you'd like to share?

[liebs]

David Gordon has done many delightful pieces with chairs, including Field, Chair and Mountain for ABT in the 80s. And Feld did a peice for Baryshnikov with an office chair to music by Leon Redbone, I think.

And if you will allow me, I want to mention Feld's The Real McCoy to music by Cole Porter. It featured a chaise and was a magical little ballet. He wore a bowler and there was a dance wit canes for the men.

[Paul Parish]

Oh yes, I loved "Field chair mountain."

Tell me more about the Feld piece. He's clever.

David Gordon has done many delightful pieces with chairs, including Field, Chair and Mountain for ABT in the 80s. And Feld did a peice for Baryshnikov with an office chair to music by Leon Redbone, I think.

And if you will allow me, I want to mention Feld's The Real McCoy to music by Cole Porter. It featured a chaise and was a magical little ballet. He wore a bowler and there was a dance wit canes for the men.

[liebs]

It was done with an office type rolling chair - the conceit being that Baryshnikov was "too old to dance." Charming but not a lot of content. I don't think I have seen The Real McCoy since the 70s, so can not be too specific but Croce has a great description of it in her first book.

[bart]

On a brilliant 2002-03 thread in the Archives -- "Goodbye to All that. Phrases for the Dustbin"' "Looking Back on 2002" -- Alexandra wrote:

If we're going to get rid of rope, I insist on getting rid of the chairs, too. No more dances with chairs. This is more a modern dance problem than a ballet one, but things have a way of spreading. There is nothing that can be done with a chair on stage that has not already been done. Several times.

http://ballettalk.invisionzone.com/lofiver....php/t8762.html

[Paul Parish]

THe ones I'm thinking of are more like tap dances -- and they're not portentous or serious, their charm is their charm.

Yes, modern dance reallly did get far gone in chairs. But these aren'

t earnest at all -- they;re hilarious. DOnald OConnor sort of thing. in fact, "Make them laugh" has a long section on a sofa, with hilarous crossings of legs.

[sandik]

DOnald OConnor sort of thing. in fact, "Make them laugh" has a long section on a sofa, with hilarous crossings of legs.

And in the Moses Supposes number from "Singing in the Rain" Kelly and O'Connor have a nice bit with a couple of chairs.

And then there are the high chairs in the triplets number in The Band Wagon!

Chairs are just one of a plethora of things that show up in music hall/vaudeville turns. They often are used as a kind of magic prop (rather like the precursor to CGI tricks) to extend or replace a part of the body.