Dance Marathon 2014: Block 8 recap
March 8, 2014
As dancers returned to the tent for the eighth time, chants from the side assured them “block eight is gonna be great.”
The third-to-final block of Dance Marathon — Throwback Thursday-themed and sponsored by the Residential Hall Association — began with Battle of the Bands winner King Cloud.
The four-member group excited dancers with renditions of popular songs by Franz Ferdinand,
Outkast, Drake and more (and “Let It Go,” again) as well as originals.
“They were great,” Weinberg junior Lily Cohen said. “The audience seemed to enjoy them, and they had a great presence in the tent.”
Soon after King Cloud finished their set, dancers heard from the Divin family, including eight-year-old Ben, who suffers from Duchenne muscular dystrophy.
Ben’s father Andy expressed the family’s gratitude to DM, and his wife Jessica suggested the event marks the best-ever chance of curing Duchenne.
“We all just can’t thank you enough,” Andy Divin said. “Just to see you up here, it’s utterly amazing.”
In accordance with the throwback theme, DJs played a series of songs from the 2000s. Kevin Rudolf’s “Let it Rock” and Backstreet Boys “Larger than Life” were particular crowd favorites and tracks from Ciara and Christina Aguilera also evoked excitement from a slightly-zombified corps of dancers.
The block also featured a limbo game and a video skit from emcees Ethan Levine-Weinberg, a Communication senior, and Kelsey Adams, a Medill sophomore, in which the duo attended a middle school dance.
A video from Adam Sandler and Kevin James drew chuckles, as the actors encouraged dancers to keep going.
“For Team Joseph we shall win, we shall fight, we shall dance,” Sandler belted, before James popped up at clip’s end to yell, “Team Joseph, keep dancing.”
At the end of three hours, the emcees revealed that a week before the full-money deadline, DM had raised $443,968.
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Twitter: @AlexPutt02
