Field Trip: 2010 Clippers Spirit Final Audition

Sasha | Jul 25, 2010

It’s time for the final round of auditions for the Los Angeles Clippers Spirit Dance Team!

I enjoy finals. At this point in the process, everyone is a great dancer. They’ve had time to rehearse, work on their showmanship, and polish their game day hair and makeup. No cuts are made on finals night, so from my perspective, finals are more like a showcase than an audition.

I recognize that I’m the only one who feels that way, but to me, it’s free entertainment.

Okay fine, it’s a showcase…with judges

I wondered how the interviews went. That’s the part of the process that I don’t get to see. (And thank goodness for that.) Still, if someone crashed and burned in the interview, it would be good to know that going into finals. It’s not like I’m going to ask though, since it is so obviously none of my business.

I wonder if they tell the girls how they did. Like, if you have a really crappy interview, would they pull you aside and say “I’m going to be real honest with you. This was a disaster.”

Hmm…I’ll have to ask Audrea and Cheryl about that. (Clippers Director and Asst. Director of Entertainment Groups, respectively)

Finals took place at the Pace All-Stars Dance Studio, a different location than prelims. It took me a bit longer to get there than I expected, so all of the dancers arrived before I did. When I walked in, they were already rehearsing.

From left: Celestine, Kellie, Linette, Andi, and Chelsea

Nicole C.

This was a smaller space, more suitable for finals than the cavernous GMT Studios. It was pretty snazzy, with the exposed brick and all. Being a dance studio, it of course had the requisite wall ‘o mirrors. The dancers would be able to watch themselves. I didn’t know if this was a plus or a minus. On one hand, they’d be able to catch themselves if they did something funky or forgot to smile. On the other hand, the judges table was set up right in front of the mirrors. It’s hard not to look at yourself when faced with a wall of mirrors. Would the dancers be distracted by their own reflections and forget to look at the judges?

Trust me to walk into a room and immediately focus on everything that could possibly go wrong.
(I can’t help it. I’m a pessimist AND a Virgo.)

This was also a chance to eyeball everyone who’d made it through to finals. I recognized most of them, but there were a couple who’d slipped by me at prelims. Not that they blended into the woodwork, or anything, but I tend to focus on one person at a time when I’m taking pictures, and since they audition in groups of three, I don’t always get to see everyone in each group.

I did a quick count, and we were down to 29 finalists from the 31 selected. Who knows what happened to other two. Freak rodeo accident? Flying monkeys? Too much Seafood Surprise at the Hometown Buffet?

Maybe one of them tried to take the other out, Tonya Harding-style, and now one is in jail and the other is on crutches.

(I suspect the truth is less interesting. Probably they took a look at the schedule and decided to head for zee hills.)

The dancers all seemed very composed, but I was nervous as heck for them. I really wanted them to do well. I persist in the hope that one year Audrea will say “What the heck, we’re putting all of you on the team!” And then she’d pass out some juice boxes and Chex mix and we’d all gather around and talk about our summer vacation plans.

So I went down the line and wished everyone luck individually. More than that, I made them all high-five me. I was probably kind of loud about it. And I might’ve done a little dance.

High five, chica!
Go get ‘em champ!
Show ‘em what you got!
You can do it, I know you can!
You got this, girl!
Woohoo!

Who can’t use an “atta girl” once in a while?

I keep forgetting that photographers are supposed to be unobtrusive. I should write that on my hand.

Meanwhile, there were a couple of aspiring newbies I wanted to pull to the side and say “Listen, you’ve got this sewn up. You are totally on this team – unless you mess up right now. Get out there and don’t screw up!

Not that I would do that. I can’t think of anything that would get me escorted off the premises faster. (Actually, I can think of a few things. One of them involving massive property damage, but that’s not relevant to this discussion…)

The other reason I wouldn’t do it is because my predictions are wrong more often than they are right. (Although really did feel fairly certain about a couple of girls.)

So I kept my opinions to myself. My lips are zipped.

At 6 o’clock, Marianne (Clippers Game Entertainment Manager) gathered the girls together and explained the process for finals: Hip hop first, then jazz, then the solos. I wanted to suggest that afterward we could all sing a rousing rendition of the Clippers Fight Song.

I don’t think the Clippers have a fight song, though. And I doubt everyone knows all the verses to “Michael, Row the Boat Ashore.”

The dancers did the hip hop routine in groups of three. I really wanted to see what this would look like, now that everyone had had a couple of days to recover.

Emi and Anasheh

Destiney

Brittany B.

Celestine

Jacy

Justene

The hip hop round was followed by what I refer to as the first “head-trip” of the evening. The judges call the dancers back in groups of 6 or 8 to perform the dance again. Some people are called once. Others several times.

From left: Andi, Lisa, Justene, Chelsea, and Nicole C.

Some of the reasoning behind this is obvious. They start off having the girls that kind of look alike go together. All the blondes. All the short brunettes, all the exotic looking girls, etc. After all, as Marianne says, this is a casting for a diverse team. They can’t have 16 blonde girls – this is the Clippers, not the Swedish Bikini team. So if you know you can only have 4-5 blondes (or however many), you’re going want to see them dance side by side so you can pick the best of the bunch. It is what it is.

After that is when it messes with your head. The groups start to look a little random. Nobody knows why the judges chose certain girls to audition in certain combinations, or why they have certain girls do it once, and others two or three times. It can drive a girl crazy, thinking, why did they call me three times? Why did they put me next to her? Why did they put me in the back row instead of the front? Did I screw up last time?

Or maybe I’m projecting. The dancers are all probably used to it. But that’s what I’d be thinking.

It goes very quickly, though, and hey, if you screwed up one time, you get at least one do-over.

After that, the dancers got a break to pat themselves dry. then it was time for the jazz combination. Marianne stood up and told everyone to go take their pants off. (snicker.)

Katrina

Andi and Teresa

Emi

Chelsea

Ariana and Michelle

Jazz went well. Looking good, ladies!

(I’m happy to report that this time around, nobody ended up facing the wrong way.)

I kept mistaking Bianca for Teresa, which makes no sense because they don’t look alike. Later on, I realized what it was. Check out Bianca from this year and Teresa from last year:

For the record, it does bother me that I can remember obscure stuff like this.
I seem to remember outfits more than faces.

Jazz was followed by the second head trip of the evening, as Marianne once again called the girls in seemingly random combinations to do the dance a few more times. It went quickly and without incident. I noticed a couple of girls losing a little bit of energy. I couldn’t say that I blamed them. It was just as hot, if not hotter than it had been on Saturday. It’s the kind of heat that sucks the life right out of you.

Chelsea, Anasheh, Nicole Z, and Teresa

Linette, Emi, and Bianca

Jacquelyn, Kellie, and Katrina

Many of the girls – especially the vets – were going strong, like the heat was not a factor at all. By contrast, it made some of the others look like they were really dogging it. I had to bite my tongue. I can’t tell you how badly I wanted to pull a couple girls aside for a little pep talk.

“Listen up sister, I know it’s hot. Look at me, the whole back of my shirt is wet and it’s totally gross. But I really need you to perk up okay? Just for the next five minutes, and then you can collapse. I know you can do this. COME ON. MAN UP!”

I didn’t say it. But I was thinking it in their direction. Hard.

There was a short break and then we moved on to the final portion of the auditions: the individual performances. The solos are fun. It’s cool to see what everyone can do when they don’t have to remember specific choreography.

There was lots of tumbling, spinning, leaping, and other assorted displays of musicality, flexibility, showmanship, and things of that nature.

Andi

Emi

Jacquelyn

Jacy

Jocelyn

Kellie

Linette

Nicole L.

Nicole Z.

Maki did this thing, which I always see during the audition episodes of So You Think You Can Dance. I don’t know what this leap is called. It kind of looks like you jumped into an invisible washing machine during the spin cycle.

Maki

I think one girl completely forgot whatever she had planned for her solo. Honestly, I’m surprised that doesn’t happen more often. I was a little worried for her, but I thought she probably did enough to get by.

No. I’m not going to say who it was!

And then it was over. There was a big round of applause and many heartfelt sighs of relief.

Nicole Z., Lisa, and Brittney B.

Emi, Jocelyn, Brittney B., Anasheh, Linette, and Liz

Nicole C., Rhea, Brittany W., and Justene

Marianne and Audrea thanked everyone for coming, said the team would be announced the next morning, and advised everyone to go grab a burger and get some rest. Then the judges disappeared somewhere to make the tough decisions about who to put on the team.

Those who made the team would have to hit the ground running: finals on Wednesday, the announcement on Thursday, and mini camp starting Friday afternoon. The first home game isn’t until October, but they don’t get to sit around shooting the bull until then. This really is a year-round job and there’s a lot to be accomplished before the NBA season begins.

Since this was over a week ago, the team has of course been announced. You probably already took a peek. But if you didn’t, here’s the scoop: all of the veterans made it back, plus nine newbies: Andi, Kellie, Justene, Bianca, Chelsea, Anasheh (former USC Song Girl), Jocelyn (former Utah Jazz Dancer), and ChivaGirls Liz and Mandi.