Daddies Shouldn’t Breakdance

(Celebrating the 29th Anniversary of the ground-breaking film Breakin’)

by
Jimmy Mak

Whether it’s Boogaloo Shrimp’s surprisingly homoerotic performance as the jilted best friend, the classic ‘Romeo & Juliet in the hood’ subplot, or the stupid-fresh dance moves, it would be hard to deny that the film Breakin’ is not very good.  (Don’t worry, even I’m confused by that last sentence.)

But in 1984I seriously considered it to be the greatest movie of all time.  Had I known who Orson Welles was (besides being the fat guy at the end of the Muppet Movie) I would have pictured him sitting through the pop-locks and body-waves in complete and envious awe, his mouth agape.  True, it was probably agape because of the popcorn, nachos and hot dogs being shoved into it, but agape nonetheless.  I imagine seeing the final images of the movie reflected in Orson’s eyes – a neon-grafitti spectacle as Turbo, Ozone and Special K “break” in unison.  The image goes to black except for the simple words “Coming Soon – Breakin’ 2 Electric Boogaloo” which causes Orson to spit out his food and utter the ultimate praise, “Word.” 

When I was growing up there were two things that saved me from being pummeled by the older kids like most of my friends were.  The first thing was I could usually make them laugh.  I did impressions of teachers and other kids at school and it never failed to get a great reaction from the older students.  One time I was on a roll and decided to slip into Groucho Marx, who my dad believed to be the funniest man in the world. 

“I can see you now bending over a hot stove,” I said, doubling over into groucho’s posture, holding a fake cigar and raising my eyebrows up and down.  “But I can’t see the stove.” 

I stood in silence as the older kids’ eyes went from blankness to confusion to something like anger.  Acting on instinct I turned into the biology teacher Mr. Columbo and said, “Today I’ll be giving a lecture how to dissect a fart.”  Big laugh.

The second reason I didn’t get beat up was that I could breakdance. I have no idea how my super-skinny white suburban body was able to learn and fine-tune the breakdance vocabulary, but there I was … worming and spidering and crabwalking and twisting into a plethora of contortions named after small disgusting creatures.  This was a big hit with the tall muscular black kids at the middle school, who invited me to join in their ‘break circle.’

A break circle was basically a group of young men who would do kind of a skip step around a piece of cardboard until someone (no doubt inspired by the intricate sounds of Rapper’s Delight) would jump in the middle and proceed to get down with his bad self, which is slang for … actually, I don’t know what it’s slang for, but here I’m using it to mean “breakdance.”  The other guys in my break circle had names like Smoov D, Papa Smurf and Jingle Bear (who wisely re-named himself MC Kill a year later.)  Refusing to breakdance with “Jimmy,” they soon handed me the moniker of “Phantom J” which was and will always be the coolest nickname I’ve ever had.

Whereas being funny had always made me kind of goofy, being able to breakdance made me kind of … cool.  I would go to the skating rink on Saturdays from 12 – 5 and at 2:30 they would clear the floor, play some rap and let the kids breakdance for a song.  It was there I found my signature finish – using my elbows to hold up my body, I would walk around on my hands and then slide onto my back whereupon I would do a ‘kip,’ which is rolling back onto my shoulders and propelling myself up onto my feet, a move seen in any kung-fu movie.  I called it the crab-walk kip combo.  And I’ll be honest, it got me more than one girlfriend.  (Tricia, Cassie …and um … hey, two’s more than one.)

When Breakin’ came to the theater just blocks from my house, my friend Jamie Beadling and I saw it approximately 314 times.  We had it memorized.  We quoted it like it was a Monty Python movie.  We studied the moves.  Like my imaginary Orson, when the words promoting Breakin’ 2 appeared we enthusiastically worded it up.

Now, I don’t remember when it happened but breakdancing did go out of style.  However, I never forgot my moves.  The only difference was that now instead of cool, they made me even goofier.  Breakdancing had become … funny.  Needless to say, my groupies dissipated and I went back to being that somewhat weird but safe guy that girls would talk to about their boyfriends and remind me constantly that I was “like a brother” to them.

20 years later I was working as a writer / performer for Shadowbox, a sketch comedy and rock ‘n roll club in Columbus, Ohio.  We were putting together a Christmas production and it was decided that the band would do a version of Run DMC’s “Christmas in Hollis.”  (If you’ve never heard this song, please don’t feel the need to run out and purchase it.  I have too many things to feel guilty about and would rather not add that to the list.)  Somewhere along the lines the choreographer decides to add a dance to go with it and somehow she finds out that I can breakdance.  She asks to see my moves and I show her.  She’s impressed.  So much so that she gives me a solo – four eight-counts to do whatever breakdance moves I want.

I guess I should also mention at this time that I have just become a father and the most exercise I do is trying to push my wife out of bed when the baby is crying.  In other words, my body isn’t exactly the same body that folded and twisted and leapt and spun all those years ago.  We started rehearsing and when it got to my solo I ran to the front of the group.  I popped.  I locked.  I waved.  I wormed.  I spun.  I crab-walked.  I kipped.  I fell.  I hurt.  I cried. 

I was lying crumpled up on the carpeted stage wondering how my body was ever going to forgive me, when one of the younger guys in the dance walked over and looked down at me.  I was waiting for him to ask if I was OK, but all he said was, “Dude, daddies shouldn’t breakdance.”

That was a hard moment for me.  I had always been a firm believer in the Breakin’ 2: Electric Boogaloo tagline which was – “If you can’t beat the system … break it!”  I guess I just felt a little different about it when the “system” happened to be “my spine.”