Not Strictly Ballroom.

LONDON--A huge, mirrored panel slowly opens, and a solitary couple in dove-grey satin waltzes out to the strains of Erik Satie's Trois Gymnopedies. The music swells to the Carousel waltz, and forty-two precision dancers suddenly swirl into view--a Strictly Ballroom beginning to a show that quickly becomes incendiary. The waltzing women's skirts light up, and Burn The Floor erupts into a dance extravaganza geared to audiences who love to watch arena dance.

Following in the footsteps of Riverdance and Lord of the Dance, Australian producer/promoter Harley Medcalf has developed Burn specifically for wide-open-space auditoriums like London's Albert Hall, New York's Radio City Music Hall, and Los Angeles' Universal Amphitheatre, where Burn opens its U.S. tour on March 29. Then it flames across the country from New York City to Miami, including Boston, Chicago, Detroit, and Atlanta. Says producer Medcalf: "I got the idea at Elton John's fiftieth birthday party. Peggy Spencer [the doyenne of British social dance] organized a ballroom dancing entertainment for him. It was a fusion of the wonderful traditions of ballroom dancing with technology, creativity, and the energy of rock `n' roll. I was bowled over."

Tour promoter Medcalf and his creative team, which includes director/choreographer Anthony Van Laast and artistic director Jason Gilkison, spent a year developing the show, which takes the everyday basics of championship ballroom-lindy, hip-hop, jive, samba, rhumba, jitterbug, salsa, cha cha cha, and waltz--and effectively energizes it further in new formats, such as "street funk" and "urban industrial."

It meant working with a very different mindset for the twenty-two championship couples from sixteen countries who make up the cast. They had to work on adjusting their egos, reining in their competitive spirits, and adapting to ensemble dance with no particular stars. Says Matthew Cutler, 26, a British amateur cup-winner and ranking medalist: "Instead of `two people dancing as one,' which we get dinned into us for pro-ballroom competitions, it's a lot freer. You feel easier, knowing there are no judges around to fault your style, hairdo, or costume." Adds his wife and dance partner, Nicole, "It felt strange at first, but now I really like it." Yet in a show that features no one over anyone else, these two make a particular impression. For them, showbiz proper could be the next step.

Aimed to attract an audience that grooves on spectacle, Patrick Woodroffe's lighting for Burn is industrial-strength rock concert style, with spotlights, smoke and strobes used lavishly. The eclectic sound score features everything from Bizet to Berlin, including "primo techno" music by Stephen Brooker. Bonita Bryg's sometimes funky, sometimes retro costumes are the ultimate in vulgar glitz, eschewing professional ballroom's beloved puffy tulle skirts for plastic, chains, and calculated bareness. Fast-paced, the show skips around from the Busby Berkeley thirties to the jivin' forties. If there's one really bad spot, it's the Carmen melodrama, where unfortunate Peta Roby, adorned in a long red wig with two purple horns thrusting from it, is obliged to flounce around while two macho matador types battle for her favors to tango, rhumba and flamenco tempi, with a little Tchaikovsky thrown in. More elegant is the "chess" number where couples elegantly outfitted in black and white thirties-style costumes glide around to The Continental.

Along with synchronized swimming, ballroom dancing is being promoted by its organizers as a non-competitive Olympic sport--odd, really, because it's so competitive outside the Olympic arena. There's nothing Olympian about Burn The Floor. But it's pretty good entertainment if you're tired of trying to distinguish between the quickstep and the dead.

A shorter version of Burn The Floor, adapted for television, was aired on PBS stations during December.