Season 5 Tour – Atlanta Part One
As promised, I went by the Arena where the Atlanta tour date will be tonight, in order to interview the dancers. Amusingly, when the press were led out to the secured area near the tour buses (it was a gorgeous day, so the interviews were going to be outside), our first view was of Randi and Kupono sunbathing on a blanket – “in their underwear” as one of the folks with me said in a shocked voice. Rascally dancers.
Apparently, they haven’t seen a lot of the sun lately since they usually travel between cities during the night and mostly go into the venues. They have a few days off, as they told me, where they explore the city. Melissa chuckled when I asked her for tour gossip and said, “Maybe we partied at the beginning, but now we’re like, party for 45 minutes and then out.”
I got to meet Jeanine briefly, but she had two telephone interviews during the press session, so she was off to the side doing that. Brandon came out briefly and lay on the blanket, talking to Kupono. He, Kupono and Randi weren’t actually technically available for press access. They’d opted out because they didn’t feel well or just wanted a break. Though, Kupono invited me to sit on the blanket with them when we first went out, so I asked him Christine’s question and he said that his studio back in his Hawaii really did it for him, that was “home” to him. He was going to let me take a picture of him, but one of the handlers told me not to, so I moved on to the official interviews.
First, I met Evan, Jason and Phillip or as I actually called them when our interview was over, “my boys.” 🙂 Here’s a picture, first of Evan and Jason and then of the three of them (Phillip arrived a minute or two later).
Jason and Evan
I asked them a few questions about the tour. Evan said he really enjoyed exploring Boston cause he’d never been there, but that he loved the performance in Detroit. Jason said that he was hoping his hometown would be his favorite performance. Phillip really liked Toronto.
Then, my boys moved on to talk to the local Fox affiliate folks and I chatted for a few minutes with Melissa and Ade. Melissa and I shook hands, but Ade gave me a hug, which made me giggle. I told him he did seem like that type from the show and he said, “Yeah, that’s just how I am.” They were really relaxed and comfortable with each other, which made it a lot of fun to talk to them. Mostly, I just felt like we were hanging out, they were just so chill. Melissa said she really enjoyed the Milwaukee show because she had a lot of support in the audience and Ade favored Manchester because it was the first show and there was a lot of energy from the audience because of that.
Here’s a picture of them. And then a second where they’re jokingly recreating one of their favorite movements, the joke being they don’t actually have any chemistry, (“that is real,” Melissa said).
As I was leaving, Kupono called the others over to the blanket to show them something in a magazine and they were all clustered together to look. It really does seem like they’ve banded together on tour, which is great to see. I really enjoyed meeting them. Now, I have to go see the show!!
If you haven’t bought tickets to the SYTYCD tour yet, they’re only about half way through the tour and SYTYCD tour tickets are still available.
Very very cool. I loved your writeup of it all. I can’t wait to see your next post. Not to mention for the tour to come to Las Vegas. Sweetness.
Oh yes, I was also just thinking. Did they allow video for the media stuff? I’d even be cool with doing something live since I think that my blackberry could live stream some video for people on Qik or something.
Must look into this.
@John: I just realized Kupono is visible in the Melissa/Ade pic on the left. And that you can see the blanket spread out in the one on the right. Very sneaky of me, as I didn’t even know I was doing it. Lol. He really was very sweet. When he said, “come sit on the blanket,” I could’ve done that for the rest of the afternoon if I would’ve been allowed. Actually, they were all great – they *all* remembered me when they saw me again hours later at the meet & greet with my mom. As for video – go ahead and try it. No one checked to see if I was shooting video and the Fox affiliate folks shot video. They asked Melissa and Ade about Mia Michaels leaving – I’ll have to add their answers to the post. And I can’t forget to do Part 2 – when I can get the pictures uploaded. The quality might not be as good, but they’re still pretty awesome, imo. Evan and I took a pic on my phone of our almost matching tattoos (mine says “see ya later” in Russian, his says “brother” in Greek, of course). It was a *very* good night. You’ll love it when they come to Vegas.
AWesome!
Now I wish I had asked more questions >_<
Like what food he missed eating from home…
And what he misses most about Hawaii.
Boo i failed.
BUT THANKS FOR ASKING THE QUESTION FOR ME!! 🙂 XD
I wish I was there to have seen him too.
I wish I could have made it in time for this part. However I did get a few questions at the meet and greet. Got to talk to Kupono, Ade, and Melissa. Someone next to me asked Brandon an excellent question which I’ll have in my blog. Plus found out from someone who travels with them…he said out of the past three tours he has been a part of there was only one dancer with a diva type attitude. Lol and my first guess was correct. Last night was great.
[…] Where should I begin to tell you about the show? Maybe I should start by saying that I lost my voice from screaming so much. And my mom got blisters from clapping so much. We waited after the show for two hours in the cold to see the dancers (all but Janette) and it was totally worth it. Amanda’s already commented on some of her experiences in the comments of Part One. […]
@Christine: I had to talk to him sort of covertly, so I might not’ve been able to ask more questions. 🙂 Lol. I don’t sunbathe well, so I doubt I could’ve used that as an excuse.
@Amanda: It was fun – wish you could’ve been there too. Link to your blog, I’d like to know what you asked them and what the answers were. Did you get any pics of them at the meet & greet?
I loved this writeup! i went to the show here in Chicago, I loved it. After the show a girl told kupono that his lei was the same color as her homecoming dress and he gave it to her right off his neck. They were all so nice and gracious enough to come out and hang with us even thoough it was a freezing cold night in Chicago.
[…] upload the pictures I’d just taken for our readers. Check out the post I did that afternoon here. I’ve been struggling on a book for years that relatively few people have seen, so it’s […]