Harvard Dancers 'Funk' on Club

"You go to Harvard, right?"

Frank Harper, a second-year Harvard law student, seems unfazed by the common question, even though his questioner in this case is MTV's "Downtown" Julie Brown, and the setting is the flashy New York City Palladium.

"Harvard Law, actually," he answers calmly.

Brown, garbed in a black catsuit, presses on in her obscure transatlantic accent, "What law are you practicing?"

"Probably civil rights," Harper answers, and Brown smiles. She wiggles her eyebrows suggestively. "I need to talk to you about some civil rights, actually," she says. "But we won't get heavy right now, darling. You're here for fun, so enjoy yourself."

Wubba wubba wubba and always God bless...

A Refreshing Change

Frank Harper is one of two Harvardians who once a month swap backpacks and briefcases for funky hats, bustiers, MTV baseball caps and New York City subway tokens. Harper and J.J. Talvy '91 are both regulars on Club MTV, the video music video channel's hip hot daily dance show.

Under the bright lights of New York's popular dance club, the Palladium, Talvy and Harper say they get a welcome break from Harvard Square.

"It's just a refreshing change from the hustle and bustle of Harvard life," says Talvy, who is an English concentrator and a dance teacher for CityStep.

"I love it," Harper echoes. "It breaks up the monotony of all that work."

Talvy's dedication to dancing goes way back. She has taken ballet, tap and jazz since junior high school. But it was the encouragement of the kids in her CityStep class last year that motivated her to audition for Club MTV, she says. In September, she won a spot on the snow. Since then, she has nown to New York almost once a month for two-day, 15-segment taping sessions. Harper joined the show two years ago, on a dare.

To each taping, Talvy and Harper bring 15 changes of clothing--and large water bottles. "It's like a big dance marathon," says Talvy. "Basically, it's like slave labor. It's grueling because Julie Brown takes forever to change her clothes. She has to look perfect, and we sit there waiting for her."

Still, the gyrating bodies and multicolored spandex of Club MTV exert a strange lure. "It's weird how I prioritize that thing," says Harper. "I've gone down [to New York] the day before finals."

A Parallel Universe

To the first-time viewer, Club MTV is a riveting spectacle. Talvy approximates it to an updated version of American Bandstand, but says that the description fails to do it justice.

The show features 150-170 people cavorting under flashing tiles and through tunnels, captured by camera angels that magnify their kneecaps and reduce their heads to the size of small peas. In the parallel universe that is Club MTV, men in masks imitate frogs, and blond women are consumed by their hair.

"Club MTV is certainly not one of your more stellar programs on TV," Harper admits. But meeting the other dancers has given him a perspective on life that he doesn't get on the manicured grounds of the Law School, he says.

"I have a lot of respect for entertainers and these people, even more than some of the students I'm at school with," Harper says.

"They are people who seem to me to be pursuing their dreams," Harper explains. "They're models, they're actors, they're dancers. They're just trying to do whatever they can to make a little money and get some extra exposure."

But on Club MTV, dancing is more than a job; it is a way of life. After one taping, says Harper, "we all went to Uno's--and subsequently got banned from Uno's. They were playing music, and we started singing and dancing and disturbing people."

When Uno's played Madonna's "Vogue, says Harper, the Club MTV cast went wild. "People were dancing on chairs."

More Exposure

Talvy agrees that the cast has fun together, but she says the dancers' desire for publicity makes them compete for camera time onstage--something which makes her uncomfortable.

Many of the dancers jockey for center spots on the stage. During filming breaks, "there are people who don't change clothes, or don't get water, or eat a quicker lunch, to get that spot," says Talvy.

And for women on the show, bare flesh is the most effective lure for the cameras. "These cameramen are perverts," says Harper.

"Cameramen will come right over to your breasts and watch them jiggle. There's a lot of tits and ass. It can get really sexist like that," says Talvy.

"There are people who dress just in a decorated bra and underwear," she says. "The motto is, the more exposure, the more exposure."

At first, Talvy says, she wondered, "Is that kind of a rule that you have to dress in bustiers and act kind of slutty?"

For many dancers, that is the rule. In fact, slutty may be an inadequate description of the Club MTV spirit, which is reminiscent of a post-nuclear brothel. People wear very little, and they look very strange. The sleaze factor is considerable.

On her first show, Talvy wore shorts that when zipped up on the side, opened to the top. Talvy kept the zipper half-way, but the other dancers told her to go further.

"'J, you want coverage? Zip it up, go the full nine yards,'" they told her.

Talvy says she regretted giving in to the pressure. "When I saw myself on TV, I was like, this is definitely not me," she says.

Now, Talvy wears clothes she feels comfortable in and focuses on her dancing. "I want to dress with hats and ties and long-sleeve shirts--I just want to dance and funk it up," she says.

And she gets even more coverage, says Talvy, explaining that "there are cameramen who look for people who just want to dance and give a lot of energy."

Closet Viewers

Back home, in East Rockaway, N.Y., Talvy's family watches her no matter what she wears, she says. "My mom will freak out," says Talvy. "She watches it every day, or tapes it every day. She's really adorable."

Although some may scoff at Club MTV, says Harper, the show is fun, and closet viewers are everywhere.

"I was working in a very conservative New York law firm last summer and I was at a cocktail party after work," he says, "and this associate from the firm came up and said, 'I know you. You dance on Club MTV, don't you?' We hit it off."

But Harper has yet to put Club MTV on his resume, he admits.

Learning to Funk

The Club MTV dancers, many of whom are "regulars" and get called back repeatedly, are chosen at open auditions in New York. Talvy says she auditioned after being prodded--and pushed--by the group of kids she taught in CityStep last year.

"My CityStep kids were telling me that I should be on it, because they knew it was an open call, somehow, someway," Talvy says. "I owe a lot to my kids; they're a lot of fun, and they're totally the public." They tell her what new records she should own and what hip dances she should learn, she says.

"They'd say, 'J, can you do the running man?' I'd say, 'No, show me.'"

"My kids taught me how to funk," she says.

It was exactly that ability to "funk" that won her a place on the show, according to Club MTV casting director Wendy McSwain.

In the world of MTV, where funky and hip are the ultimate praise, McSwain is the Queen Bee. She auditions all the dancers and wields ultimate power over their fates.

"She can cut you if you sweat too much," says Talvy.

For the Harvard crew, McSwain has only praise. "JJ's a riot, she's a ball of fire," McSwain says. "Even when the camera's not on her, she's always smiling, she's always upbeat."

"JJ's funky #1," she adds. "She's been outgoing from the start."

But, McSwain adds with a thoughtful air, "I think the show's been good for Frank. Frank is definitely getting funkier."

Harper grew up in San Francisco, where he won some local dance competitions. When he moved to the East Coast, he became one of the first dancers McSwain auditioned after taking her job. She remembers his audition vividly.

"Frank was just funny; he was such a prep when he came in," she says.

Preps are a rare sight in the heart of Manhattan, says McSwain, and Frank's plaid jacket made him extra-special. "It was like, who the hell was this?" she says. "He was adorable. He was very nice and very clean-cut looking."

Since then, Frank has gotten looser, McSwain says.

"I'm really glad that they didn't stay in their own world," she adds. "They said, 'Hey, there's another side to me; I like to dance.'"

Talvy's two worlds seldom mix she says. Most people on the show refuse to believe that she goes to Harvard, says Talvy. "I don't know if it's an insult or what," she says."

But still, both Talvy and Harper say they are glad to have the opportunity to completely cut loose once in a while--and to show off that "other side," as McSwain calls it.

After her first appearance on "Club," the studio received a fan letter from someone who had gone to high school with Talvy, McSwain says. "Is that our valedictorian?" the writer of the letter asked. "Is that J.J.? Boy, has she changed. That's great!"

"My (City Step) kids taught me how to funk..." -J.J. Talvy' 91

"It's weird how I prioritize that thing. I've gone down (to New York) the day before finals."   -Frank Harper