Summer Nights Live: Fighting Gravity

Fighting Gravity - Performing July 29 – August 4

Get ready to question reality, the laws of physics, everything! Fighting Gravity's mesmerizing spectacle of light and illusion will have you on the edge of your seat, wondering what fantastical trick they can possibly pull off next. Performing at Busch Gardens Williamsburg as part of Summer Nights Live for a limited engagement, these America's Got Talent finalists should be at the top of your must-see list this summer!

Busch Gardens Williamsburg: Welcome to Busch Gardens! What’s Fighting Gravity’s story? How did you get started?

Fighting Gravity: We started out around 2009 on a whim at our college, Virginia Tech. Go Hokies! A group of us in our fraternity thought it would be fun to put together a blacklight routine for a talent show that a local sorority was sponsoring. When we put that routine together, it was just for fun and we never thought we’d ever be doing it again. But someone in the audience happened to record it and posted it to YouTube where it got around half a million views! Needless to say, we were all pretty shocked that it went viral. One of the comments on the video said that we should submit it to America’s Got Talent, and one of the guys said what the heck! and sent it in. Then one of the producers from AGT called us up and asked us to fly to NYC to perform! We were shocked, excited, and just a little nervous because we never expected to be in that position. From there, it took on a whole life of its own and it’s been a tremendous experience.

BGW: It’s awesome that you have members from across the country and walks of life! How did you assemble such a diverse crew?

FG: The crew came out of a combination of necessity and friendship. As we wanted to create more complex routines and travel to more locations, we needed to find more people to join our adventure – people who were born performers and not just college students. Throughout our time on AGT and on the national tour that followed, we met quite a few dancers and became great friends with them. So over time it was just a matter of asking them if they were interested in being on our team. It’s been about ten years now (wow, time flies!) and some of the very first dancers we brought on are still with us today. We’re incredibly lucky to have grown up together, traveled the world together, and seen people from our Fighting Gravity family go on to do incredible things! Past Fighting Gravity members have become featured dancers for Jennifer Lopez, Nikki Minaj, Meagan Trainor; performed on World Of Dance; produced shows for The Walking Dead; and even gone to work at SpaceX! While it’s hard work doing what we do, we have a lot of fun together and don’t take one second of it for granted.

BGW: What’s your process for creating a new routine? How do you collaborate to bring your vision to life?

FG: The process of creating a new routine is mostly a mass amount of planning. When you watch the show itself, it’s hard to tell just how much is happening on stage since everything is blacked out. There are so many moving pieces and complex choreography happening on that stage that the audience will never get to see. So whenever we want to create more material or add a new illusion, the first questions are often, do we have enough people on stage to make this happen? And, what is the feeling/effect that we want to bring to life? Sometimes it takes several people to perform one tiny trick, so we need to make sure we have the right amount of people available. Outside of that, the process always begins with a small concept, like skateboards, and everyone starts to throw ideas in the ring. We get as many as possible then start to narrow them down based on the logistics of what’s happening on stage, the music, the props, and how long we want a piece to be.

BGW: What has been a highlight of your time as Fighting Gravity?

FS: I think I can speak for everyone by saying that the tour after being on AGT was one of the biggest highlights. We got the opportunity to travel the country with 13 of our closest friends on tour buses for two months, all while performing in 24 different cities. Nothing will ever come close to being able to replicate that moment in time in our lives. It’s a time that we will all cherish forever. We’ve had a lot of other incredible highlights that to this day, seem like a dream. Performing with Jennifer Lopez and Will.I.Am, collaborating with Far East Movement, becoming friends with the insanely talented Glitch Mob, and performing around the world in countries & cities like Dubai, China, Mexico City, Canada, and London. We’ve been so fortunate to experience different cultures and meet great people across the globe. Not bad for a bunch of students from Virginia Tech!

BGW: What’s next for you guys? Anything exciting coming up?

FS: Performing at Busch Gardens Williamsburg, of course! With our roots in Virginia, this is just a great kind of homecoming. We are so grateful for the opportunity and are excited to entertain park-goers with something they probably have never seen before or only online. There’s nothing like connecting IRL!