Sometimes a great Halloween costume isn’t about how intricate it is, but whether the person wearing it truly captures the spirit of whomever he or she is supposed to be. Take for instance, Erica Lall. A corps member at the American Ballet Theatre, Lall probably didn’t have to dig too hard to find the garments necessary to play The Fresh Prince Of Bel-Air’s Aunt Viv—specifically, Aunt Viv in the season two episode “The Big Four-Oh.” Nevertheless, Lall totally nailed her performance, which just happened to take place on a Lincoln Center stage in New York.
As you’ll no doubt recall, Viv (the original one, played by Janet Hubert) goes into panic mode upon turning 40, so she decides to take some dance classes. After her first one goes very poorly, she resolves to get better, then absolutely dominates a routine set to C+C Music Factory. Naturally, Lall has the skills to perform the basic steps, given that she’s a professional dancer, but she’s also stylistically spot-on in her recreation of Viv’s idiosyncratic moves. Lall, mind you, isn’t the first performer to take on this specific scene for Halloween: Last year, Kinky Boots’ Nick Rashad Burroughs posted an abbreviated rendition, necessitating an unexpected debate over which dancer paid finer tribute to this particular dance sequence from a 1991 sitcom episode.
[via @ira]