May 16, 17, 18, 2012 at 7:30 and May 19, 2013 at 2:00

WAITERS, choreographed and directed by Terry Beck – faculty of SUNY Fredonia’s Theatre and Dance Department - is performed by faculty, alumni and students of SUNY Fredonia along with professionals from the Buffalo arts community. Performances by Terry Beck, Elaine Gardner of Pick of the Crop Dance Company, Phil Wackerfuss of LehrerDance, and Travis Widrick of Buffalo’s premiere tango organization – Tango X. Also dancing will be Samantha Kenney, associate professor at SUNY Fredonia Dance Department, Amanda Sahr, Rick Doetterl, Noelle Lazor, and Steve Russell.

WAITERS combines modern and ballroom dance with strong theatrical performances to create an evening’s length dramatic tour de force. Ten characters come together in their search for love and connection in a theatre transformed into a ballroom. The storyline is revealed in the lyrics of songs from the thirties, forties, fifties and sixties. WAITERS is funny, tragic, powerful and always timely dance-theatre that audiences around the world have embraced.

WAITERS was originally created in Philadelphia for Terry Beck Troupe under the direction of Terry Beck and Nancy B. Hill, artistic directors/choreographers and performers. The work was funded by both the Pew Charitable Trusts and the William Penn Foundation and produced by the Baltimore Theatre Project in Baltimore MD. After the world premiere in Baltimore, WAITERS went on to have a critically acclaimed, sold out, three week run at the Edinburgh Festival in Edinburgh, Scotland. This performance of WAITERS is presented by Terry Beck and by the SUNY Fredonia Department of Theatre and Dance and has been funded in part by the New York State Dance Force and by the New York State Council on the Arts.  The performance at the Fredonia Opera House will be the first reconstruction of the work since its performance at the London Institute of Contemporary Art.