A critique of the Glee wheelchair choreography (the "Proud Mary" routine from a while ago) by someone who does wheelchair dance: [link]

And then there's the sad fact of the "dancing;" the choreography sucks. The one potentially interesting move that McHale supposedly "does" is a cut -- he wheelies on one rear wheel. The rest is notable only for the way that it shows that able-bodied, non-wheelchair-using folk really do think of chairs as bicycles you move with your arms. There's absolutely no body-chair integration at all. They think of sitting in a chair as being only about not being able to move their legs (and in Artie's case as being about having his hips and legs twisted to one side). That mistaken understanding leads to some very weird looking people in chairs. On chairs would be a better phrase for it. The fake paralysis of their legs somehow wends its way up their bodies so that they are really only able to push with their elbows (no wonder they have sore arms!).

I'm so glad I got to see the wheelchair dance vids you posted, Hil. I wish the choreographers at Glee could see them too.

I'm so glad I got to see the wheelchair dance vids you posted, Hil. I wish the choreographers at Glee could see them too.

It took me less than five minutes to find those. There are dozens if not hundreds more on YouTube (for some reason, a huge portion of them are from Eastern Europe), and quite a few of them list the choreographer. If Glee actually cared about getting the wheelchair choreography to look good, it would be simple to call up a few of those choreographers and say, "Want to work on a few episodes of our show?" Or even contact some of the dancers, so that there would be people with actual experience in the type of dance they're doing.

It looks like Nick Scott has a special chair but I don't see why Artie couldn't have a chair for dancing too.

It looks like Nick Scott has a special chair but I don't see why Artie couldn't have a chair for dancing too.

Yeah, I mean, we've already got costumes and lighting and bands appearing out of nowhere. A dance chair would fit in fine.

How so, smonster?

The disability blog posts I've read on the subject all point out how his legs fall to one side and that means it doesn't fit. Having had an ergonomics assessment done on my office chair, I can totally see this. I would think that especially not having leg mobility, it would be important to have the correct distance from seat to footguards, to avoid putting pressure on his joints. Hell, I'll bet it's even not good for the actor to be sitting in that chair all day.

Oh my, "Dream On" was delish and oh so awesome, and "I Dreamed a Dream" was so powerful and apt and perfect. I cried.

I mean, there's the inherent power of the song, but it still needs to be done well, and it so so was.

Most people in wheelchairs on TV don't have things that PWD really have. Not that I can comment on this specific instance cause...I don't know, I find Glee kind of watch-from-the hall...it made me feel awkward. I don't know why.

Wow, community theatre auditions are never really like that.

Also, the woman singing Big Spender would make a terrific Mrs. Thenardier.

Also, the woman singing Big Spender would make a terrific Mrs. Thenardier.

I was thinking the same thing.