For my holiday production i have a special part that i need to fill. i don't want to hold auditions so that is out. I thought of using the person who had zero absences last year but I already gave her a special thing for that (should have been thinking farther ahead I guess). So now I have narrowed it down to three girls. They are the three that are in all of the classes I offer so they would be easier to work into all of the choreography (no one can argue with that). I was seriously going to have them each put their name in a hat and I would draw one out but...one of the girls won't be able to perform the part as well as the other two. She is very shy and I don't think she can pull it off. I tried thinking up two other special parts but it just doesn't really work.

What do you all do in this situation. I don't want to hurt feelings but the production needs this. Any help would be great!

How many performances are you going to do, if it's more than one why don't you have, principal dancer A and, principal dancer B so they both get to perform.

I take the oldest one, because there will be other chances for the younger one.

Usually with special parts at our studio it comes down to who's been dancing the longest. I'm not sure if that's another way to separate the girls apart in your case or not but that's how we do it. Or one year the studio did a "Scenes from an Italian Restaurant" production and the two dance company captains got to be Brenda and Eddie. But I'm assuming these are younger girls in this case?

Just curious, what is the "special part"?

Yes they are younger girls (8 yrs.) and the ones who don't have the part will be in the same dances so there is no way (unfortunately) to have an A and B dancer for each show (though there are two shows). They are literally all three the same age (born in the same month!) Hmmm what to do, what to do???

Oh yes and if I took the one who was technically dancing the longest (though basically they have been dancing almost the same amount of time) I would be taking the one that I don't think could pull it off! LOL. But I do love all of your ideas in any other scenario...just not sure about this one.

I usually take who fits the part and who will work hard. If the others cannot handle that, they will learn. I hate stepping on eggs with students. If they cannot accept that not all things will come to them, then they need to learn this.

I have explained, in groups and classes, why someone has a part and the importance of all parts, like a sentence missing the small words would be a bad sentence, or a recipe missing ingredients.

There are NO small parts (jsut small people).

Whenever I have special parts, I always have 2 dancers learn them, so maybe you could use both of your stronger ones after all. In my productions where they're both in the same dance, I have them learn 2 parts--the lead role, and the part they'll be dancing when they're not doing the lead. Then they switch off.

I agree w/JLL about the weaker girl--if she's not ready, then she's not ready, & it's OK to tell her so. Just be encouraging that you're confident that she'll eventually grow into such a privilege someday, but for now, she has other issues to concentrate on & develop.

I don't think you need to explain yourself to anyone. You don't need a reason for choosing someone other than you felt they were the best for the part.

When we were kids dancers were chosen for special parts all the time and no special reason was ever given to us or our parents. Yes, sometimes we were jealous of not being chosen but kids will be jealous of others even without special parts.

This is part of the performing world.

Thanks everyone! They are just so young...I don't want to hurt any feelings. And...sometimes I think there is a little competition between two of the moms (the girls are great friends). The one I will be picking is the one that everyone sees as the "best." It's really not that she is so much better than the others she will just be able to pull off a character roll better. You are all right I can do what I want LOL. That is one reason I love this job!