{"id":4473,"date":"2017-07-11T08:35:48","date_gmt":"2017-07-11T08:35:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/theduanewells.com\/?p=4473"},"modified":"2026-02-23T18:34:38","modified_gmt":"2026-02-23T18:34:38","slug":"dance-dance-dance-james-whitesides-white-hot-summer-tour","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/theduanewells.com\/staging3\/dance-dance-dance-james-whitesides-white-hot-summer-tour\/","title":{"rendered":"Dance, Dance, Dance | James Whiteside\u2019s White-Hot Summer Tour"},"content":{"rendered":"

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ABT Principal Dancer, James Whiteside, by Nisian Hughes<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cI choose to live my life with a certain fearless vitality that I think more people should try.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

— James Whiteside, Principal Dancer, American Ballet Theatre<\/strong><\/p>\n

I find the ballet to be a lot like life when it comes to men \u2013 the bad boys always stand out.<\/p>\n

To be clear, in using the term \u2018bad\u2019, I mean no disrespect to the wildly creative artists to whom I attach the term here. I rather use it to describe the fiery, matchless ability of those rare few performers whose talent is so explosive that it can\u2019t be put into a box \u2013 those true artistes whose mastery of an art form is so advanced that it can scarcely be harnessed or contained by one genre, but instead must constantly be allowed to spill over into new arenas in order to achieve its fullest expression.<\/p>\n

Think Nureyev at the height of his career breaking with tradition to perform both classical ballet and modern dance or Baryshnikov dancing his way to an Academy Award nomination in The Turning Point<\/em>, the first of his many acting roles on the big screen. More contemporarily, think of genre-busting former Royal Ballet star Sergei Polunin, who is fast becoming a Hollywood \u2018It\u2019 boy co-starring and working alongside some of Tinseltown\u2019s biggest names like Ralph Fiennes and box-office megastar Jennifer Lawrence.\u00a0 Now add to this exclusive clique of auteurs, the always daring, never boring, James Whiteside (aka pop-dance artist JbDubs, aka \u00dchu Betch of the drag posse known as The Dairy Queens).<\/p>\n

Not fully able to express the breadth of his creativity within the realm of his widely lauded, four-year run as a principal dancer with the American Ballet Theatre, which just recently closed its current season at the Metropolitan Opera House, Whiteside has spread his talents far and wide, venturing into music and video production and becoming something of a YouTube sensation under the alias JbDubs, while simultaneously pushing the boundaries of his art in almost every direction imaginable. This week, the chameleon-like Mr. Whiteside launches an eclectic, globetrotting series of summer performances that promise to reveal more about the range of his talents than the world has ever seen before\u2026and he couldn\u2019t be more excited.<\/p>\n

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James Whiteside in studio. Photo by Nisian Hughes.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cMy summer has a wide range of dance styles, so throughout the course of the summer I think people are actually going to learn a lot about the real range of things that I can do\u2026 from hip-hop to ballet to contemporary ballet and jazz,\u201d Whiteside explains when asked what people can expect to see on his tour which will make stops in Los Angeles, Vail, and Tokyo over the course of the summer. \u201cNormally my summers consist of a lot of gigs essentially,\u201d he continues. \u201cBut this summer is a little bit different in that I have programmed a lot of it myself. So, I\u2019m doing a lot of stuff that I really want to do and that I\u2019m looking forward to doing as well as stuff that I\u2019ve done in the past and really loved and want to revisit.\u201d<\/p>\n

Among the performances to which Whiteside is most looking forward is one that is set to debut at the Fire Island Dance Festival on July 15 and 16. It is a new work by musical theater choreographer Al Blackstone that promises to showcase a sexy, flirty side of the dancer entitled, \u201cHow Come You Don\u2019t Call Me Anymore?\u201d. \u201cThe premise of the piece is that I am pining after this guy and these other four guys are pining after me,\u201d Whiteside offers as something of a teaser preview of the performance. \u201c[But] I don\u2019t want to give it away because there\u2019s a bit of a twist \u2013 there are some interesting things that go down in the dance. It\u2019s great. It\u2019s just Prince and a piano and it\u2019s a great, sexy, jazz piece.\u201d<\/p>\n

Another highlight of Whiteside\u2019s summer calendar will be the premiere of his new production company \u201cJames Whiteside Presents\u201d at Jacob\u2019s Pillow in Becket, MA. Along with 5 Dances<\/em>, a collection of works in varied styles that the he has created over the years, Whiteside will also treat the Jacob\u2019s Pillow crowd to a performance by his sassy, uninhibited pop alter ego JbDubs, whose YouTube hit \u201cI Hate My Job\u201d has scored 4 million plus views. \u201cOne of the numbers that I\u2019m going be doing [for my Jacob\u2019s Pillow performance] is to a song that I wrote called \u201cWallflower\u201d\u2019 says Whiteside who admits to being the antithesis of the person about whom he wrote the song. \u201cIt\u2019s basically about not being a wallflower and just getting on the dancefloor and shakin\u2019 it! I\u2019ve got a music video for that song with ABT soloist Cassandra Trenary [and] we\u2019ll be doing a live version of that.\u201d<\/p>\n