The Fly Honey Show, a summertime performance series created and directed by Dance Center of Columbia College Chicago alumna Erin Kilmurray ’08, is featured in a Chicago Tribune article published August 8 in anticipation of the opening of the show’s ninth annual edition, running August 9 through September 8 at the Den Theatre, located at 1331 N. Milwaukee in Chicago’s Wicker Park neighborhood.

Erin Kilmurray

Founded by Kilmurray in 2009, The Fly Honeys are a fierce group of choreographers, dancers, musicians, actors, designers, and performance artists who foster a safe space for advancing gender equality and promoting self-love. The Fly Honey Show promises an intimate yet explosive celebration of body + sex positivity through a feminist perspective with a carefully curated, rotating set of genre-defying, collaborative and radical performance acts. Reimagining the classic cabaret, The Fly Honey Show features Chicago’s premiere artists, a live band, and The Fly Honey + Hive: a fierce group of dancers, musicians, actors, designers and performance artists who foster a safe space for advancing gender equality and promoting self-love.

“The ground rules of sex positivity and body positivity are the spine of The Fly Honey Show,” explains Tribune reporter KT Hawbaker in the article. Hawbaker goes on to quote an essay published by the American Psychological Association: “Sex-positive approaches begin with the assumption that a wide variety of sex practices and desires are an inherently healthy and important component of human development and connection.” Adds Hawbaker: “The body-positivity movement arose from queer communities of color in the 1960’s as a means of battling discrimination based on factors like ability and size.”

Kilmurray, a graduate of the Dance Center’s BA Program in Dance, explains her inclusive view of dance and dancers in the Tribune article: “In the main ensemble, there are some folks that used to work professionally as dancers — they just love moving, even though they’ve changed their career path. There are folks who danced on their high school pom squad. They haven’t danced since, but I would say they are trained movers. That person’s not a professional, but they’re an experienced mover. That’s how I think about dancers.”

The Fly Honey Show has been extended to five weeks this summer, with a different lineup of talent every week. The performers and creative team include many alumni of Columbia College Chicago‘s dance, music, and theatre programs. For a full schedule and tickets, click here.