TikTok challenges have lifted spirits and kept us moving throughout lockdown, but the latest one will have you pining for a return to the theatre. If you want to improve your moves so you can showcase it on social media, you can learn a ton from tutorials like those hip hop dance classes.
According to Broadway World, the #fossechallenge (or simply #fosse) started with a post by French dancer Pierre-Émile LV that has since been viewed nearly 475,000 times. In it, he dances to “The Rich Man’s Frug” from the 1969 film adaptation of Bob Fosse‘s Sweet Charity, matching the scene from the film move-for-move as it plays on the television behind him.
After nearly 15 months of living predominantly private lives, through days demarcated only by the changing light, the precision, exaggeration, and sexuality of Fosse’s signature choreography comes as a welcome reminder of a world where presentation matters. Others, like former dancer Mark Stephen, joined Pierre-Émile, and what followed was delightful enough to draw this heretofore TikTok-resistant old millennial down the rabbit hole of highly stylised isolations.
There was a burlesque interpretation:
An American tribal belly-dance take:
Mother-daughter dances:
One set amongst the concrete jungle where a man you would not expect to have any familiarity with jazz hands breaks out with some surprisingly on-point moves:
And one in a perfectly appointed backyard with two professionals who know exactly what they’re doing and look delicious doing it:
One that makes you break out the red lipstick:
And one that makes you break a sweat:
One that triples your fun:
And—perhaps, my favourite—one that plays upon assumptions about the swaggering cowboy:
Have you participated in the Fosse Challenge? Share your video in the comments below.
