All The Right Moves

By CHRISTOPHER JOHN FARLEY

Dancing has its risks. We're not talking about shin splints and cuboid-bone displacements. We're talking about something really serious: public humiliation. Earlier this year, when R.-and-B. star Sisqo was on tour with the boy band 'N Sync, he would regularly attend after-parties in area clubs. Invariably, a local hotshot would slide up to him for a dance-floor face-off. "I would pretty much get challenged every night," says Sisqo, who is known for the impishly kinetic footwork in his videos. "Someone would go in the middle and start spinning on their head and jumping around and flipping around and then give me a look like, 'What you got?'"

That's the question music fans everywhere are asking these days: What you got? We're going to let you in on a little secret--and we're going to say this as nicely as possible--not all of today's hottest teen-pop stars are blessed with powerful vocal instruments. But that's not what many fans are looking for. In the '00s, they want to see their favorite performers get down, back that thing up, shake their bonbons, dance. "I want to be an all-around entertainer," says teen singer Christina Aguilera, who is actually blessed with a powerful vocal instrument but is nonetheless honing some salsa steps for her upcoming tour. When the 2000 MTV Video Music Awards are held this week in New York City, the most hotly contested category won't be Best Video of the Year (D'Angelo has the only clip worth rooting for). No, the contest to watch is Best Dance Video. That slot features Britney Spears, Jennifer Lopez, 'N Sync, Sisqo and Ricky Martin. Now that's a dance card.

In the alternative-rock-ruled early '90s, dancing was not a requirement. Who wants to sweat in flannel? Now, with teen pop topping the charts, good choreographers are in demand. Three in particular have emerged as major movers and hip shakers: Tina Landon (who has worked with Lopez and is teaching Aguilera those salsa steps), Darrin Henson (Spears, 'N Sync) and Fatima Robinson (Aaliyah, Backstreet Boys). Says Judy McGrath, president of MTV Group: "These days, when kids send us home videos, hoping to get on MTV, they're dancing in their bedroom, not playing air guitar."

The choreographers who have risen to the top tend to be self-taught. Landon, 34, a native of Lancaster, Calif., dropped out of junior college and worked as a Laker girl before getting her start in videos. The Bronx-born Henson, 28, says he "never actually trained anywhere...I used to watch music videos on TV and imitate what I saw." And Robinson, 29, from Little Rock, Ark., says, "The clubs are my classroom."

Most video choreography isn't pushing the frontiers of dance. Watch a day of MTV, and you won't see much that compares favorably with the abstract poetics of Merce Cunningham or the rich ethnic synthesis of Garth Fagan. Choreographer Susan Stroman, who won a Tony for her work on the musical Contact, says the dancing she has seen in teen-pop videos lacks the depth of stage work. "In theater, a dance piece has a beginning, middle and end, like someone telling a story with dialogue," says Stroman. "In music videos, it's about the energy and the sound of the instrumentation. The lyrics and the plot points are not as important." Still, she says, anything that exposes youngsters to dancing is, on balance, a good thing.

The single biggest influence on dancing in today's videos is Michael Jackson. Most clips follow the format he perfected in his epic 1983 video Thriller: a single dancer out front, with a phalanx of dancers in the rear echoing his steps. Still, Landon, Henson and Robinson have all conjured up moments of vibrant originality. Henson's work tends to be punchy and blunt, Landon's playfully carnal, Robinson's fluidly urban. In the video (You Drive Me) Crazy, Henson has a captivating phrase in which Spears rotates on a chair, her legs splayed, projecting both sensuality and repose. Fatima's choreography for Aaliyah's Try Again ends with the R.-and-B. diva dancing with a black cane, a visual reference to the step shows held by black fraternities. As with a woman in her boyfriend's dress shirt, there's something sexy about it.

The most daring moves sometimes end up on the cutting-room floor. In Aguilera's video Come On Over (All I Want Is You), Landon created a part in which male dancers push female dancers' heads down to waist level before the women playfully slap their hands away. It was a little risque for teen pop. "Britney and Christina are both at the age where they don't want to be little girls anymore," says Landon, who has worked with both. "But their audience is still made up of little girls. So sometimes you have to cut back."

The hot trio of choreographers are broadening their influence. Landon is working on a new video for the ska-rock band No Doubt. Robinson was behind the dancing in the striking "Khaki Soul" Gap ads. And Henson has a starring role in the Showtime drama Soul Food.

The most unexpected nomination of the MTV Video Music Awards highlights dancing's renewed prominence. Alanis Morissette's clip So Pure, which the singer directed, is up for Best Choreography in a Video (Robinson and Henson are also nominated; Landon twice). Morissette took ballet, jazz and tap-dance lessons as a child. "Now I only tap-dance if I'm waiting in airports," she says, laughing. In So Pure she shows off her skills. The video, choreographed by Kevin O'Day and Anne White, features Morissette dancing through the decades--at a '50s sock hop, at a '90s rave. She taps, she swings, she celebrates movement. It's a lovely sequence: a rocker, not known for her footwork, surrendering to the beat. "I was dying to dance again," she says. What you got, Alanis? Sisqo may have a new challenger.