<p>Caught some episodes on On Demand. Will be on the lookout for it now. Another guilty pleasure.</p>
<p>And how about that scene where the young guys were hitting on the moms in the hotel pool? That had to be staged!</p>
<p>Yes- that looked very staged . Also that episode where poor Brooke has to go on that date to help aid their lack of connection ?</p>
<p>All of these “reality” shows are staged. Including Idol, SYTYCD, etc. Every one of them. </p>
<p>The faster this garbage is off the air the better. Just turn it off.</p>
<p>LasMa</p>
<p>thanks for the clarification. That makes sense that they do group girls by skill level even if the ages are slightly different, but I agree there is no way that Maddie and her little sister should competing on the same team since they are obviously not at the same level.</p>
<p>I always thought they grouped them together for the show because those were the only mom’s they could get to agree to do a show like that with their kids. But really the sad thing is they probably could have filled those spots all day every day for weeks and not run out of people willing to do it.</p>
<p>The show is Dance Moms so the point of the show (I guess) is to follow the moms but I am also more interested in seeing the dances and how well the girls do in those crazy circumstances.</p>
<p>I also wonder how much is contrived. I mean really, Abby Lee is supposed to be this top studio that always wins and the moms obviously invest a lot of money yet they always have costume issues. I would think they would have someone to handle and organize that. Why are costumes not being ordered or why are the moms making them themselves on the way to the competition? That doesn’t match with the level of the studio and the money being thrown around. I guess if they need new costumes every week it would be hard to order, but if Abby had her act together she would have all of this planned in advance and order the stuff in plenty of time. Just my two cents ;-)</p>
<p>Gosh, maybe I should watch this one! I love Toddlers and Tiaras and this sounds just as amusing. </p>
<p>And, while I’m sure all of this is very contrived…my S and D have danced competitively for many years on a mixed age/skill dance team. They have 3 different levels of dancers in the troup and for their big production number they all dance together - younger kids doing simpler moves, older kids doing “showcase” moves. So, a mixed age troup is not unheard of - but they don’t all dance the same routine.</p>
<p>We have found the dance world to be fairly laid back compared to gymnastics. My S also trained for several years at the gym in TX that produced several Olympic team members - but it was way too intense for him. Part of it was “the Russians” (coaches) - they scared the bejeebers out of my S. (Curiously, he also has a Russian dance teacher who is very stern but he seems to handle that better.)</p>
<p>I have a question for the “dance moms”. Before each competition, Abby sets up a pyramid, with one girl on top. Apparently it means that this girl gets extra attention. I think this only fuels bad feelings among the girls. Is this really necessary?</p>
<p>Toledo : I have never seen the photo pyramid anywhere - I’m sure the producers added this for more drama !</p>
<p>In on of the interviews with Abby, she said that the pyramid was added by the producers and she has never used this in her studio.</p>
<p>If you google Abby Lee Miller you will fine a much more attractive picture of her (face)from what must be years ago. Too bad that she has a very bad weight problem now. She seems angry on the show…</p>
<p>We were wondering when these girls go to school. They went on a cross country trip for weeks to LA, Las Vegas, Lake Tahoe… Was it summer?</p>
<p>I can understand having a love for dance, but I actually don’t understand deciding at age 10 or 8 that you would like to be a rockette or in a broadway show years down the road. It looks like some of the kids are not really having fun. I am not a fan of moms who force their kids to compete (so the mother is satisfied?)</p>
<p>P.S. I have noticed that some of those toddlers and tiaras mothers are also morbidly obese (and they are a lot younger than Abby.) It baffles me that they are training their daughters to be “beauties” when they are not (at least on the outside.)</p>
<p>Interesting thread, though I haven’t seen the show (and probably won’t), I did want to comment on at least one poster who said that she couldn’t see young girls getting this serious about dance, etc. Without talking about this particular show or dance class, there are areas where kids do have to get serious this early, for whatever reasons it is the nature of the beast.</p>
<p>For example, with ballet, the ‘serious’ training has been pushed younger and younger (there have been some excellent articles and documentaries about young dancers heading into ballet). I seem them every week at ABT (American Ballet Theater) at Lincoln Center…a lot of these kids end up homeschooling or going to special schools like the “young professional school in NYC”…does this apply to more ‘popular’ forms of dance like Broadway, Rockettes, etc? I don’t know, but wouldn’t surprise me.</p>
<p>With kids in gymnastics, same thing, it almost requires getting in early, between the level of competition and the level required to get on the top level, I would bet serious money against a young gymnast getting serious in high school and making it (take a look at the age of Olympic gymnasts). </p>
<p>Music is much the same way (with some variations, every instrument is different, voice is different again). The committment is earlier and earlier, with Piano and Violin, for example, if kids don’t make the choice to seriously commit to it by the time they are roughly 11 or 12 (and that is considered late in some quarters), the odds are way stacked against them. On violin and piano there are kids who start very, very young, and some of them are practicing obscene number of hours when they are 5 or 6 (I am talking 6 hours + a day).
It is a bit different with wind instruments, if only because they are are impossible to play before a certain age, where a 3 year old can start piano or violin lessons…</p>
<p>As far as the show being staged, probably. But if my experience with music holds, and if the stories I have heard even going back into the golden age of Heifetz and such are true, none of it would surprise me, human nature doesn’t change all that much…and if momma and poppa see something as ‘the ticket to la dolce vita’, they will do things most people would gape at, take it from me.</p>
<p>As a parent of 2 kids who have been in musical theatre since an early age (including Broadway auditions and national tours, etc) I have seen my share of driven kids and driven mamas including a mama that actively sabotaged my D at several auditions when they were 11. We’ve never pushed our kids - when they wanted to quit, or skip an audition, or take a break, we let them, but they did train hard. Luckily we found a performing arts HS for them, but many of their friends are homeschooled or go to the professional schools (for actors, gymnasts, figure skaters, etc).</p>
<p>Meg-
Your story is similar to ours (though we homeschool) and our kid is in classical music. We never pushed him, and I kind of wonder about the pushing, I have seen the result of it, and it often is an unhappy kid who to watch perform is painful, because it is pretty obvious they would rather be doing something else. I also have seen the other side of parental pushing, kids cracking up, suicidal,you name it…and the parents like that? Has to be some of the uglier group of people I have ever been around, I think I would prefer swimming around sharks with an open wound <em>shudder</em></p>
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<p>anothermomof2 it seems a lot of the girls in the pageants are not far behind their mom’s. It you look at some of the competitors that are not being featured it seems they have been bribed one too many times with “pageant candy” and force fed mountain dews so that they can “step up their game”.</p>
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<p>Yes, nationals are usually in mid-July. The west-coast regionals which they went to were in June, and the earlier regionals were within driving distance of Pittsburgh.</p>
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<p>This is because of yet another fake aspect of this show: New numbers every week (and thus new costumes every week). In real life, a team like this one would have a set of dances for the entire year, maybe 6 or 8 group dances plus a couple of solos per dancer. They begin learning the dances early in the season, say, September or October. Costumes would be ordered around that time. The girls would practice the dance for weeks or months in the studio, and then compete the same set of dances all season, right up through nationals. Studio owners like Abby Lee want to WIN, and you don’t do that by making your dancers to learn a new number every week. </p>
<p>BTW, another thing that we found amusing is the way Abby talked about “nationals” – as if there were a single national title up for grabs – and pressured the girls that “we have to do well this week so we can go to nationals.” It’s not like the US figure-skating title, or USA Gymnastics, where there truly is one winner. In fact, there are dozens of competitions and every one of them has nationals. It’s actually kind of hard NOT to be eligible to go.</p>
<p>My son , who is now 24 and out of dance , spent 6 years at Professional Children’s School (Known as PCS ) in NY and 8 years at School of American Ballet . When he first started , he only attended 2 times a week . He did NY City Ballet Nutcracker , which is a GRUELING schedule as there are only 2 casts for 48 shows and we lived outside NY , We would often get home around 11:30 at night , so I took son late to school the next AM . American Ballet Theater at the MET also took young children for their child roles as well . Some school districts are not supportive of this lifestyle , and by age 12 , our son began attending PCS where many Broadway kids , as well as kids from the ballet school attend . Other memorable kids included Scarlett Johanson , Hillary Duff Beverly Sills (opera ) as well as kid models , junior golf pros , and even YoYo MA (cellist ) . It was all a wonderful experience for the both of us . BTW , boys attend the ballet school for FREE , if your son is chosen at an audition . We paid a private school salary for PCS .</p>
<p>Found the old thread, just bumping it up, in case you want to continue it.</p>
<p>I have to admit that I watched last night’s episode… Oh lordy. It’s like watching a train wreck - I can’t look away! When Chloe’s mom made the Weight Watchers comment I thought, “Wow, no kidding!” I just can’t get over the fact that Abby is so big but she’s a dance teacher. Geez. She is pretty hateful. Kind of skeeves me out to think that all the creeps watching Toddlers & Tiaras are probably watching this show too… Yikes! I would not want my kids exposed like that.</p>
<p>For moms who might be a bit more familiar with this sort of thing - what exactly is the goal of all these dance classes? It’s not like being a prima ballerina or in gymnastics (where you can aim for the Olympics)… Do these girls want to be showgirls? Rockettes? On Broadway? On TV shows or in movies? All of the above? They take it so seriously.</p>
<p>If you look at the studio’s website, and I don’t recommend it if you have a tendency to migraines, it would seem that the studio aspires to train dancers for Broadway, touring companies, Disney, SYTYCD, etc. Since the girls in the show are so young, who knows what their goals are? I think they’re little girls who like to dance (or liked it at one time), and had the combined misfortune/parental resources to wind up where they are.</p>
<p>I watched a few episodes last season but won’t this time around. Just a side vent - I HATE the obvious staginess and fakery of the situations and dialog in this show, as well as in pretty much all the “candid reality” programs. Scene writing and improvisational acting are crafts that professionals spend years perfecting. It’s beyond lame to have amateurs with nothing more to offer than personality disorders make up dialog in ridiculous situations.</p>
<p>I would love to know why one of the mothers, who has a Ph.D. and is the principal of a middle school, would think this is something she wants on her resume.</p>
<p>She just did an interview with the local paper. It is pretty real according to her and she thinks it teaches her kid about life–good and bad. Also said her kid really loves it and the other kids are her best friends. She works at an exclusive private school and has a PhD from Penn, Wiiliams undergrad so she is pretty smart.</p>