Vanity Fair: This was the first round of DCC auditions and training camp since the Netflix series debuted in June 2024. What makes someone a Dallas C
Vanity Fair: This was the first round of DCC auditions and training camp since the Netflix series debuted in June 2024. What makes someone a Dallas Cowboys cheerleader for the “right reasons”?
Kelli Finglass: Savannah, to be sincere with you, our audition process is a pretty well-oiled machine. As a result of COVID, when we wound up having to take our round one and round two auditions online, it gave us the chance to judge more thoroughly. We can see the technique, the talent, the creativity. We see their hometowns. If they want to be identified with Arkansas, they show their high school gym or college in Fayetteville. We’ve had girls dance in front of the Eiffel Tower. So by the time they make it to Frisco, to our final round of auditions at our world headquarters, they’re all college dancers, concert dancers. This year we had this uptick in cruise-line dancers. So the ones that aren’t here because of dance technique and training fall out of the process early on.
Do you ever see a future in which social media plays more of a role in who ultimately makes the team?
I’m not there yet. I’ve kind of resisted it, but I’m learning and growing. I’ve definitely seen great things happen in social media; it does give people a platform to shine in their talent. Outside of that, I’m not personally scouring social media to find dancers. But everything is evolving, and we will stay as relevant as we can while at the same time maintaining our organization’s standards and a great degree of tradition.
This season Judy Trammell, the squad’s head choreographer, confesses to reading Reddit comments about the team. Do you ever wander into the comments section?
No, but I know the girls have had a lot of critics. I’m sure I do too; I just don’t personally consume it. It’s not going away. It affects people. This year it was actually brought to my attention and surprised me. Even [cheerleader] Anna Kate [Sundvold], you can see in the TV show, is receiving criticism that is completely unfounded.
The words of people, while they can be very, very uplifting… Like in my personal case with my skin cancer journey, the people that reached out to me were extremely supportive. Words can hurt and they can also heal. I’m trusting humanity to facilitate figure this one out because it’s a much bigger thing than I can solve. But the girls being busy and focused and supportive of each other is where our strength will remain.
The show has attracted celebrity fans like Kacey Musgraves, who joins this year’s audition process as a judge. Who would you be most excited to see on the sidelines at a Cowboys game?
Well, yes, but unfortunately, it’d be from heaven: Freddie Mercury of Queen. This year Dua Lipa came to a Monday Night Football game. She was so excited about the cheerleaders. The next day we got a phone call that Dua Lipa is in Dallas, and she wanted us to perform with her. She had a song called “Physical” that was dance-based; we were able to put that together and it was incredible. We have music video offers, a lot more high-level entertainment asks are now very commonplace.
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