‘Dance Moms: A New Era’s Glo Hampton Insists She’s No Abby Lee Miller: “I Get Results A Different Way”

Gloria “Glo” Hampton may be the coach of Studio Bleu’s junior elite team, but she also boasts another esteemed title quite fitting for her new role on Dance Moms: A New Era: dance mom.

“I’d like to think that these moms understand I’ve been there, but I am also the expert,” she explained to DECIDER ahead of the Dance Moms reboot’s premiere. “I got my daughter to a place where she can make a career dancing and doing what she loves. It’s not always easy to navigate them. Forty years of dance moms is not easy. But there comes a point where you have to lay down the law and you’re like, ‘You have to trust me and that I have the best interest for all the children.’”

Hampton highlighted that while the series is of course an iteration of the wildly popular Lifetime reality show, it’s a “new era,” with a new world, team and teacher.

“I certainly have a different teaching style than the predecessor,” she continued. “And I think that shows I’m tough, I’m absolutely tough. I just get results a different way.”

For more on Hampton’s dance coaching origins, the return of the infamous pyramid, and whether or not she sees a Season 2 in the show’s future, continue reading.

DECIDER: When did you become a dance coach?

HAMPTON: I actually started assisting other teachers when I was probably 13, so I’ve been teaching for quite a while. And then after I graduated college, one of my former teachers came to me and said she wanted to open a studio, and she wanted me to help her. And so we went and had a chat with my dad. My dad was like, “Okay, we’ll give this a try.” So he put up the walls, he did all the work, and so I started teaching. I owned my own studio at a very young age, probably like 22.

And this was Studio Bleu? Or a different studio?

No, it was a different studio. It’s still there. I ended up moving to New York for several years with my daughter, so I had to sell my part of the business.

Did you dance prior to assisting?

I did, I grew up dancing. Competition was not so big back then, it was actually just starting out in my young teen days, and it’s just grown so much since then.

I know that you’re a dance mom yourself. Of course the show would not be what it is without its signature drama. How did you approach and navigate the dance mom drama throughout this series, especially being not only a dance coach, but a dance mom yourself?

I’d like to think that these moms understand I’ve been there, but I am also the expert. I got my daughter to a place where she can make a career dancing and doing what she loves. It’s not always easy to navigate them. Forty years of dance moms is not easy. But there comes a point where you have to lay down the law and you’re like, “You have to trust me and that I have the best interest for all the children.” When you’re dealing with mothers or fathers even, in any sport, they see their kid as the star and I have to put them all on an even playing field. Obviously, there are the breakout dancers, but they also have very different strengths and weaknesses, so it’s my job to see that and navigate that.

Speaking of being a dance mom, you brought your daughter, Kaeli, in to choreograph a routine in the third episode of this season. I know that some tensions kind of arose surrounding your treatment of Audrey, who was injured also backstage. But what was it like having this go down on camera, and also getting to work with your daughter on camera?

I have a great respect for my daughter’s talent, she’s an up-and-coming choreographer. As a dancer, she’s amazing, but I didn’t realize until the last couple of years just how much knowledge and potential she has as a choreographer. So I trust her implicitly. But at the same time, the drama that went down on the show, there was a previous issue with Audrey and my daughter wasn’t aware of that. Something else happened backstage, and she didn’t have the full information before we kind of went at each other. So that was very real…she’s still young, she teaches a little differently than me.

The infamous pyramid returns in this reboot. I was curious if you took any inspiration from the original series to apply to this show?

I mean, it’s Dance Moms. It is a new era, but it’s still Dance Moms. There’s a lot of the original format. In any dance teacher’s brain, there’s a pyramid. In every class that you have, there’s a pyramid, and the kids know it by how you choreograph the pieces and where they’re put in the dances and who gets to do certain things. It’s very much out there for the world to see, but they know where they fit into that.

Had you implemented it at all previously? Or was this a new practice for the show?

Not visually, no. But again, like I said, the kids know as soon as they walk off the stage, they know how they did. They know if they’ve done their best in class, they know if they’ve been to class or if they’ve been doing the homework. The pyramid is all based on that.

On the other hand, was there anything from the original show that you kind of wanted to stray away from in your approach to this show?

I mean, it is a new era, and it’s a new world and it’s a new team and it’s a new teacher. I certainly have a different teaching style than the predecessor. And I think that shows I’m tough, I’m absolutely tough. I get results a different way.

And speaking of this predecessor, I know you mentioned in the first episode that you “used to be dear friends” with Abby Lee Miller. You cited some kind of jealousy as a result of a potential fallout.

Did I say jealousy? I did?

From her point of view, that you’re now taking over.

Dance Moms was Abby. This is why the show was wildly successful. But I don’t think it has to be the same. In fact, I don’t think people want to see the same thing. I can’t do the things the same way because I’m not Abby, I’m Glo. I can’t be compared to that, nor do I want to be compared to that, but it’s just a different time.

Have you reached out to her at all since making the show?

She actually congratulated me. She sent me a text and I was thrilled because I was like, “You know, I can use some guidance here. You did this and you got eight seasons out of this. You were the trailblazer, you are the face of Dance Moms.” And so after that, I did reach out to her to try to get together and she didn’t seem too receptive. So I’m not sure that right now she considers me a dear friend. Maybe we’ll get back to that. I’d like to.

You were really vulnerable in the second episode, choreographing “Medium,” a dance in light of the stillbirth of your son, honoring what would have been his 25th birthday. Can you speak to this experience at all?

I have wanted for years to do something to honor him, and it just seemed like the perfect timing, with it being the 25th anniversary, having this national spotlight for this platform to do that. Things happen to people in life and people are there for you, but then life goes on. And those people go on and live their lives and they don’t always remember, not that they should have to, but I wanted people to remember my son, I wanted to honor him in what I do best, and that’s teach dance and choreograph. So I thought what better time to do it then while we’re doing this show? It was really special for me and it’s something that I will always be grateful for, that I was able to do that.

It was a really powerful number. I know it also led to Mina opening up about the loss of her brother. Can you also speak to that experience and hearing her open up about this?

We had no idea, none of us knew. She actually shared it with one of the other girls in the group. And one of them came to me to tell me and I was like, no, I’ve known her for however many years, we had no idea. I think because it was so fresh, it was so extremely painful for Min, she had a really hard time talking about it. I do believe that the “medium” actually, she had a very strong feeling. And nobody was speaking up about who this person could have been. And afterward when we talked to her, she was like, “I’m sure that was Mina’s brother.” There was no doubt.

Going into this season, your primary goal is securing a national championship. But were there any other goals you had going into this show?

I mean, we always want to win, right? There was a learning curve to doing things on a much quicker scale. We usually have months to prepare for competition, and we had days. And so it was a challenge for me, but I think that was why I was so excited to do this show, was because I’ve been doing what I do for so long, it was like, hey, this is something new, I want to challenge myself, I want to step outside my comfort zone. Challenging all of us, the kids to work together to support each other. And it was something really special. I think the OG’s can attest to how special that relationship is with those kids that you spend every day with and you have to work [with] as a team.

At the beginning of the first episode, they kind of tease some of the audition process. Can you talk about how many people came out to the audition and what it was that you were looking for?

There were a lot of kids who showed up, obviously there was an age range. We have a huge studio. In the area we live in, there are a lot of government workers, so a lot of parents couldn’t commit to doing the show, but the kids that did come out, we had some really talented kids. But it came down to who can really work together, who’s going to take the corrections, who can I make gel as a group, right? And who is going to be captivating. It’s not entirely about the dancing, they have to have the personalities to go with that. Then it’s my job to somehow manage to take all of those different dancers and personalities and make them work as a group.

What are you hoping that fans can take away from the show?

First of all, where I’m concerned, this is my life’s work. This is what I’ve done since I was literally a teenager, it’s just on a much bigger scale. But I’m happy to show that, I’m so excited for people to see what I’ve done all of these years. I’m also excited for them to see these amazingly talented little girls and their personalities and I think they’re going to be mega stars. And they deserve it. They all deserve it.

Do you see a Season 2 in the show’s future?

There’s nothing I want more than a Season 2. I told you there was a learning curve. So I think now, we feel much more comfortable, we know what we’re getting ourselves into. I think that we could knock a Season 2 out of the park.

This interview was edited and condensed for clarity.

Dance Moms: A New Era is streaming on Hulu.