Vivian Nixon

Currently: Making her Broadway debut dancing to Earth, Wind and Fire favorites as Kalimba in the new musical Hot Feet.

Hometown: Santa Monica, California. "I was born in Miami," says Nixon, "because I was three months premature. I was supposed to be born in California."

One of the Boys: Nixon grew up surrounded by stardom—her mother is dancer/choreographer/producer/
director/actress Debbie Allen, and her aunt is actress Phylicia Rashad—but the whirlwind of show biz hardly fazed her. "Actually, I took on a lot of my dad's side," she says with a laugh, referring to former basketball player and now actor Norman Nixon. "I've always been athletic, and I wanted to be with the boys and play basketball. My mom encouraged me not to do that because I'd always get banged up and bruised."

The Apple Doesn't Fall Far: Nixon has been developing her own hot feet "since I could walk," she says. "There are home videos of me choreographing numbers when I was little." Gymnastics took priority until she was 13, but when a fellow gymnast fell and was seriously injured, Mom stepped in: "She was like, 'Time to find a new hobby!'" With Allen's blessing, Nixon began formal training at the Kirov Academy of Ballet in Washington, D. C., which they discovered when Allen was producing, directing and choreographing the show Pepito's Story. Though Nixon began her studies much later than most serious ballerinas, she took on the challenge with gusto. "My mother nudged me in the right direction," she says, "but I made the ultimate decision."

Stepping It Up: Now in her final year of the Ailey/Fordham BFA Program in Dance, Nixon describes the combination of luck and preparation that led Hot Feet's conceiver/director/choreographer Maurice Hines to cast her as Kalimba. "My name came up a few times from different people, and he actually came down to the school and looked in on one of my jazz classes," she recalls. "He told me about [the show] and invited me to take class with him. He asked me to audition and eventually offered me the role, but a lot of it had to do with being in the right place at the right time."

Boogie Wonderland: Hot Feet follows the classic storyline of The Red Shoes with a '70s funk facelift, and Kalimba is the ambitious girl at the center of it who can't stop dancing literally. "There's no doubt that this show is taxing," she says with a chuckle. "There was a point when I never left the stage for the entire ballet, and when I tell you I was reconsidering my decision to go into this profession, I'm not kidding!" Although modifications in the show made her role more manageable, Nixon notes that the challenges keep coming. "You have to find your pace. It's a slightly different show every night, but I love it."

Oldies but Goodies: It's impossible to be involved in a show like Hot Feet which includes several new songs by Earth, Wind and Fire's Maurice White in addition to well-known hits, and not get caught up in the group's unique sound. Asked if she had a history with the music, Nixon doesn't hesitate: "Absolutely," she says, smiling. "In the house, during barbecues, whenever… they were definitely coming out of the speakers. My parents listened to a lot of the Isleys and Earth, Wind and Fire and all that old-school stuff, so I'm hip to it."