Lennon Torres is an advocate and former competitive dancer, who rose to fame as a child star on Lifetime’s Dance Moms. In an exclusive essay for Us Weekly, Lennon looks back on her experiences as a competitive dancer and on reality TV and accusing both the show and industry of perpetuating child abuse. Us has reached out to Dance Moms star Abby Lee Miller and the series’ production company for comment but have not heard back at the time of publication.
It has been three years since a story broke that the mega dance company Break the Floor Productions was exposed for child abuse, and I still haven’t seen the progress needed to ensure these atrocities stop for good. As a past attendee of countless Break the Floor conventions and competitions, the breaking news put a pit in my stomach and sparked a reflective walk through of some of my own experiences during my dance career. In fact, I am disheartened, but not surprised, to see that new dance competitions continue to pop up. And even less of a surprise that the same person who built the infamous, abuse ridden culture reported on by the Associated Press, is the owner of the new competition’s trademark. This continues to create environments ripe for abuse.
Competition dance in the United States is inherently exploitative and the industry is bigger than ever, as young dancers all over the country building toward this summer’s Dance Awards, a national competition held in Las Vegas. I have no doubt there will be routines with young children wearing close to nothing, with caked-on make-up, and performing provocative choreography on stage. But what I am most interested in unveiling is that the inappropriate costumes and choreography are just the tip of the iceberg.
I filmed Dance Moms during my early teen years and spent most of my adolescence as a competitive dancer. It was a norm to be left without an adult guardian in casinos, hotels and convention centers, spending time with fellow dancers of all ages or even older choreographers. Dance Moms nationals in 2013 sticks out to me. I can close my eyes and still smell the stale, cigarette-smoke-filled hallways and templated rooms in New Orleans. I remember we were close to Bourbon Street because our choreographer and one of the moms went out partying some of the nights, leaving her son in the care of my mom.
On one of the other nights, we decided to stay in as a team, kicking back in a room with our choreographer and the dance mom that he went out with that same week. Both adults in the room were smoking cigarettes in a smoking-free hotel. I remember being terrified we were going to get in trouble from the hotel security, while also wracking my brain trying to figure out how to not smell like cigarette smoke when I went back to my room.
That night continued at a similar pace, with a few Instagram posts requested by the choreographer hoping to gain more followers and notoriety, something most of us kids had from the show. Dancers who travel, on and off TV, have likely experienced something similar to this. Whether it be after hours in a hotel ballroom learning the combinations to be taught the next day, or in the hotel room of the choreographer you are assisting, we were often left feeling that opportunities could be lost if we “couldn’t hang,” didn’t fit in or didn’t boost the popularity of the choreographer by posting on Instagram. In the worst of scenarios, many dancers experienced sexual abuse. Looking at middle school kids I am around as an adult now, I can say with 100 percent certainty that a lot of what I — and many of my friends — experienced as a child dancer was unacceptable.
Earlier that same season of Dance Moms, I was given the opportunity to compete in a duo with my teammate, an opportunity I remember not being thrilled about because more time on stage meant more time in hostile rehearsal environments. After a long week of rehearsals, and many tears, my duo partner — now a dancer for Sabrina Carpenter — and I were ready to perform our father and son themed duet. I was the father.
I got off stage and remembered feeling proud of the performance. That reality was crushed when my mom told me that she heard the lead of Dance Moms, Abby Lee Miller, say I looked like a pedophile, right after the routine ended. And she went further, saying that the duet was inappropriate. I remember feeling sick to my stomach, knowing that I was just called one of the worst things you can call someone of any age, at 13 years old. And that it might air on TV for the world to see. Luckily, that was not included in the final edit, and, randomly is one of the episodes conveniently left off of Hulu, but the impact still stuck with me and is often one of the first things I think about when recalling my time on the show. That and the fact that I was encouraged to stage a “romance” between me and one of the other costars, sparking a flurry of conversations about my sexuality before I was ready to have that conversation myself.
I am not trying to sink the entire dance industry and stop kids from being able to express themselves artistically and independently from their parents. I also am not saying that Dance Moms, or even the specific people referenced, are the only villains in my story. There is, however, a larger question we have to ask ourselves: Why is the first instinct of one of the most infamous dance teachers to view two kids dancing together in a sexual manner?
I asked myself that same question and decided to write this. I consider myself retired when it comes to my dance career, but as I recall much of my childhood through the lens of child sexual exploitation, and the work I do at Heat Initiative, I am disgusted. Our kids deserve better, and dance deserves better.
If you or someone you know is experiencing child abuse, call or text Child Help Hotline at 1-800-422-4453.
