foxtrot oscar commissioned for southbank centre’s 75th anniversary “one-off pop-cultural spectacular”

28 Jun

Written By isabel Williams

28 June 2026

By Izzi Williams, Foxtrot Oscar Founder

Foxtrot Oscar social dancer, Jeryl Burgess, in performance

“The effect was uncanny and mesmeric” - The Telegraph

“An authentically eerie evocation of smog-bound London” - The Guardian

“The jaw-dropping opening segment of YOU ARE HERE.” - Misan Harriman

Foxtrot Oscar social dancers, Sarah Davies and Jason Sousa, perform alongside actors and navigate the roving audience in the opening scene of You Are Here, with the London Eye in the background.

On 3 May 2026, sixty community dancers - recruited by Foxtrot Oscar - performed alongside professional dancers, actors and performers in “an epic, one-off pop-culture spectacular that invite[d] you on an electrifying journey through 75 years of British music, dance, theatre, fashion and film.”

Co-Creating the Movement: The 1950s Social Dance Scene

You Are Here, set out to be an immersive theatrical journey to celebrate the Southbank Centre’s 75th Anniversary, directed by Danny Boyle, Gareth Pugh, Carson McColl and Paulette Randall, with Sabrina Mahfouz and Natasha Chivers.

Our section opened the entire show, transporting the audience straight back to a Blitz-torn London in the early 1950s. The creative brief was to capture the mood of a post-war community finding connection and resilience through social dancing. The site-specific nature of the project meant that our dancers had to adapt to dancing on the uneven concrete floor outside the Southbank Centre (difficult in heels!), and the audience travelling through the performance site.

Because the main choreographer didn't have a background in traditional partner dancing, my role was to step in as the social dance specialist. I was tasked with recruiting a cast of 60 intergenerational community performers - many of whom were not professionally trained - and creating an authentic, immersive 1950s social dance scene. This was in response to archival footage of social dancing from the 1951 Festival of Britain.

How we built it together

When you’re working with a large community cast, you can’t just stand at the front of the room and dictate strict, rigid ballroom frames. It has to be a collaborative process. If people feel intimidated by technique, they lose the natural joy of the movement, which ruins the authenticity of a social dance scene.

Instead, we focused on the core elements of partner dancing: connection, rhythm, and communication. I worked with the dancers to find ways of moving that felt natural in their bodies. We adapted classic social dance structures so that everyone - from our 18-year-olds to our participants in their 70s - felt confident and comfortable.

Foxtrot Oscar social dancers, Alex Mandrut and Izzi Williams, in performance

Group of Foxtrot Oscar social dancers from left to right: Elizabeth Oliver, Kerry Frost, Nella Gocal-McConky, Marc Theron, Kitty Liao, Thorsten Dreyer, Stephen Bayley, Ralf Schiller, John Marshall

The power of an intergenerational cast

The best part of the rehearsal process was watching the different generations interact. The younger dancers brought a brilliant, raw energy to the room, while the older cast members brought a natural poise and an understanding of the nostalgia we were trying to capture.

By the time we hit the performance, it didn't look like a clinical, over-rehearsed routine. It felt like a real, living community coming together to dance in the 1950s. Seeing 60 dancers confidently commanding that entirely new space and supporting each other through the movement was incredibly rewarding, and it's exactly the kind of collaborative energy I love to bring to community projects.

*You Are Here* Opening Scene Whole Cast Photo

If you want to see more, Southbank at 75: You Are Here is available to view on BBC iPlayer here.

Thank you to the Southbank Centre and Rambert for involving Foxtrot Oscar in this project. Most of all, thank you to each and every social dancer who threw themselves into the challenge and trusted the process.

If you are interested in creating a site-specific performance, community dance projects, or bringing the joy of social dancing to a particular environment, then please feel free to get in touch via email at izzi@foxtrotoscardance.com.