PHOTO | BRING IT!

“Bring It! Live” returns to Charlotte with a July 7 performance at Ovens Auditorium.

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“Bring It! Live” is back.

Coach Dianna Williams and the Dancing Dolls of the Lifetime television series “Bring It!” take the Ovens Auditorium stage on July 7 at 7 p.m. Tickets start at $32.75 plus fees. An added component includes the fan vs. Dancing Doll battle.

The tour begins on June 22 in Savannah, Georgia, not long after some of the Dancing Dolls graduate from high school and college. Williams, who is known as Coach D, insists the Dolls maintain excellence on stage as well as in the classroom.

“Sunjai will be on the tour this year, who just graduated from DeSales University with a full scholarship,” Williams said. “She managed to not only maintain a social life, but maintain high academic achievement, constantly on the dean’s list while still being able to do what she’s gotta do in preparing for the tour.”

Williams also referenced Dancing Dolls alumnae like Ken’janae McGowan, who just completed her freshman year at Jackson State University, where she maintained a 4.0 grade point average.

“I don’t know how they do it,” Williams said. “I think they are just super, super driven, and they know this is the expectation…knowing that they are who they are, and how to maintain grades and continuing to move forward, it’s just going to take them far.”   

Williams, who moved from Mississippi to Georgia in order to focus on family, keeps up with Doll alumnae from afar.

“Five years from now, I plan to have three more Dollhouses open in three completely different states,” she said. “I have to open up one more in Georgia, because the one that is in Stone Mountain has outgrown itself. I see myself having a talk show, and putting out a children’s book series. I see Ken’janae graduating from college. I see Makalah graduating from college. I see Sunjai starting that veterinary clinic that she has been talking about forever, because that girl loves animals.”

Another reason for Williams’ move to Georgia was to lessen the grind of media obligations. She found herself consumed by the lives of her dancers while neglecting herself.

“I spent a lot of time filming television for five years, and not focusing on my family,” said Williams, who felt she had done all that she could in Jackson, Mississippi. “When I took a look back over my own life, I had to make a decision about what was best for Diana at that time.” Opportunity called in Atlanta, and she had to answer.

“Atlanta is like little Hollywood,” Williams said. “There are movies being filmed here, commercials being filmed here.”

“Bring It!” returns on Jan. 17 at 9 p.m. ET with boys joining the Dollhouse, something Coach D had not allowed before. Prepare for pandemonium.

“Even though I moved to Georgia, the ‘Bring It!’ television show is going to be potentially coming to Georgia,” Williams said. “The show will continue to evolve, and be bigger and better than ever.”

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