Halloween Creepy Crawlies

The Story

Our story starts when Mallory (a ghost) awakes on Halloween Eve to find that she has been removed from her haunted house! After figuring out how to move her various limbs again (or lack thereof), she runs into Jake. This twirling and bouncing Jack O Lantern directs her to talk to the mysterious ballerina witches of the Foggy Forest. Jake gives Mallory a map to find the Foggy Forest and hopefully to meet the ballerina witches for their advice. The witches take her to their Cauldron of Truth where Mallory is told that she will have to help the jazzy vampires and modern dancing mummies at Creepy Crawly Lane make amends for the Cauldron to help her.

When Mallory and Jake make their way to CCL, they find the jazzy vampires and modern dancing mummies in a fierce candy stealing war. She and Jake convince them that if they share all their entire candy stash, everyone will end up with enough candy. On their way back from Creepy Crawly Lane, they run into a tap-dancing skeleton getting ready for a dance performance. They stop to watch her dance and wish her luck! Then back at the Foggy Forest, the Cauldron produces a map back to Mallory’s haunted house. The production ends with Mallory waving from the stoop of her haunted house with Jake handing out candy to the Halloween Trick or Treaters.

CHOREOGRAPHERS + PERFORMERS BIOS

Brandie DeJesus (they/she) is a Chicago-based professional dancer, choreographer, and teacher with a BFA in Modern Dance from Point Park University. Throughout her training and performance career, she has performed works by renowned choreographers including Martha Nichlos, Penny Saunders, Camille A. Brown, Paul Taylor, Jessi Stegall, and others. Passionate about movement, collaboration, and artistic growth, Brandie is continually seeking new creative projects and opportunities to expand her artistry while sharing her love of dance through performance, choreography, and education. She is currently dancing with Hedwig Dance Company as of 2026.

Ashton Craven (she/her) is a Chicago-based contemporary and tap artist. She spent her childhood training at Dance Center North, Libertyville under the direction of Stacy Keller. Ashton holds a Dance BA and Biological Sciences BS from the University of California-Irvine, where she studied with Molly Lynch, Charlotte Griffin, Lar Lubovitch, Katarzyna Skarpetowska, and Tong Wang. Her interdisciplinary thesis research culminated in a dance film using contemporary movement to explain complex microbiological topics. Ashton now trains with Chicago Movement Collective under the guidance of Ethan Kirschbaum. She has performed in collaboration with Winifred Haun and Dancer’s 3rd Coast Program in Persistent Spring and participated in the 2025 Dance for Life finale choreographed by Jonathan Alsberry. She teaches tap at various Chicagoland studios and works as an arts administrator with Ballet Chicago.

Cailey Evans (she/her) is a dancer from Raleigh, NC. She grew up training under the direction of Debra Sayles Senchak, Brian Youngkin, and Cari Lenn Youngkin, with a focus on classical ballet and Horton-based modern as well as jazz, contemporary, musical theater, and character dance. She has attended programs at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts and The Ailey School. After high school, Cailey attended the University of Alabama as a dance major for two years where she continued exploring her artistry. Following her time at the University of Alabama, Cailey completed Visceral Dance’s trainee program in Chicago. Cailey is now working as a freelance dancer around the Chicago area.

Mariah Eastman (she/her) holds a BFA from Virginia Commonwealth University in Dance and Choreography and recently received her MS in Leadership for Creative Enterprises from Northwestern. In 2021 she created Café Cortado which explored caffeination culture and highlighted two local Chicago coffee shops through prerecorded interviews, dance film and livestream dance. She started her own company “Darvin Dances” in 2023. Since January 2023 Darvin Dances has performed in multiple productions including the following; First Draft produced by Winifred Haun & Dancers, Breaking the Silence Café produced by Resilience Chicago, Common Ground produced by The Rooted Space, On the Move and Wave Walls produced by See Chicago Dance as well as their inaugural production of “Inclined to Decline”. Eastman has also toured her work in New York City, Baltimore, Marthas Vineyard and Richmond (VA). She is the creator of the Chicago Dancer Pay Transparency Project under the Darvin Dances umbrella. In 2024, she received an Individual Artist grant from DCASE for Halloween Creepy Crawlies. Darvin Dances also received a grant from Night Out in The Parks in 2026 for “Take A Chance” and “The Choreographic Mad Lib”

Gabriella Estes (she/her) is a recent BFA alumni of the University of Arizona School of Dance. During her time there, she trained at the professional level in ballet, jazz, contemporary, modern, and commercial dance styles. She was selected as an artist for the University of Arizona Dance Ensemble, where she performed works by Tamara Dyke- Compton, Michael Williams, Cat Cogliandro and Juel D. Lane. Most recently, she performed in the Finale for Dance For Life Chicago in August of 2025. In the past few years, she has had the opportunity to train with Boston Dance Theatre, Hubbard Street Dance Chicago, Visceral Dance Company, Alonzo Kings Lines Ballet, River North Dance Chicago, and Interlochen Academy for the Arts, to name a few, under partial and full scholarships. She is super excited to be a company member with Darvin Dances!

Caleb Ryan Jones (he/him) is a professional scenery chewer and freelance yapper who trained at Columbia College Chicago where he graduated in the inaugural class of Comedy Writing & Performance. He is an alumni of Nashville School of the Arts. His recent credits include: Stage Frights! (Director/Performer), Child Protection (Martin), Henry IV; Part I (Owen Glendower/The Douglas), The Matchmaker (Horace Vandergelder), Spirit: The Authentic Story of the Bell Witch of Tennessee (James Johnston), and Three Sisters (Kulýgin). @the_bookeyman. 

Vanessa Maxwell (she/her) started dancing at the age 4 and tried many styles over the years including ballet, modern and hip hop. She graduated with a BFA in Dance from Columbia College Chicago in 2019. She has been teaching dance for over 11 years to students aged 6 months old through the age 14 years old in a variety of styles such as creative movement, jazz, tap, ballet, and hip hop across the Chicagoland area. She is currently twirling away as the Studio Coordinator as well as the Principal Teacher of both Tutu School Roscoe Village and Tutu School Lincoln Park. 

Mandy Milligan (she/her) has danced with companies from all over the midwest such as Mamluft & Co., Dance Kaleidoscope, Winifred Haun & Dancers, Simantikos Dance, Cocodaco Dance Company, Kanopy Dance Company and Darvin Dances. In addition, Mandy Milligan graduated from University of Cincinnati Summa Cum Laude with a BFA in Ballet Performance. She received additional training at the Graham School for Contemporary Dance, Beijing Dance Academy, Dance Works Chicago, Interlochen Center for the Arts, San Francisco Conservatory of Dance and Perry-Mansfield.

Since moving to Chicago in 2017 her choreographic work has been shown at the Links Hall 40th Anniversary Celebration, the Overture Center in Madison WI, Dance Chance, Going Dutch Festival, First Drafts, RADfest, St. Louis Contemporary Dance Festival and Dance City Festival Chicago. Her dance film work has been shown at PREheat, enCore dance film festival and Dance City Film Festival. Mandy is currently the rehearsal director and dance artist with Darvin Dances. She is also the director of Mandy Milligan Movement Project.

Maggie Caitlyn Sedlacek (she/her), Mags, is a dynamic movement artist, dancer, choreographer, and battler who began her career in the Chicagoland area with guidance from Angelina and Karlo Familara. She graduated from Illinois State University under the director Laina Reese Werner-Powell in 2025, and has since collaborated with Chicago Dance Crash, the Chicago Dance Health Fund, and Trinity Irish Dance Company. In addition to dancing, her choreography has been featured at ACDA, Alluvion, Bodies of Water, We Are Collective, Still Inspired, Solarium, and Trifecta Artist Festivals. She is driven by the intersectionality of dance genres, specifically hip hop technique and contemporary, continually creating movement that pushes boundaries.

Sidney Valdez (she/her) is a multidisciplinary dancer from Elmhurst, IL. After growing up dancing at DuPage Dance Academy in Elmhurst, Sidney furthered her interest in both dance and the mind-body connection at Dickinson College, Carlisle, PA where she graduated with a BS in Neuroscience and Dance. Sidney is a current Claire Bataille Legacy Program Student at Chicago Movement Collective and Staff Writer for See Chicago Dance. She also teaches dance to students of all ages in the western Chicago suburbs and is a physical therapy tech at Midwest Orthopedics at RUSH. Sidney is so excited to continue her dance career with Darvin Dances!

Alicia Wilson (she/her) is an award-winning choreographer and costume designer, dancer, and teacher, based in Chicago. Originally from Columbus, Ohio, she received her BA in Dance from Columbia College Chicago in 2015. She has performed at the Chicago Salsa and Bachata Festival, and internationally, at the Collide Dance Festival in Stratford, England. Alicia’s passion for teaching and dance technique development has opened many doors for her, including her position as the Director of the Competition Company at Dovetail studios from 2021-2026.

Thank you to our sponsors!

This performance has been generously subsidized through Chicago Danztheatre Ensemble’s artist's support and residency program