{"id":206451,"date":"2018-10-08T12:50:54","date_gmt":"2018-10-08T16:50:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/theatre-and-dance\/?p=206451"},"modified":"2018-10-08T12:50:54","modified_gmt":"2018-10-08T16:50:54","slug":"alumnus-cole-mills-appears-on-so-you-think-you-can-dance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/theatre-and-dance\/2018\/10\/08\/alumnus-cole-mills-appears-on-so-you-think-you-can-dance\/","title":{"rendered":"Alumnus Cole Mills Appears on So You Think You Can Dance"},"content":{"rendered":"

Judges on the hit TV show\u00a0So You Think You Can Dance<\/em>\u00a0described contestant and Montclair State alumnus Cole Mills\u2019 dancing as \u201cgorgeous,\u201d \u201cgenuine\u201d and \u201camazing\u201d before naming him as one of the five male finalists who would compete along with five female finalists in the live shows.<\/p>\n

\u201cMaking the Top Ten is a result of my passion,\u201d Mills says. \u201cNo other opportunity in the world gives a dancer an international platform that streams in over 18 different countries to showcase both talent and personality.\u201d<\/p>\n

Montclair State Dance Program Director Lorraine Katterhenry agrees with the show\u2019s judges\u2019 assessments. \u201cCole is a natural performer and a very hard worker. Many guest choreographers saw his talent and he was selected to perform in works by Larry Keigwin, Andrea Miller and University faculty during his time here.\u201d<\/p>\n

A Passion for Learning<\/h2>\n

A member of the Class of 2016, Mills came to Montclair State as a national ballroom dancing champion who specialized in the cha-cha-cha, rumba, samba,\u00a0paso doble<\/em>\u00a0and jive of Latin Dancesport and who had also danced professionally since childhood with Val and Max Chmerkovskiy of\u00a0Dancing with the Stars<\/em>\u00a0fame. The Ocean Township native was more than a dancer: he played lacrosse and football in high school and played rugby while at Montclair State.<\/p>\n

Mills recalls that every year the Montclair State dance program handed him a new challenge \u2013 from learning to pick up ballet technique to being selected for solo performances. \u201cBallet was my greatest achievement at Montclair State and was a testament to my dedication and passion for learning ballet technique.\u201d<\/p>\n

Life after graduation posed new challenges. \u201cGraduating is tough because there is no class that can teach you how to get on after it,\u201d he says. \u201cAfter a slow summer, I made a highlight reel and I signed with Bloc NYC and began working commercially at the end of 2016.\u201d While Mills\u2019 credits include work as a background dancer on commercials and TV shows such as\u00a0Saturday Night Live,\u00a0<\/em>he also teaches dance and coaches professional athletes with an \u201cadaptable movement philosophy\u201d he has developed to enhance performance.<\/p>\n

Second Time\u2019s the Charm<\/h2>\n

In 2017, after making it into Season 14\u2019s\u00a0So You Think You Can Dance<\/em>\u00a0top 50, Mills discovered the show is more than a technical dance competition. \u201cIt\u2019s a showcase for technical dancers where their charisma \u2013 not their turnout \u2013 is voted on,\u201d he explains. \u201cSo last year, I competed on my technical abilities and didn\u2019t play the game appropriately. But I knew I\u2019d come back.\u201d<\/p>\n

To step up his game, Mills trained in his weakest area, hip-hop, before auditioning for the 2018 season. \u201cKnowing that my dancing was where I needed it to be, my challenge this season was to show the judges the performer I grew up as and not forget about putting on a show.\u201d<\/p>\n

His approach landed Mills in the Top Ten, although he was subsequently eliminated on the show\u2019s third live episode.<\/p>\n

Show preparation is demanding. \u201cYou get 11 hours over four days to have a piece \u2018show ready\u2019,\u201d Mills says. \u201cThere\u2019s no time to feel pressure, though, because your brain is using all its capacity to learn choreography by Monday\u2019s show.\u201d<\/p>\n

The greater challenge, though, was the physical toll on his body. \u201cMy shoulders were raw from all the lifting. I like to think I train myself at the level of a professional athlete and this show was the hardest game I have ever played.\u201d<\/p>\n

While the show brought him back to his ballroom dancing roots, Mills enjoyed competing outside of his comfort zone. \u201cI prefer to get better at things I\u2019m not already proficient in, so ballet and hip-hop are what I most prefer to do,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

So You Think You Can Dance<\/em>\u00a0judges clearly sensed this. After viewing his contemporary dance performance before naming him as a finalist, judge Nigel Lythgoe said, \u201cI wouldn\u2019t have said you were a ballroom dancer.\u201d Judge Mary Murphy agreed, \u201cI have never seen a trajectory of improvement like the one you just had.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Mills, being part of the show was an unforgettable experience. \u201cThere\u2019s no other opportunity where the best choreographers in the commercial industry create works of art specifically for you,\u201d he says. \u201cThere is so much emphasis on the dancer that being yourself never felt so good.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Passion and talent earn dancer a finalist spot on hit TV show<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":206452,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[35,34,36,33],"class_list":["post-206451","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-announcements","tag-alumnus","tag-cole-mills","tag-so-you-think-you-can-dance","tag-sytycd"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/theatre-and-dance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/206451","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/theatre-and-dance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/theatre-and-dance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/theatre-and-dance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/theatre-and-dance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=206451"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/theatre-and-dance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/206451\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":206453,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/theatre-and-dance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/206451\/revisions\/206453"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/theatre-and-dance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/206452"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/theatre-and-dance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=206451"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/theatre-and-dance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=206451"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/theatre-and-dance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=206451"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}