Swing is the Thing

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It’s like stepping back into an earlier time as one approaches the Keith Anderson Community Center in Orono on a recent Saturday.

The music wafting from the upstairs window is from the early to mid-20th century. Three of the retro Chrysler PT Cruisers parked outside sport the vanity plates HEPCAT, JITABUG and SWNGTIME.

Inside the center, four couples execute an intricate group waltz to Henry Mancini’s classic “Moon River.” Next, six women do the Charleston to “Bei Mir Bist Du Schoen.” It’s hard to believe most of these dancers, mainly garbed in neon-green T-shirts, had never danced a step before starting lessons in recent years.

Welcome to the world of the Zoot Suit Revue, the precision dance team of the Back Door Dance Studio in Eddington.

The revue is a troupe of 19 dancers, ranging in age from mid-20s to mid-50s, who perform Charleston, Lindy hop, swing, waltz, cha-cha and jitterbug.

The troupe will be making a public appearance when it hosts a benefit dance Oct. 6 at the Elks Club in Old Town. It will be a battle of the bands, with New Society and Flint Hill playing nonstop ’50s music. The evening will benefit My Friend’s Place, a day-care center for people with Alzheimer’s disease.

At 53, Ben Dresser is the oldest member of the revue. It’s hard to envision the tall University of Maine teaching laboratory coordinator decked out in a brilliant red zoot suit. But it’s an outfit in which he’s quite comfortable. He and wife Karen have been dancing for 15 months. Now even their daughters, Amy and Laura, are involved, helping out wherever they can.

Dresser said that he and Karen have lost about 50 pounds since they began dancing.

“It’s very aerobic, and improves your health,” said the Old Town resident. “I could never get myself to work out. This is my gym.”

Exercise is one benefit the dance team enjoys. Another is the chance to socialize at the group’s weekly Friday dances and Saturday rehearsals.

“There’s people from different backgrounds, with different occupations, but we all get along well and it’s a lot of fun,” said Joe Cannon of Hudson. “Whole families get involved.”

Then there are those who find out that they were born to be entertainers.

“I didn’t realize I was going to be such a ham,” said Tony Cox of Frankfort. “But showing off is the way to go. My goal is to absorb more of the attention of the audience than Chuck.”

“Chuck” is Chuck McKay, who with wife Sue founded the Back Door Dance Studio about four years ago. It’s hard to believe that, if not for a coin continually coming up heads, the McKays would be working to better their bowling scores now.

When their boys grew up and “got lives of their own,” the couple decided to find an activity to enjoy together. He picked bowling, she chose dancing.

After two weeks of disagreement, they opted to decide by flipping a coin. It came up heads for dancing. Still Chuck fought it. After it came up heads four more times, he gave in.

“I guess you’d call it destiny,” Chuck said.

Chuck, who was determined not to make a fool of himself on the dance floor, went to Bangor’s Thomas School of Dance for lessons. Although he’d never danced before, he soon found himself drawn to swing.

“I saw it on TV once,” he recalled. “I get bored really easy, and can’t sit still. I had to invent moves, so I stayed interested in it, so I didn’t get bored.”

“I’ve always said you were born too late,” Sue said to her husband. “You were meant to be born in the ’20s, so you’d be dancing to swing in the ’40s.”

About four years ago, the couple rented a hall and started giving lessons. They were building their Eddington home at the same time, and decided to convert their basement into a studio.

It’s in that basement studio, lined with album covers and adorned by a colorful cartoon drawing by Lauren Jellison, that many of the revue members learned to dance. Sue works as a certified public accountant and Chuck in inventory control for Shaw’s during the day, but at night, they teach several classes a week.

Troupe members credit Chuck’s teaching methods for their progress.

“He has small group lessons, but everyone moves along at their own pace,” said Sue Richard of Hampden. “It’s very individualized.”

In general, the dancers agreed that it’s possible to get comfortable with the steps in a matter of several weeks to a few months.

The McKays began to get asked to perform, but they realized that it was hard to put on a show with two dancers. That’s when they created the Zoot Suit Revue, a little over two years ago. They now do several public performances a year, along with other shows for private groups, such as senior citizen homes.

“We never charge to perform, because it’s good advertising,” Chuck said. “People see it, and want to learn how to do it.”

What does it take to be a member of the dance team?

“It’s commitment,” said Sue McKay. “We look at people. They don’t have to be the best, or the most advanced dancer. There’s even beginners on the dance team, and we makes dancers out of them. We want people who are passionate about dancing.”

Dresser echoed her sentiment, adding, “It’s buying the clothes, it’s getting days off and reducing extracurricular activities elsewhere. We don’t let anything get in the way.”

Dresser maintains that rural Maine men hate to dance. “So you have to trick ’em,” he added.

That’s what happened to him. His brother-in-law, Tony Cox, got a session of lessons as an anniversary gift from his wife, Kimberly. Dresser indirectly got involved as a result, or as his wife, Karen, put it, “Did he tell you the table-saw story?”

Since he hadn’t, she did: “The dance team was doing a performance at the mall. Also there was a table saw on sale at Sears that Ben wanted, so off to the mall we went. I reminded him that Tony and Kim were dancing. Within five minutes, he was hooked. We went back and got the table saw. It’s still in the box. He thought it was his idea to take dance lessons, so that’s all I care about.”

Dresser in turn recruited Cannon, a coworker at the university.

“I mentioned it to [wife] Janet, and she thought it was a good idea,” he recalled.

“One lesson, and we were hooked,” Janet added.

Summer Sunderland of Orono, one of the group’s younger members, is one of the few to have danced previously. She got involved in lessons as part of “my post-divorce plan for myself.”

She soon found a home.

“I didn’t have a partner, and they helped me find one,” she recalled. “I can be shy at first in new situations, but people are very friendly and welcoming. I even ended up getting a boyfriend out of the deal.”

Dancers learn to communicate nonverbally on the floor.

“It’s all hand signals for moves,” Dresser said. “You could dance with anybody in the whole group with duct tape over your mouth.”

Members can spend hundreds of dollars on costumes and invest many hours of their spare time into the Zoot Suit Revue. They all agree that it’s worth it.

“It’s a reason to get up in the morning, it keeps me going,” explained David Kneeland of Old Town. “It’s become an important part of my life. Work is what I do; this is what I am.”

For more information on the Back Door Dance Studio or the upcoming benefit dance, call 843-5638 or write swingtime34@aol.com.