James Whiteside Did a Britney Spears Tribute and You Guys, It Is Everything
Here is a sentence that will immediately brighten your day: American Ballet Theatre principal/#queen James Whiteside—or, rather, his pop-art alter ego, JbDubs—just released a music video that is, and here we are quoting directly from the YouTube description, “an homage to his life in NYC, Britney Spears, and 90s competition jazz.”
Friends, it is exactly as magical as those 13 words make it sound.
“NYC Piece of Me” cleverly retools Britney’s “Piece of Me” with lyrics about Whiteside’s own experiences (“I’m Mr. ‘Who is this queen?’ since I was 17, don’t matter if I’m Prince Siegfried or JB in them red high heels“). But the real highlight is, unsurprisingly, the dancing.
Why? First, because Whiteside’s choreo pays cheeky tribute to his early days as a comp kid/jazzerina (Luigi warmups!), which, YUP YUP YUP. But also because his co-stars in the video are ABT’s Jeffrey Cirio, Courtney Lavine, Calvin Royal III and Cassandra Trenary. And while we already knew they could do things like this…
…we didn’t know they could do things like THIS.
We will never, ever tire of seeing super-classical dancers getting in touch with their nasty selves. Especially when it turns out they’re really good at it.
Happy #TutulessTuesday!
