From July 19 to 21, Dancers Responding to AIDS (DRA), a program of Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS, will present the 25th anniversary Fire Island Dance Festival, at the Great South Bay and in Whyte Hall in Fire Island Pines, as a benefit for DRA, with performers and choreographers donating their services.
The guest host for the Fire Island Dance Festival will be Tony and Academy Award winning actor, singer and dancer Joel Grey, the original MC of Kander and Ebb’s “Cabaret,” as well as director of the Broadway revival of Larry Kramer’s “The Normal Heart” and the Yiddish-language “Fiddler on the Roof,” by Bock and Harnick. The Festival will include six world premieres and will feature celebrated choreographers and dance companies. Leadership tickets start at $375, with individual tickets for the afternoon performances going for $175. Tickets are available are www.dradance.org, 212/840-0770 extension 229, or in the Pines Harbor or in front of Island Breeze restaurant in Cherry Grove.
New York City’s Ephrat Asherie Dance, rooted in street and social dance, will begin the Festival on July 19 at 7:30 pm at Whyte Hall, for Leadership Supporters only. Further Festival performances are set for July 20 at 5 and 7 pm and 21 at 5 pm on the waterfront stage on the bay.
Performing on the 20th and 21st will be Kyle Abraham’s A.I.M., with an excerpt of a work slated for its premiere in 2020, with Tamisha Guy and American Ballet Theatre’s (ABT) Calvin Royal III; Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, with “Sinner Man,” from “Revelations;” Emmy Award nominee Al Blackstone, with a world premiere work about the Pines in the 1970s; Dorrance Dance, with the world premiere of a tap piece, featuring Tony Award nominee and former New York City Ballet principal dancer Robert Fairchild; Martha Nichols, of “The Greatest Showman” and “La La Land” fame, with a solo piece with Ballet BC’s Jordan Lang; MOMIX, with Pole Dance; Paul Taylor Dance Company, with Taylor’s “Sunset;” Garrett Smith, with a world premiere danced by Pacific Northwest Ballet principal Lucien Postlewaite and corps de ballet member Christopher D’Ariano; Tony Award winner Christopher Wheeldon, with a world premiere; and ABT principal dancer James Whiteside, with a world premiere featuring ABT corps de ballet member Aran Bell and soloist Catherine Hurlin.
Daytrip packages from New York City, with roundtrip luxury transportation, a champagne lunch, and tickets for the July 21 performance are available for $275, with VIP packages without the transportation going for $225. Complimentary roundtrip water taxi service to and from the festival is available, courtesy of Fire Island Water Taxi.
The 2018 festival raised $604,103, with more than $6.1 million raised since 1995. Proceeds fund medications, meals, counseling, and emergency financial assistance throughout the 50 states and in Washington DC and Puerto Rico. In honor of the 25th anniversary, Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS is adding an annual $7,500 grant to the Pines Care Center to support HIV testing throughout the Pines season.
Further information is available at www.dradance.org, at facebook.com/DRAdance, at instagram.com/DRAdance, at twitter.com/DRAdance and at youtube.com/DRAdance.