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"Movin' Out Moves Into Rochester"
By: Melissa Long
(May 4th, 2005)

Billy Joel's hit Broadway show "Movin' Out" is now on stage in Rochester. The show includes 24 of the "Piano Man"'s classics and Tony-awarding winning dancing.

You don't need a ticket since News 8 has your backstage pass.

When the curtain goes up, you'll immediately recognize the music. You'll likely be amazed by the synchronized steps and buff bodies. It has been called one of the most intense dance shows ever.
It's just as intense backstage.

The Assistant Stage Manager says, "In Rochester, we have a small backstage. So often times there's a lot of traffic. Dressers on top of dancers and costumes everywhere."

To keep everything from becoming too chaotic, costumes are kept in "gondolas" and the dancers are assigned specific spots for quick changes. Some of the costumes are skimpy.

Has there ever been a "wardrobe malfunction"? Lead dancer 32 year-old Laurie Kanyok says, "It has happened. Not to me. But it has happened."

To perfect the daring dances, practice is paramount.

While the house was empty, the dancers turned the stage into a studio.

28 year-old Corbin Popp keeps his physique through a lot of hard work.

"I cross train. Racquetball, swim. Mountain bike."

So does his dance partner, Kanyok.

"I personally do pilates, gyrotonics."

Despite the constant conditioning, injuries are prevalent due to the demands of the choreography.

"Our show has an extremely high injury rate," says Kanyok.

"I pulled a hip flexor last night," says Popp.

The performers say it's all worth it - at the curtain call.

Kanyok says, "When I see the joy, I know I've done my job and touched however many people. It makes the pain worth it."

Tickets to "Movin' Out" are nearly sold-out. The show runs through Sunday in Rochester.


"New Bedford Musician's Been 'Movin' Out'"
By: David Boyce
(May 5th, 2005)

Musician and composer Bryan Steele is crazy about New Bedford. In fact, so crazy about it that three years ago, the Syracuse, N.Y. native and his wife decided, after many years of visiting friends in the area, to settle down here and buy a house.

Bryan's current job, however, has made it difficult to fully enjoy his new home. He's been on the road for the past 15 months, playing in the band for the national tour of the Twyla Tharp/Billy Joel Broadway musical, "Movin' Out."

The acclaimed show is coming to the Providence Performing Arts Center for a five-day, eight-performance engagement, opening Tuesday and running through May 15th, 2005. Lionized as an innovative hybrid by the critics when it opened in October 2002, "Movin' Out" is unlike other shows that rely exclusively on dance, or the new wave of catalogue or jukebox shows that depend on the boomer-era pop songs they employ.

Created by the celebrated dancer and choreographer Twyla Tharp, and with the full cooperation of singer/composer Billy Joel, the show is built around more than two dozen of Joel's best-known hits. All that an audience hears is the Joel music and lyrics, which are performed and sung by the pianist of the nine-piece on-stage band, and who is vocally supported by four of the band members. The dancers interpret the songs through Ms. Tharp's active and innovative choreography. There is no spoken dialogue.

Having conceived the show and directed the Broadway production, Ms. Tharp has described it as "a story without language. The movement and the action tell the story - the experience, the emotional resonance, comes from action rather than language."

The skeleton book that propels and unifies the dances tells the story of a group of five lifelong friends over the course of 20 years of change. These characters will be recognizable from those in Joel's lyrics. Songs like "It's Still Rock and Roll To Me," "We Didn't Start The Fire," "Pressure," and the title song all weave together to lead the audience through three principal themes: the idealism of the post-World War II era, the halcyon days of the 1960s and the subsequent unrest of the Vietnam War years, and finally, to survival.

Asked how this gig happened for him, Mr. Steele replied, "Well, I subbed for the sax player during the last year of the Broadway run, and when the producers decided to launch a national tour in 2004, I was tapped for it and decided to do it. It's been amazing."

Mr. Steele received his education at Ithaca College in upstate New York, met his future wife in New York, and the pair lived for a while in Boston. He's a featured player of the tenor, alto, and soprano saxophones in the show, "all instruments that are important in Joel's music," said the musician. "I'm also one of the show's singers."

"We do eight shows a week on tour, which is like being on Broadway, but we're moving all over the country. It can be tiring at times, but it's also a great way to see this country and its people. I'll finish out the year with this tour, and then I'm not sure what's next," Mr. Steele said. "I look forward to taking some time off, and maybe concentrate on my own music for a while. But touring is something I'd consider doing again, if everything about it was right."


"'Movin' Out' A Thrilling, Moving Delight"
By: Marcia Morphy
(May 5th, 2005)

Words pale when describing the sheer physical exuberance of a musical like "Movin' Out."

Complemented by a hit parade of Billy Joel's music and lyrics - "Uptown Girl," "Big Shot," "We Didn't Start The Fire," "Captain Jack" and "Keeping The Faith" - the production opened like a Fourth of July spectacle last night at the Auditorium Theatre.

While the songs exuded the same kind of forbidden, anarchic sexuality that the "Piano Man" was famous for, it was the dancing that gave it passion. Under the masterful choreography of Twyla Tharp, dance numbers crisscrossed from classical ballet to acrobatic duets to doo-wop and rock and roll - and never, not once, missed a beat.

"Movin' Out" is a series of vignettes told in dance, and its plot is simultaneously featherweight and profound. Spanning the 1960s, '70s, and '80s, it chronicles the lives of five Long Island teens: buddies Tony (Corbin Popp), Eddie (Rasta Thomas) and James (Matthew Dibble) and their girlfriends Brenda (Laurie Kanyok) and Judy (Julieta Gros). (The actors you see may be different, though. Because the roles are so physically demanding, each of the three starring roles has two actors who alternate between shows.)

Their lives change when Judy and James become engaged, Brenda exchanges boyfriend Eddie for Tony, and the three men are drafted to serve in Vietnam.

One dies ("Only The Good Die Young"), his lover pines in agony, the other two vets return home radically changed and time eventually heals all wounds.

Joel's music is reborn through a live onstage rock band and the vocal mastery of Darren Holden, whose top-notch musicianship and distinctive style capture Joel's personality without impersonating him.

But the heart of this production is the dancing, with the hyperkinetic athleticism that takes your breath away - often resembling physical feats you might expect from a Cirque du Soleil performance in Vegas. Kanyok is hot and explosively sexy, with flexibility resembling Elastigirl of The Incredibles. And the Argentina-born Gros' portrayal of the grieving Judy is remarkably beautiful to watch, a ballet dancer at her finest.

Dibble and Popp were equally first-rate as dancers, but it was Thomas who was the leader of the pack.

He's so good, we don't question the fact that a car mechanic is capable of a grande pirouette and powerful leaps that defy gravity.

Nor do we question when he drops to the floor and turns five revolutions upside down using the base of his left shoulder. That, too, seems appropriate.

It's easy to think that every generation has its own version of Joel, a talented artist whose music seeps into ordinary lives and seems more precious now than it ever was at the time. While this musical is a tribute to American life, it also carries deeper meaning, those flashback moments when we can say, yes, that's exactly right.

And "Movin' Out" is exactly right, so absorbing and overwhelming to the eyes and ears that it moved me in a way I never expected. I didn't want it to stop.


"Phenomenal Dance In 'Movin' Out'"
By: Bryan Rourke
(May 12th, 2005)

"Movin' Out" is moving.

It's jaw-dropping dance. It's toe-tapping music. It's heart-wrenching theatre, and it runs through Sunday at the Providence Performing Arts Center.

The show, which opened Tuesday, conceived and directed by Twyla Tharp, couples her creative choreography with the marvelous music of Billy Joel.

The result is riveting.

The two-act, two-hour, 24-song production involves 26 dancers and no dialogue. But it does present a clear and poignant plot through forceful lyrics and amazing movement.

The latter bears repeating. The dance is phenomenal.

All the performers in this production are superb. But one, Brendan King, is almost incomprehensibly accomplished. He's athletic, acrobatic, aggressively balletic and otherwise dynamic.

He's really, really good. In fact, King is one of the most gymnastic dancers you'll ever see.

The show is dance as theater, with a rock concert thrown in. A live eight-piece band, with Darren Holden and Matt Wilson ably and alternately impersonating Joel's voice, plays 20 feet above the stage.

"Movin' Out" debuted on Broadway in 2002, winning two Tony Awards: one for Tharp's choreography, another for Joel's music.

The show centers around a couple of characters: Brenda and Eddie, who in Tuesday's production were played by the same people who did so on Broadway - King and Holly Cruikshank, a stunningly beautiful and statuesque dancer of grace and elegant extension. (Other dancers alternate in the physically demanding roles; see the note at end for more details.)

The music and dance tell a story, from 1965 to 1984 - about coming of age, graduating from high school, fighting in Vietnam and, in its aftermath, yearning for understanding and a return to normalcy.

It's chronological and easily accessible. Follow the lives of a few friends coming together, pulling apart, living, dying and redeeming.

This isn't just dance for dance's sake, though if it were, it would be pretty impressive. It's dance expressing emotional, social and psychological states.

King is especially convincing. In a couple of scenes - one while he's in the Vietnam War and one when he has returned from it - his dance is filled with defiance, rebellion and rage, conveying his inner torment and trauma, which he tries to treat with the salves of the '60s and '70s: alcohol, sex and drugs.

Later, when King's anguish clears, he's leaping for joy, as though off a trampoline, flipping and spinning.

It's an impressive performance, which many support. David Gomez and Matthew Dribble are excellent as Tony and James, respectively, as is Julieta Gros as Judy. She eventually becomes a wayward widow in black dress and veil, pirouetting across the stage: spinning as though out of control, as her life seems to be.

Tharp has put thought into every detail - costumes, gestures, movements - of this production, which began one morning years ago with Joel's song "Scenes From An Italian Restaurant" running through her head. She wondered: What ever happened to that song's couple, Brenda and Eddie?

Tharp reviewed all of Joel's music, didn't find an answer, but found the arc of an era. She created a connection of characters, and came up with something truly moving: "Movin' Out."


"Broadway's 'Movin' Out' Finds A New Home In Philly"
By: Jake Bruner
(May 17th, 2005)

The Broadway smash "Movin' Out" is moving in for its Philadelphia premiere.

Grammy-winner Billy Joel wrote the music for "Movin' Out," which tracks the experiences of lifelong friends through two uproarious decades. Joel fans will recognize the main characters, Brenda, Eddie, Tony, Sargeant O'Leary, Judy, and James, taken straight from such classics as "Scenes From An Italian Restaurant" and "Why Judy Why."

Dance is as vital to this show as music. Twyla Tharp conceived, choreographed and directed the play, which she calls a "story told without language."

"The movement and the action tell the story. The experience, the emotional resonance, comes from action rather than language," she said in a press release.

In a 2003 interview with Dateline NBC, Joel said the project appealed to him because "it was unorthodox. It was untried. It was different. It was risky. It was daring. It was crazy. It was ludicrous. I said, 'This is fantastic. What a great idea.' "

The original Broadway production took prizes for orchestration and choreography at the 2003 Tony Awards. Now in its first National Tour, the musical "sizzles with energy, vitality and class," said Chris Jones in Variety.

The Philadelphia debut is produced by James Nederlander, Hal Luftig, Scott Nederlander, Terry Allen Kramer, Clear Channel Entertainment and Emanuel Azenberg. Stuart Malina provides musical supervision and Santo Loquasto designed the set.


"Music and Dance Mark The Decades"
By: Denny Dyroff
(May 17th, 2005)

The Tony Award-winning show is a dance-filled musical that was conceived, directed and choreographed by Twyla Tharp and based on 24 songs by Billy Joel.

Tharp's name might not be that familiar to those outside theatre circles, but her credentials are more than impressive. Over the course of her four-decade career, she has choreographed some 125 dances and five Hollywood movies. She has directed and choreographed two Broadway shows, won two Emmy Awards and one Tony Award, and has been awarded 17 honorary doctorates.

Joel, on the other hand, is one of America's best-known singers whose music is featured on every classic rock station in America. He has sold more than 100 million records and was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1999.

In "Movin' Out," the story is told through dance and music. There is no dialogue and only one vocalist.

"The only person who sings is the piano player up top," said Brendan King during a phone interview last week from a tour stop in Houston. King, who is one of the lead dancers, plays the role of Eddie. "Twyla used Billy Joel's songs and threaded a story together from the stories in the songs," said King, who has been with the tour since its start 15 months ago. "It's about growing up in Long Island - about guys getting drafted, going to war and coming back.

"Billy Joel was a baby boomer, so a lot of his songs are based on the war era. This show deals a lot with the Vietnam War and soldiers who have gone to Saigon and come back."

"Eddie can't deal with the fact that he came back from the war while his friend, James, died there - and he thinks it was his fault. The show is set in a period that begins in the early 1960s and ends in the 1980s."

"Even though it is all dance and music, the show does have a full story. It goes through a number of eras and takes the audience on a journey."

King, who is part of a 12-member ensemble, has been dancing almost as long as he’s been walking.

"My mom owned a dance studio in North Jersey. So dancing has always been a part of my life, ever since I was 3 years-old," he said. 'This show is one of the most physically demanding roles ever, with a million jumps and tumbles and lots of partnering. It touches on every dance style possible. Because it's so strenuous, the leads are double-cast. We each do four shows a week."


"Theatre Review: 'Movin' Out' at The Merriam"
By: Bob Nelson
(May 20th, 2005)

Billy Joel's initial reaction to choreographer Twyla Tharp's idea for a dance musical based on a couple of dozen of Joel's songs was, as he put it, "ludicrous but certainly different."

Tharp's concept won over Joel's misgivings, with the result that "Movin' Out," the high-energy, high-decibel musical became an immense hit.

Still playing in New York, an impressive touring company has moved into Philadelphia's Merriam Theatre, where it will remain until May 29th, 2005.

Tharp comes in as choreographer and director, with the concept that marries Joel's songs to a sketchy book about young people moving past post-World War II idealism to the pain and folly of other wars - and, finally, survival.

The songs are there if ridiculously overamplified. The set is ablaze with strobe lights and enough stage smoke to fill an amphitheatre.

But while the book is difficult to decipher, it is the dancing that overwhelms. It has youthful athleticism that will take your breath away. It may even wear you out.

There are some who insist "Movin' Out" represents a revolution in musical theatre. I wouldn't go that far. But as Billy Joel put it, "It is different!"


"Billy Joel's Works Showcased In 'Movin' Out'"
Choreographer Twyla Tharp Collaborated With Singer To Create Vietnam War Music-Dance Show

By: Sono Motoyama
(May 20th, 2005)

Behind the high-energy, critically acclaimed Broadway show "Movin' Out" - at the Merriam Theatre through May 29th, 2005 - are months, even years, of preparation on the performers' part.

An unusual collaboration between the edgy choreographer Twyla Tharp and pop songster Billy Joel, the genre-bending "Movin' Out" tells the story of five friends from Long Island, NY, torn apart by the Vietnam War. The cast dramatizes the lives of Brenda, Eddie, Judy, James, and Tony - characters familiar to Billy Joel fans - through song and dance, without the benefit of dialogue.

Telling the story through movement puts "Movin' On" in the realm of ballet, but then there's the rock music and the band, led by the Piano Man - a sort of Joel stand-in - onstage. Though it's kin to Broadway musicals, that category isn't exactly right either, as there's no book. Tharp and Joel have settled on calling it simply a "show."

The show has been enrapturing audiences and critics with its combination of Tharp's high-kicking athletics and Joel's narrative-heavy hits since its Broadway debut in October 2002. But that was after disastrous Chicago tryouts in the summer of that year. Audiences found the early version of the show confusing, leading Tharp to heavily revise it - paring it down and clarifying the story.

Laurie Kanyok, who plays Brenda in the touring company (there are two rotating casts for the main dance roles and the "Piano Man"), was in the original "Movin' Out" cast and saw the show evolve in Chicago.

"It was amazing because we started with one show and left with a different show," Kanyok remembered. The cast would perform one version at night and learn a different version during the day. "For us it was challenging just to remember what version we were doing."

Once Tharp worked out the kinks and the show moved to Broadway, that didn't mean that the work for the performers was over. Brendan King, who performs the physically demanding role of Eddie (a role that requires, besides dance skills, the acrobatic ability of a circus performer), joined the ensemble in New York.

He recalled that Tharp asked the cast to work on their acting skills and to do background research on the Vietnam War. "Some days, Twyla would ask us not even to dance but just act out different scenes," he said. "At first we were uncomfortable." But, he said, it was exactly that uncomfortable feeling that Tharp wanted to get rid of.

Tharp also insisted that the cast watch videos and read accounts about the Vietnam War and post-traumatic stress disorder (something that the male characters experience). An Army Ranger came in to tell them stories of the battlefield.

The ranger also put cast members through their paces. "He told us the correct way to stand, about-face, salute and hold a gun," King said. "He gave us a whole mini boot camp, taught us how to crawl. It was fun."

King noted with a laugh that Tharp was her own kind of drill sergeant. "I never worked so hard," he said. "She's hard on you, but in a good way. She would say, 'Do it again, do it again.' She'd make you do it five times just to make you tired. 'Like that, I like it tired.' She wanted it more relaxed."

Despite the physical rigors of rehearsing and performing, the dancers said that the toughest part of "Movin' Out" is making sure to tell the story.

"The most challenging thing about the role is telling the story without speaking," Kanyok said. "I look at it as doing a silent film or miming. It's interesting to say, 'I love you,' without saying the words."

"I can do the steps, but if my face isn't showing it, it loses 100 percent of its emotion," King said.

Sometimes, though, the cast gets so into their roles that they begin speaking to each other onstage, in character. But they try to rein in that impulse. "The audience is so close in Philly that it would be more of an interruption," King said.

Darren Holden, a talented Irish musician who sings and plays piano onstage as the "Piano Man," does have the benefit of words. But he too must keep his mind on storytelling, he said. "A lot of Billy's music - he's a storyteller.... I have to get inside the story on a nightly basis. It's not just throwaway pop music, it's deep stuff."

Holden said that when he was performing in "Movin' Out" on Broadway, Joel gave him little input, but he did say that "he didn't want me to interpret his musically identically. He told me to put my own personality on the role."

Joel had another request - he wanted Holden to have an East Coast accent. "The show is set on Long Island," Holden said. "Being Irish, I had to develop a Long Island accent."

How did he manage it? Holden watched videos of "The Sopranos" and imitated Tony Soprano.

Well, that's New Jersey, Darren, but close enough.