Popping and locking weren’t built for assigned seating.
They were built for cyphers, sidewalks, and West Coast block parties, which is what makes 99 seats in a foothill playhouse the happy surprise.
Enter Versa-Style Street Dance Company, the LA troupe LA Weekly named the city’s best for hip hop empowerment, bringing “Box of Hope” to Sierra Madre for two nights only. Founders Jackie “Miss Funk” Lopez and Leigh “Breeze-Lee” Foaad built this edition as a 20th-anniversary love letter — to West Coast hip hop, to the styles that travel under it (popping, locking, house), and to the people who got there first.
The tribute names names: Rennie Harris, Damita Jo Freeman, and Toni Basil, still going strong; Stephen “Twitch” Boss and Marjory Smarth, gone but threaded through every step.
The roster reads like a battle callout sheet: AryLove, Siga, Essence, Mag’k, Inner-G, Marvelous, Floetic, Surge, Taktic, Noiz, Zuly, Eklypse, and J-Free. Thirteen artists who dance and teach in equal measure and, by the company’s own description, reflect LA’s complexity and diversity.
Versa-Style has been at this since 2005, when LA natives Lopez and Foaad founded it to promote, empower, and celebrate street dance — and to carry that energy from the street to the concert stage.
Sierra Madre Playhouse has spent more than a century shape-shifting, from furniture emporium to silent movie theater to the intimate house it is now, its recognizable marquee still out front on Main Street. The trophy shelf backs up the booking: Ovation Awards, NAACP Awards, and LA Times Critics’ Choice honors.
Settle into the foothills of the San Gabriels, get close enough to hear the sneakers squeak, and book before Saturday goes.
Sierra Madre Playhouse, 87 W. Sierra Madre Blvd., Sierra Madre. Friday and Saturday, Aug. 7-8, 8 p.m. For more, visit sierramadreplayhouse.org. Tickets: $12-$35.
