Transcript ©CNN Headline News

To make things easier:
Spoken words that are not voiceover are in regular print
Voiceovers are italicized
Video is in parentheses ( ) and this color.
Vocals are in *red *


Preview
Anchor Denise Dillion in voiceover: Broadway is swinging with this new musical.
(Video: Scenes from the Finale and the USO)
*Vocal: “It Don’t Mean a Thing, If It Ain’t Got That Swing!*


Main Feature
Anchor Denise Dillion: Swing dancing has hopped its way into commercials and nightclubs across the country. Cynthia Tornquist tells us how Broadway is paying tribute to this vintage dance.


(Video: scenes from the Finale and the USO)
*Vocals: It Don’t Mean A Thing If It Ain’t Got That Swing!*
Cynthia Torquist - in voiceover: - The Broadway musical SWING! Is symbolic of the dance craze which has enjoyed a comeback across the United States as people take to the dance floor to learn the same dances their grandparents once cut a rug to.


(Video: Beverly Durand and Aldrin Gonzalez are showing off steps on a bare stage.)
Durand: (naming steps as she performs them) underarm turn, this is a whip and a count basic.


Tornquist – in voiceover (while Durand and Gonzalez keep dancing) Beverly Durand got hooked on Swing eight years ago.


Durand (headshot) – I started doing it and started competing – team competitions, nationals. In fact, some of the people I know in the show, they’ve also been competitors in the US Open Championships.


(Video: Throw That Girl Around)
Tornquist – voiceover – Now Beverly and her partner Aldrin Gonzalez are among the stars of SWING!.


(Video: Anne Hampton Callaway singing “Stompin at the Savoy)
Callaway – voiceover – In the 30’s and 40’s Swing really started to develop into it’s full range of exciting power. (video – cut to headshot of Callaway) Bands like Duke Ellington Band and the Chick Webb band, where Ella Fitzgerald got her start. (video: two different black and white photos of big bands) And a lot of the songs they made famous are in our show.


(Video: Everett Bradley doing “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy”)


Tornquist – voiceover – Why has Swing made a comeback? (video – Gap commercial) Some people say this Gap commercial may have kicked it off.


Callaway: (headshot) People in their 20’s are going out to swing clubs all over the country. There are swing websites, swing stores, (video – people dancing in a club) and there’s this wonderful sense of fun in this music.


(video: logo for club: Swing 46)
(video – Tornquist in a club in front of some dancers) Tornquist: Clubs, like this one, are capitalizing on swing’s popularity (video – cut back to the dancers in the club) and are attracting fans of all ages.


Unidentified Lady (headshot): It’s not like hip-hop or anything else where you’re just dancing around. You’re really connecting with another person.


Tornquist – voiceover – (Caitlin Carter and Rod McCune dancing) So how do you connect? Stars of the show say the Lindy Hop is a start. It was created (video – scenes from the Finale) in 1927 to celebrate Charles Lindbergh’s transatlantic flight. (video – back to Carter and McCune) Swing Dance Captain Rod McCune show us how the Lindy Hop is done.


McCune – (while showing steps with Carter) – so you go trip full step, trip full step and with a rock step.


McCune – in voiceover – (while he and Carter are dancing) We think of our grandparents as the swing swingers, but I think everything old is new again.

Tornquist – in voiceover – Cynthia Tornquist, CNN Entertainment News, New York.


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