Dorfman tells students connection is key amid dance group’s tribute to Max Heller

You could almost picture New York’s busy streets as 14 Furman University dance students strode confidently across the stage at McAlister Auditorium. 

Their strut halted halfway across before they performed a modified chassé, a triple-step that turned them around to stride the way they came, then a sudden leap back as if avoiding a splash of water from a passing car. 

Their dance, performed Jan. 27 under the direction of guest conductor Carolyn Dorfman, told the story of Eastern European immigrants in a world of opportunity and hope after coming to the United States to escape the horrors emerging in Europe in the 1930s. 

Furman students joined members of the Carolyn Dorfman Dance company for a dance techniques class in McAlister Auditorium on January 27, 2025. Photo by Nathan Gray, Furman University.

“Showcasing to the Furman community the joy and power of dance is so very important,” said Helen Joy, adjunct dance professor. “The arts bring value to our humanity, the capacity to communicate beyond words allows us to see more possibilities in ourselves, and each other.”

Dorfman brought her dance company, Carolyn Dorfman Dance, to Furman to perform a tribute to former Greenville Mayor Max Heller. Heller, who escaped Austria to avoid the Holocaust, and his wife Trude Heller were great friends of Furman. The Heller Service Corps is named in their honor.

While in Greenville, Dorfman delivered a Cultural Life Program discussion about dance, she taught Joy’s class and a class for the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute, and she worked with students from the Fine Arts Center and the Governor’s School for the Arts and Humanities.

“The goal is connection. I want you to be yourself,” Dorfman told the Furman students, encouraging them to lock eyes with one another as they stepped in rhythm across the stage. “Dancing is a dialogue.”

Theater arts major Ciara Cox ’25 said Dorfman treated the students with compassion and her focus on considering the movements of the other dancers helped them bond with one another. Dance classes have helped Cox feel better connected to her fellow students and feel welcomed throughout her time at Furman.

Tribute to Heller

Dorfman founded Carolyn Dorfman Dance 42 years ago. Through it, she has taught others to tell evocative stories through dance. Her seminal body of work, The Legacy Project, taps into her experiences as the daughter of two Holocaust survivors and explores themes of genocide, resilience and the hope found through the immigrant experience.

Dorfman told Furman dance students that connecting with one another is the key to telling great stories through dance during a techniques class January 27, 2025. Photo by Nathan Gray, Furman University.

“A Dance by Chance in the Park,” is the new prologue her dance company presented in a performance on Tuesday, Jan. 28 in McAlister Auditorium. It tells the story of when Heller met Mary Mills, a girl from Greenville  he shared a dance with in Vienna. They exchanged letters for months after she returned to America, but as the Nazi’s neared Austria Heller wrote to Mills for help. She encouraged a local businessman to sponsor Heller’s immigration and give him a job at the Piedmont Shirt Company.

Heller would go on to marry Trude, whose family had also escaped Nazis in Austria, serve two terms as Greenville’s mayor and serve on the city council, championing affordable housing and diversity in municipal hires.

“I believe that we all have a hero within us, and we can create those changes we want to see,” Dorfman said. “One action can save a life and change the world. This is my way of saying we can make the world a better place.”

That’s the legacy Heller left at Furman – one the university is lucky to have the opportunity to continue through the Heller Service Corps, said Meredithe Carr, assistant director of the Trone Student Center, orientation and Heller Service Corps.

“By connecting current Furman students with volunteer opportunities in the greater Greenville community, we hope we are able to showcase the servant-leadership that the Hellers exhibited during their time leading Greenville,” she said.