Character Competition: What It Is, Where It’s Run and How It’s Judged

A studio dance style in which the routine is built around a role, persona or story, told through costume, acting and movement, and entered as its own section at dance competitions in the United States and Australia.

Character is a performance style in which the dancer, or the whole group, plays someone: a figure from a story, a period or a tradition, or a persona invented for the piece. The routine is marked not only on the steps but on how convincingly the performer becomes that person, in how they walk, how they hold their face and how the costume and the movement agree with each other. At a dance-studio competition it is entered as a section of its own beside Jazz, Lyrical, Tap and the other styles, rather than being absorbed into one of them.

The word carries two meanings, and the syllabus matters. In classical ballet training, character dance means the stylised, theatrical versions of folk dances, such as the mazurka or the czardas, danced in character shoes and full skirts. On the competition circuit the heading is also used more loosely for any routine whose central idea is a role or a story. None of the eTalenter templates that carry the section prints a definition of its own, and one US rule book simply says a routine goes in whichever category best describes it, so the safe course is to ask the organiser which meaning the section uses.

A round runs like any other style at these events. Routines are called in a running order, the dancer or group performs one piece to recorded music inside the printed time limit, and the panel scores it live. Five of the six templates offer Character from solos through duets and trios and small and large groups up to lines, and one of them also runs it as a production routine of up to eight minutes. The sixth, an Australian series, runs it for solos and for duos and trios. Each entry size is then repeated across the age divisions and levels, so the same style can be entered by a five-year-old soloist and by a studio line of older dancers.

Organisers keep Character in the programme because it rewards dancers who tell a story, which a purely technical style does not, and it is often the section audiences enjoy most. For the coordinator it needs no special equipment beyond what any dance section uses, but a character routine leans on costume and sometimes on props, so read the event’s own props and safety rules before choosing a concept that depends on them.

Where Character comes from

Character dance in the ballet sense grew out of the nineteenth-century ballet stage, where choreographers adapted national and folk dances, such as the Polish mazurka and the Hungarian czardas, for the theatre. It is still taught as a subject of its own in classical ballet syllabuses, which is why the name turns up on competition programmes. The studio-competition use of the word is broader and varies from one event to the next.

Where Character is run

In the templates eTalenter holds, Character is a dance-studio competition section. Five of the six templates are United States studio dance competitions, each listing it among between 16 and 24 printed categories; the sixth is a dance competition series in Victoria, Australia, that lists it as one of its genres. These are adjudicated studio-circuit events rather than school festivals, and the age divisions, levels and scoring differ from one event to the next, so always follow the syllabus of the event you are entering.

• United States
• Australia

Key facts

• Individual in solo sections, and Team in duet/trio, small group, large group, line and (at one event) production sections
• Open to both genders in every template that carries it
• Time limits run from 2:00 to 3:00 for a solo, from 3:00 up to 5:00 for groups and lines, and up to 8:00 for a production where one is run
• Scored on a 300-point scale in four templates and out of 100 in the other two
• Only one template names the headings its judges score on (technique, difficulty, execution, choreography, showmanship and overall presentation) and it prints no marks for each, so no per-criterion marks are published for this section
• Age divisions run from the youngest division for children (six and under or younger) up to adults in the US templates, and from six and under to an open age in the Australian one, with novice, intermediate and advanced style levels on top

On eTalenter, Character is filed under Dance and typically scored with Marks. It appears in 6 ready-made event templates — each one can adjust its time limit, age-group assignment and scoring setup independently.

Across the templates that use it, Character is most often entered as an Team competition, typically scored out of 300, commonly time-limited to 2–8 minutes where a limit is set.

What judges look at in Character

What a Character panel is actually weighing up, and where the marks are usually won or lost:

• No template prints marks per criterion for Character, so what follows is general advice plus the headings one US syllabus names: technique, difficulty, execution, choreography, showmanship and overall presentation
• Commitment to the role from the first count: the panel is looking for a dancer who is the character, with the walk, posture and gestures of that person, not a dancer wearing a costume and doing steps
• Costume and styling that match the idea, without the costume doing the work the dancing should do; a strong silhouette helps, but a prop or hat that distracts from the movement loses more than it gains
• Technique inside the character: clean, controlled steps and a secure line, because a story told with sloppy footwork still reads as a weak routine, and difficulty only counts when it is executed cleanly
• Choreography that tells the story, with a clear beginning, development and ending, rather than a set of unrelated steps stitched to a theme
• Showmanship and facial expression, which carry the role to the back of the room; a blank face or a fixed smile throughout is the commonest way to lose marks here
• In duets and groups, a shared characterisation: every dancer holding the same attitude and the same timing, as well as unison and spacing

Treat these as the judging focus, not a fixed rubric: publish your own weighted criteria for Character under Scoring Setup, or start from the full group dance competition judging criteria guide.

How to prepare for Character

How entrants and their teachers usually get Character right on the day:

• Ask the organiser, or read the syllabus, to find out what the section means by Character, and check the age, level and entry-size rules before registering, since the sections differ between events
• Put the character into one sentence before any choreography is set: who they are, what they want and how they feel at the end; every step should then be able to answer to that sentence
• Rehearse the walk, the posture and the hand gestures separately from the steps, and run the routine in the real costume and shoes well before the event so nothing changes on the day
• Cut the music to the printed time limit and rehearse with a stopwatch; two of the rule books print overtime deductions (one point per 15 seconds in one, one point per 5 seconds in another), so a long routine costs marks
• Work the first eight counts and the last pose hardest: a clear entrance in character and a held final picture are what the panel remembers
• Read the props and safety rules, plan any quick change or prop handling backstage, and walk the stage floor before going on so a slippery patch does not catch the routine out
• Ask for the judges’ written comments after the event and use them to decide whether the next version needs a clearer story, cleaner technique or stronger expression

Frequently asked questions

Is Character judged individually or as a team?

Across eTalenter’s templates it’s most often run as an Team entry, though an organiser can set either participation type when assigning the item to an age group.

Is Character the same as character dance in ballet?

They are related but not always the same thing. In ballet, character dance is the stylised stage version of folk dances, danced in character shoes. In many studio competitions the Character section is used more loosely for any routine built around a role or story. The templates do not print a definition, so check the event syllabus.

How is Character different from Musical Theatre or Song and Dance?

Musical Theatre and Song and Dance sections are tied to the musical stage, to its songs, and in the second case to singing and dancing together. Character is built around a role regardless of the style of the music. Events that carry several of these sections expect one routine to be entered in the one that fits best.

How long can a Character routine be?

It depends on the event and the entry size. Across the templates a solo runs from 2:00 to 3:00, duets and trios up to 3:00, small groups 3:00, large groups up to 4:00 and lines up to 5:00, with production routines, where run, up to 8:00. Always check the limit in the syllabus you are entering.

Is Character judged individually or as a team?

Both. A solo is judged as an individual entry. Duets, trios, groups, lines and productions are team entries, where the panel also looks at how evenly the dancers share the same characterisation, timing and spacing.

Which age groups can enter?

The US templates run it from their youngest division for children (six and under or younger) up to adults, and the youngest division is often a placeholder floor rather than a printed minimum. The Australian template runs it from six and under up to an open age. Check the age rule of your event, because several use the average age of a group.

Want the full judging picture? Read the full group dance competition judging criteria guide, or browse every dance competition item.