Shit Gets Real in A Chorus Line

Despite the near 45 years since A Chorus Line’s first performance, the show’s themes of identity, individualism and the devastatingly harsh world of the performing arts are just as relevant as ever in the Syracuse Department of Drama’s rendition.

The whole show is set during one day of intensive auditions for parts in the chorus line of a Broadway musical. Throughout A Chorus Line, the applicants are asked to perform certain parts of the show that they’re trying out for. During these run-throughs, they are ridiculed by the casting director, Zach, who warns the performers that he doesn’t want anyone to “pull my eye.” The opening number of the show, “I Hope I Get It,” ends with each applicant covering their faces with their headshots, demonstrating how each person is reduced to one over-done picture. To casting directors such as Zach, these people are expendable and interchangeable.

However, as the show continues, the audience is shown just how unique each applicant is. Each member of the chorus line sings a song or a verse about who they are and why they started to perform. One woman shares how she had been told she was ugly for all of her childhood and began to attend ballets to escape because “everything was beautiful at the ballet.” Another woman had a hilarious song about her easy hack to the show biz industry: plastic surgery! Her solo, “Dance: Ten; Looks: Three,” is cosmetically toned with lines like “Bought myself a fancy pair, tightened up the derriere.” Her solo had interesting points about how a dancer, no matter how talented (even a 10!) won’t get a job without a ‘perfect’ body. The stories of the dancers Paul and Cassie are slightly more serious and take up a larger part of the narrative.

Paul’s story is one of sexuality and identity. His character is notably quiet throughout the show, and he is asked to stay behind while the rest of the chorus line leaves the stage for a break. For a captivating and lengthy amount of time, Paul stands alone on the stage, speaking to the voice of Zach, presumably coming from the sound booth offstage. Paul tells the story of his first experience in the performing arts, which the audience soon learns was a drag show. He shares how he hid his work from his parents, telling his mom that the earrings and heels that she would find in his closet were left behind by a friend. When his parents found out about his work on the stage, Paul changed his name and moved out at 16.

His story expresses the familiar theme of the conflict between loving your family and being yourself. Growing up at home, Paul says, “I didn’t know how to be a boy.” Once he left home and started to move towards a professional dance career, Paul continued to struggle with his identity, now trying to figure out “how to be a man.” Only when he learned to dance and to preform did he come to the moving realization that “I am one.”

Cassie’s story, while more focused on the fleetingness of “stardom” in theater, is similarly heart-wrenching. A former Broadway star, she struggles through her auditions as she fails to conform and blend in with the group. Every kick or spin has a little extra flair that simply does not belong in the chorus line. After her fall from first-billing fame, Cassie has to learn how to be second best again.

After a whole show of individual stories, A Chorus Line concludes with a final collaborative number. Suddenly the happy, sad and funny stories that each applicant shared earlier disappear into a song and dance that is supposed to be seen as “one singular sensation.” Those who stand out are eliminated from consideration for the roles.

Syracuse’s Department of Drama’s rendition of the show was incredible. The dancing was amazing and the singing was nearly perfect. However, the most enrapturing aspect of the performance was the nagging idea that each theater major that was performing before this audience was telling a story that could become their own future. One day, they may find themselves in a frighteningly similar situation, reduced to a headshot and forced to blend in with the masses or face rejection. But hey, that’s show biz.