At this very moment, 26 dancers from Mary Jane's School of Dance are exploring the streets of New York City, awaiting their 15 minutes of fame as part of the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.
This week, the 14- to 19-year-old dancers are joining hundreds from across the nation as they perform in the 83rd edition of the famous holiday parade, set for 9 a.m. Thursday. The parade will air live on NBC.
For seven days and six nights, the girls and 26 spectators from the area will do more than just get ready for the parade, although evening rehearsals will prepare the dancers for their nationally televised appearance. They will explore some of the city's most famous sites -- including the Empire State Building and Times Square -- and enjoy some classic New York experiences, like ice skating in Rockefeller Center, taking in a Broadway show, seeing the Radio City Rockettes perform live and shopping on Fifth Avenue. They will even get to attend dance classes with famous choreographers and dancers.
"I'm just so happy for the girls, that they get an opportunity to do this, because it really is a once-in-a-lifetime thing. Not everybody gets the chance to dance in the Macy's Day Parade," said Mary Bray Mehrzad, who co-owns Mary Jane's School of Dance with her mother, Mary Jane Maxwell.
"The actual parade is amazing. It's just pure excitement. It's not like any other parade that I've been to," she said.
Mary Jane's dancers have experienced all of this before. The school was first invited by Mike Miller & Associates Special Events to take part in the parade in 2005, and Mehrzad said plans are to take dancers every four years, as long as the school is invited to participate.
According to the MMA Web site, performers are selected by invitation and qualification through summer cheer and dance camps and award-winning teams.
"They're the chaperones, and they're the choreographers," Mehrzad said of MMA. She said MMA sends each participant a DVD, and "it's all up to them to learn the choreography before they go up there."
"You can tell that they've grown and they've taken leadership," she said, watching the girls rehearse together prior to the trip. "It's good just to see them work together, on their own."
Emily Shirer, who spent her 16th birthday yesterday traveling to New York, attended the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade four years ago as a spectator. Her older sisters, Rebecca and Susan Shirer, were performers and have returned this year as spectators.
"It was freezing cold, and it was raining ... but it was definitely worth it to see them. It was a lot of fun," the Orangeburg Preparatory School sophomore said.
Fifteen-year-old Laura Andrews also returned to New York for her chance in the spotlight.
"It's a really good experience for everyone, and I think it builds you as a person, going and having your own responsibilities," she said, adding that she's more excited than nervous at the prospect of being on TV.
"It's a really fun time. I love New York. If I could live there, I would," the OPS sophomore said.
Weslie Ann Clark, 17, a senior at Bamberg-Ehrhardt High School, was at the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in 2005 to see her sister, Sallie Clark, perform.
She said what stood out most in her mind was "visiting the Empire State Building, getting up at 5 o'clock in the morning to go line up on the streets of New York when it was freezing and raining, and sitting there for hours, waiting on the parade to come by."
Not only do the girls get to dance in the parade, Mehrzad said. They also have the opportunity to see preparations being made for the main event.
"They get to actually go and watch the balloons get blown up," she said. "They get to go in there and see the whole process."
Before taking off, 14-year-old Sarah Catherine Williams, a freshman at B-E, said, "I'm kind of nervous because I've never flown, and I'm just anxious about going and seeing what it's like. I've never been anywhere big, so I'm kind of anxious to see what all of the buildings are like."
She said it's kind of scary, knowing she might be on TV.
"Everybody knows about it, so it's like, 'We'll be watching for you,'" she said.
While Williams left town looking forward to shopping in New York, 16-year-old Casey McCurry said she just wants to take in the whole experience.
"I want to see the Broadway shows, and we get to wear our red jackets, and they say everyone will ask for your picture and stuff, so it's kind of cool," the OPS junior said. "I want to see how good all of the other dancers are because I'm thinking they're going to be really, really good."
She said the possibility of being on TV is nerve-racking.
"It's probably going to catch everybody doing something embarrassing, and it would be me that happened to," she said.
Mehrzad said the trip is optional, and dancers are responsible for coming up with their own money to fund it. Some of the girls held fund-raisers, including a nail-spa salon day sponsored by several of the younger spectators. The only requirement for the dancers is that they are between the ages of 14 and 19.
"We just have a great group of girls, and they are excited to come to dance every Monday and every Tuesday. This has just added excitement," Mehrzad said. "They come in here and they work hard, and they're just always a pleasure to teach. This has just taken everything to the next level.
"I just know that they're ready."
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