Paula Abdul’s “Damn Hard, Strong Dancers”: Power, Gender, and Dance
Paula Abdul made this striking statement about her choreography during an interview in the late 1980s, a period when she was experiencing unprecedented success as both a choreographer and pop star. At this moment in her career, Abdul was actively choreographing for major music videos and live performances while simultaneously launching her solo recording career, which would culminate in the massive success of her 1989 debut album “Forever Your Girl.” The quote emerged from discussions about her distinctive choreographic style, which demanded explosive energy, precise technical execution, and an almost athletic intensity. By making this statement, Abdul was essentially articulating something that had become evident to anyone watching her work: her choreography defied the softer, more traditionally feminine aesthetic that had dominated pop music videos throughout the 1980s. Instead, she created movement vocabularies that required the physical stamina and muscular control typically associated with male dancers, even as she was building her career in an industry that often relegated women to more decorative roles.
To understand the significance of this quote, one must appreciate Paula Abdul’s unique position in entertainment history. Born Paula Julie Abdul in 1962 in Los Angeles, she grew up in a household that celebrated both dance and music—her father was a film director and her mother an interior designer and former ballet dancer. This creative environment nurtured her multifaceted talents from an early age. Abdul began studying dance at age five and became a serious student of several disciplines, including jazz, ballet, and contemporary dance. However, unlike many dancers who followed a traditional path through prestigious ballet companies or modern dance troupes, Abdul’s career took an entrepreneurial turn when she began working as a choreographer for various artists while still in her twenties. This was remarkable because the world of music video choreography in the 1980s was male-dominated; names like Michael Peters (who choreographed Michael Jackson’s iconic videos) and Kenny Ortega dominated the field.
By the time Abdul made her statement about demanding choreography, she had already distinguished herself as one of the few female choreographers breaking through in an industry that historically treated dance as either a supportive theatrical element or a vehicle for displaying the bodies of female backup dancers. Abdul’s work with The Jacksons, Janet Jackson, and other prominent artists demonstrated that choreography could be a primary creative force shaping how pop music was experienced visually. Her choreographic choices were characterized by sharp, angular movements combined with smooth isolations, a style that drew from both jazz and contemporary techniques while incorporating street-style elements that would later influence the development of hip-hop dance aesthetics. The difficulty of her choreography wasn’t incidental—it was intentional. By creating steps that required significant technical ability and physical strength, she positioned dance as an art form demanding respect and serious skill development, rather than something ornamental or secondary to music.
A lesser-known aspect of Paula Abdul’s career is how her transition from choreographer to recording artist was far from inevitable or obvious at the time. In 1988, when she released her debut single “Straight Up,” many in the industry were skeptical that a choreographer could successfully become a performer. The music industry had relatively few examples of successful dancer-to-pop-star transformations, and gender dynamics made Abdul’s path even more uncertain. Yet “Forever Your Girl” became one of the best-selling debut albums of all time, spawning multiple number-one hits and making Abdul a bona fide pop superstar. What’s particularly interesting is that her success as a recording artist didn’t diminish her credibility as a choreographer—rather, it enhanced it. When she appeared in her own music videos, audiences could see firsthand that she could execute the demanding choreography she created. This unified vision of artistry—being both creator and performer—was relatively novel and helped establish her as an auteur in an industry that typically separated these roles.
The quote itself has resonated through decades because it addresses fundamental questions about gender, strength, and artistry that remain relevant today. When Abdul stated that her choreography “suits men very well,” she was making a political point disguised as an observation. She was acknowledging that her work operated outside traditional gender expectations for dance—it was powerful, demanding, and didn’t apologize for requiring strength. By then noting that “women who can do it are damn hard, strong dancers,” she was simultaneously celebrating the women who could meet these standards while implicitly critiquing the notion that women dancers should be limited to softer or more ethereal movement qualities. In essence, Abdul was advocating for an expansion of what women’s bodies were permitted to do in popular culture, using her own choreographic demands as the vehicle for this argument.
This quote has been employed and reinterpreted in various contexts over the years, particularly as conversations around female empowerment and representation in dance have evolved. Dancers and choreographers working in contemporary dance, hip-hop, and commercial styles have cited Abdul’s work as evidence that women need not conform to gendered expectations about movement quality. The quote has also appeared in discussions about the “male gaze” in choreography and performance, with critics and scholars using it as a point of reference for understanding how some female artists have deliberately created work that resists being created for passive consumption. In the age of social media, the quote has circulated among dance communities, often presented alongside clips of Abdul’s iconic choreography as proof of her prescient understanding of what dance could be and do.
What makes this quote resonate in everyday life is its broader applicability beyond the dance world. Abdul’s statement is fundamentally about refusing to be limited by expectations attached to one