Fajardo: The Beat Goes On

Based on the true-life story of Billy Fajardo, it begins with his growing up in a "hard knock life" in the Bronx and his early success as a teenager who formed the famous "Dance Dimensions" with teenage friends from the hood. Discovered by nationally syndicated columnist Earl Wilson, he makes it known to his millions of readers that these young Puerto Rican kids are tearing up the disco dance floors all along Broadway and disrupting the status quo, i.e, the dances they're bringing down from the South Bronx to Manhattan are couple centric and require the learning of dance steps, something that had been forgotten during the freewheeling world of popular dancing at that time. Unknown to everyone, however, is that they're all underage and uncarded. The youngest, a girl named Sandy, is barely 13-years-old. Their discovery leads to them becoming the house dance troupe for Don Kirshner's Rock Concert. Never having left the Five Boroughs, the kids suddenly find themselves shooting a hit TV series in Hollywood. Unfortunately, sudden wealth at such an early age and a need to get high to handle the pressures that come with running the dance troupe turns Billy into a junkie. Fired from the show, he becomes a dealer too, and is ultimately caught and sent to prison. It's there he discovers he's HIV Positive from sharing needles. Upon his release from prison, he fights his way back to regain his position in the dance world. With choreographer Katie Marlow's help-- whom Billy soon falls in love-- and his "five-year plan" which involves a lot of pain, suffering, and bruised egos, they become world champions in ballroom dance, revolutionizing it with over-the-top audacious physicality and sensuality. Now a competitive dance team for nearly 20 years, they also produce two of the most highly recognized social dance events in the world today -- the International Hustle Salsa Congress and the World Salsa Summit.