All Night Long!

Natalie Kostich '00 was incredulous when her Holy Cross classmate and former ballroom dance partner, Jamie Linden '00, called her one Monday night. Sure, they've danced together in the past - but on such short notice? And on live TV?

"He gave me about two hours notice with no details," explains Natalie, who rushed out of Boston on the last bus to New York City, where Jamie had told her they would be participating in a "dance-a-thon." She arrived in the Big Apple at 3:30 a.m. to some surprising news. "Jamie had conveniently neglected to mention that I would be dancing for 26 hours straight! I had thought we were going to dance for an hour or so and then leave, but luckily I happened to pack a comfortable pair of shoes."

It’s a good thing she did, because four hours later, the couple joined 48 other dancers, including Thom O'Leary '00, at the Good Morning America (GMA) studios in Times Square. The event kicked off on the television program at 7:45 a.m. and lasted through the entire day, night and the following morning. Luckily the dancers got a 10-minute break every hour and 30-minute breaks for breakfast, lunch and dinner, amidst hours of dancing the cha-cha, swing, hussle, mambo and hip-hop.

ABC also arranged for guest stars to stop by all event-long. Natalie and Jamie got to meet Olivia Newton-John (Grease), Kelly Preston (Jerry Maguire, For Love of the Game) and actors from the shows Fosse and Cabaret. Jamie even got to dance with Kelly Preston - what a lucky guy!

At the end of the event, only 10 couples were still dancing - including Natalie and Jamie. They were also one of the top five finalist couples that were judged by GMA's viewers online. Check out the results!

In addition, both alums got to meet GMA's hosts, Charles Gibson and Diane Sawyer. After the event they were interviewed by the program, Inside Edition, and Boston-area resident Natalie was interviewed by the Boston ABC morning news show.

Jamie had heard about the "dance-a-thon" the day before through the studio where he takes dance lessons in New York. "It was one of those once-in-a-lifetime opportunities that you just can't turn down," explains Jamie. "And my boss was really cool about me missing work - at first I was thinking about calling in sick, but I realized that could be bad if my boss saw me on TV!"

Natalie lives in her hometown of Belmont, Mass., and works at EF Educational Tours in Cambridge, Mass. She started dancing as a child and took up ballroom dance at Holy Cross. She and Jamie have been ballroom dance partners for almost four years; they were both avid members of the Holy Cross Ballroom Dance Club.

Jamie currently resides in New York City and works at the accounting firm of Ernst and Young. An economics/accounting major at Holy Cross, Jamie is originally from Darien, Conn. He continues to take dance lessons, claiming that it's a "release… something to do that's different."