Dance off

Last night one of our friends hosted a 'ladies night' for any and all at her beach.

Everyone brought a dish. I am pretty sure I ate my weight in cream-cheese-based concoctions, and was reminded of a party my mom hosted a few years ago at the height if her Barefoot Contessa obsession. While I can't remember the name of a single dish, the invitation promised heavy hors d'oeuvres, and we giggled as we laid out the various spreads and crackers for what we still today refer to as her "dip party".

No reflection of the guests, of course...

Well, over a piece of my sister-in-law's famous berry pie (to offset the savory), our host told us of the years she and her husband lived in New York, in an apartment over the studio of the famed dance coach, Luigi Faccuito.

Luigi, she explained, had a theory that proper posture was the secret to the perfect physique (as I type this, hunched over my MacBook), and held lessons for women and men of all ages and sizes. He grew up in the theater, singing and dancing in Ohio, and suffered a near fatal car accident that left him almost paralyzed after he moved to Hollywood at 21. Fearing he would never walk again, he developed a method of stretching to keep his body limber and flexible and turned this into the basis for his training technique.

Hailed as the pioneer of jazz dance, Luigi has trained everyone from John Travolta on the set of Saturday Night Fever to Christopher Walken (though I have not figured out that one yet*).

Work it, John. Work it.

Luigi's star pupil,though, is Liza Minnelli, who he met in Hollywood when she was just a child. They have trained together ever since and he even toured with her a few years back.

Only in New York is it normal to have Liza Minnelli smoking on the steps of your apartment building. Got a light?

I called Luigi's studio and they still hold classes three times a day, six days a week. I don't know if Luigi, now well into his 80's, teaches all of these classes himself but at $20 a pop, it is certainly worth checking out. Find all the info and more, here.

Will definitely have to squeeze this into my next NYC itinerary.

And for those of us that rarely make it to the big apple, we can always buy the book, here.

In the meantime, remember:

Xox,

Jenny

*Thank you, Sister, for clarifying