AYESHA RASCOE, HOST:
Kick, kick, kick, kick. The Rockettes are celebrating their 100th anniversary. And recently, Rockette hopefuls from across the country lined up for an open call audition in New York City. NPR's Jennifer Vanasco went to Radio City Music Hall to meet them.
JENNIFER VANASCO, BYLINE: They came from far...
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: Naples, Florida.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: Honolulu, Hawaii.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #3: I came from Paris, actually. That's where I'm living right now.
VANASCO: ...And near....
REESE DAILEY: I live on 50th, so I just walked down.
VANASCO: ...All with one hope.
DAILEY: Being a Rockette has been my dream, like, ever since I can remember.
VANASCO: That's Reese Dailey. She's 18. She's first in line today.
DAILEY: Yes, I am (laughter). I'm super excited.
VANASCO: And it's her first time auditioning. She's originally from Bozeman, Montana. Behind her is Alyssa Gallagher. She's 28 and from Pittsburgh. This is her tenth try.
ALYSSA GALLAGHER: The whole journey has been long, but I've been patient, and I'm continuing to go for my dream.
VANASCO: They go through security, check in.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #4: Hi, how are you?
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #5: Good. How are you?
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #6: Hi. I'm just going to take your picture really quick, if you don't mind.
VANASCO: They're given numbers to attach to their fronts, like a marathon, and start stretching on the floor of the lobby, which has chandeliers and a gold leaf ceiling. John D. Rockefeller wanted Radio City Music Hall to be so grand, even Great Depression audiences would come to a show. And it is. It opened in 1932, but the Rockettes started earlier, in 1925, in St. Louis, Missouri. Here they are in the 1930 movie the "King Of Jazz." Listen, close - they almost sound like one dancer.
(SOUNDBITE OF RHYTHMIC DANCE STEPS)
VANASCO: Adrienne Gibbons Oehlers is a theater and dance professor at Wittenberg University and a former Rockette.
ADRIENNE GIBBONS OEHLERS: They began as a company of 16 dancers, and they called them the Rockets. That became 36 dancers to sort of be able to stretch across this giant stage of Radio City.
(SOUNDBITE OF RHYTHMIC DANCE STEPS)
VANASCO: The dancing they do is particularly difficult. And Oehlers says, at the time, precision dancing was also cool and newfangled.
OEHLERS: You know, these ideas of industrialization were really prevalent. And so how do we do things mechanically, organized, in unison? That was a novelty. That was really interesting and very awe-inspiring.
VANASCO: So much about entertainment and society has changed since 1925. We're not usually wowed by factory machines anymore. And it's hard to get people off their couches and into theaters. Oehlers says, yeah, that's the trick. The Rockettes need to keep routines people love for the nostalgia factor, like "Parade Of The Wooden Soldiers," which they've performed every year since it was introduced in 1933.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "PARADE OF THE WOODEN SOLDIERS")
VANASCO: But they have to balance that old stuff with something more contemporary...
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #7: It should feel like, hey, it's a party.
VANASCO: ...Like the combination the Rockettes hopefuls are trying out today.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #8: Five, six, seven, and then everything comes out. Ha.
VANASCO: The Rockettes' big shows are the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade and the Christmas Spectacular at Radio City Music Hall. That's the dream. And after they learn the routine, dancers enter the large rehearsal hall to audition in front of the director.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #9: Six, seven, eight.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)
VANASCO: In groups of five, they turn, they kick. And after they've all gone...
(APPLAUSE)
VANASCO: ...Numbers are called.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #10: Sixty-eight. Ooh. Thirty-one. One. Sixty-five.
VANASCO: Which means these are the women who get to come back tomorrow.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #11: I'm so proud of you.
VANASCO: The Rockettes wouldn't give us an exact number of how many people made it through three days of auditions and callbacks. They said it's typically between 4- and 7%. But even those who make it aren't necessarily cast. Some of them will be invited to a development program, some of them will be in the show, and some of them will be waiting in line again next year.
Jennifer Vanasco, NPR News, New York.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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