The time of their lives.

November 1, 2018 3:13 AM

Noah and PJ's wedding dance. A few minutes of love and levity. This couple absolutely smash their wedding dance mash up (SLYT), with some inspiration from Ex Machina thrown in there!
posted by smoke (31 comments total)

Oh that was just a wonderful, fun, loving little video to warm my heart on a cold fall morning.

But who ARE these people that have the time to practice these elaborate dances before their wedding?
posted by Paladin1138 at 4:05 AM on November 1, 2018 [7 favorites]

Somewhere over the past couple of years I came across an argument that dance at its core was extremely distilled and elaborated way to express "Look at how beautiful I am/we are!". Like every such all-encompassing argument, I don't know that I buy it. But whatever the intent in the present instance: message received. That was/they are gorgeous.
posted by Ipsifendus at 4:19 AM on November 1, 2018 [3 favorites]

Two more people more awesome than me.

Great job guys. Congratulations and happy life together!
posted by MrGuilt at 5:25 AM on November 1, 2018

Oh, just lovely!
posted by Sublimity at 5:26 AM on November 1, 2018

Ooooh that was lovely. Nothing like that ever happens at the weddings I attend but I keep hoping.
posted by kinnakeet at 5:51 AM on November 1, 2018 [2 favorites]

Oh, man. They're the best. You could just tell from the spins in the first "conga" part that we were in good hands. I don't want to spoil the end, but they're even better than I first thought!
posted by gladly at 6:06 AM on November 1, 2018 [1 favorite]

Yeah, these two are fantastic dancers. I'm sure they choreographed ... most of that ... themselves. I love a lead switch. And I love them!!!
posted by ChuraChura at 6:09 AM on November 1, 2018 [1 favorite]

Normally my cranky, cold, dead heart scoffs at this type of thing, but even I laughed and teared up a little. How lovely!
posted by bighappyhairydog at 7:29 AM on November 1, 2018 [3 favorites]

LOVE
posted by cooker girl at 7:29 AM on November 1, 2018

So extra
posted by GuyZero at 7:30 AM on November 1, 2018 [1 favorite]

my cheeks are dying from smiling so much oh my god thanks
posted by nogoodverybad at 7:32 AM on November 1, 2018 [2 favorites]

I hate show-offy weddings, and the surprise dance is the epitome of show-offy wedding-ness. On the other hand. I love things that are INCREDIBLY GAY, so I am, on balance, in favor of this one.
posted by Orlop at 8:03 AM on November 1, 2018 [7 favorites]

I actually laughed and cried. Well done.
posted by greermahoney at 9:15 AM on November 1, 2018 [1 favorite]

Leave it to the gays to make weddings not suck
posted by Automocar at 9:36 AM on November 1, 2018 [1 favorite]

Nothing about the Young Frankenstein reference?
posted by Samizdata at 9:46 AM on November 1, 2018

This is a much better thread than the Carly Rae Jepsen one.
posted by allkindsoftime at 10:43 AM on November 1, 2018

Also smoke how did you find this and do you know these guys? I want to be friends with them.
posted by allkindsoftime at 10:44 AM on November 1, 2018

The lift! Oh, my streaming eyes. Lovely.
posted by freya_lamb at 10:59 AM on November 1, 2018 [3 favorites]

Yet another reason why it was a shame to not have gay marriage for so long.

Ipsifendus, dance does so much! Communicates masculinity and femininity, virility, attraction, and love; communicates social status, celebrates harvests, imitates animals, issues challenges, transmits culture or at least its idealized versions. My sister tells jokes by dancing. My favorite move in the African dance community I participate in exaggeratedly communicates "oof, that last move I did, I am too old to pull that off," and is usually a self-deprecating lie.

But yeah, there is "check me out!" on top of that much of the time.
posted by gusandrews at 11:30 AM on November 1, 2018 [2 favorites]

Aw, this is delightful! These two seem like they'd be fun to be friends with.
posted by Lexica at 1:45 PM on November 1, 2018

This is the absolute best part of my day. Thanks for posting.
posted by A Terrible Llama at 2:10 PM on November 1, 2018 [1 favorite]

Also smoke how did you find this and do you know these guys? I want to be friends with them.

It was on a small british gay news website, that a friend of mine reads, and he shared with me. I don't know them one bit!
posted by smoke at 2:33 PM on November 1, 2018

Possibly the gayest thing I’ve ever seen - and I’ve had my own gay wedding.
posted by Middlemarch at 3:11 PM on November 1, 2018 [1 favorite]

Fun detail I noticed in the "Time Of My Life" section at the end - they're re-creating the final dance from the movie, but they trade off the "Johnny" and "Baby" moves. Like, near the start of the song one guy does a sort of backbend - Baby does that in the movie. Right after that they're both facing forward and the guy in front turns to the side and runs his hand down the other's face - which is another of Baby's moves in the movie but here the partners have swapped which one is in front at that point. So they didn't just copy a well known dance and pick one guy to be "the girl" - they mixed it up so both dance both parts. Nicely done!
posted by dnash at 4:59 PM on November 1, 2018 [3 favorites]

That joy in each other- I hope they never lose it. So wonderfully lovely. Thanks for posting - I think we all need this in our lives.
posted by gemmy at 5:21 PM on November 1, 2018

My ex teaches partner dancing and does a lot of wedding couple work. It's not atypical for prospective clients to:

A) Show her one or more professional dance routines, usually from movies/music videos they want to try to adopt for their wedding.

B) Want the routine worked out in 2 or 3 one hour lessons which they'll try to cram into the week before the wedding.

C) Want the lessons discounted because "they're on a tight budget."

D) Will have zero experience partner dancing.

So I shared this with her for a laugh. These guys either did a lot of dancing together already and/or put some serious number of hours into learning and practicing the routine with a teacher.

I also predicted that in the next couple of months she's going to be shown this video by some prospective clients and...well, see B through D.
posted by Insert Clever Name Here at 7:17 PM on November 1, 2018 [6 favorites]

This actually brought me to tears as the sweetest, most joyful expression of love I've seen in a very, very long time. Bravo to the happy couple and many many years of joy for them!
posted by annieb at 12:59 PM on November 2, 2018

Oh, yay! A wedding-planner friend posted an abridged version of the video this morning and I was annoyed it didn't show the whole dance. Thank you!
posted by lazuli at 4:12 PM on November 2, 2018

This is definitely one to save for the “bad day, please lift my mood” file. So lovely!!
posted by obfuscation at 4:13 PM on November 2, 2018

This was just wonderful and their love for each other and dance shone through! It was an absolute joy to watch. It made me whoop with delight and cry with delight. Also, they must be near my age bc most of the music was from Gen X heyday.
posted by honey badger at 9:52 AM on November 4, 2018

So well done, and so many smiles, but also: who ARE these folks?

The Times knows. The second paragraph has a fun fact:

Noah Aberlin and P. J. Simmons are to be married Oct. 7 at Mr. Aberlin’s family home in Earlton, N.Y. Robert Aberlin, the father of Mr. Aberlin who became a minister of Rose Ministries for the event, is to perform the ceremony with E. Joseph Simmons Jr., the father of Mr. Simmons.

Mr. Aberlin (left), 36, is the director of operations at the Paul Taylor Dance Foundation in Manhattan. He graduated from Syracuse University.

posted by uberchet at 1:40 PM on November 6, 2018 [2 favorites]