Photos provided by DCC
When Kelli Finglass lands in Little Rock for her much-anticipated Oct. 21 appearance at the Little Rock Touchdown Club, it will be a homecoming in more ways than one. Besides being in the thick of Dallas Cowboys fan country, the longtime director of the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders spent a good deal of time in the state growing up — her grandmother was from Little Rock and is buried in Cabot, and family reunions were held in the Natural State, in addition to regular pilgrimages to Stuttgart for duck hunting.
Not that Finglass feels out of place much. When you’re part of one of the most iconic dance and entertainment franchises in the world for four decades and have a hit Netflix series on your hands chronicling the current squad and its leadership, fame precedes you, and everyplace you hang your hat is home.
From Lindale, Texas, Finglass enrolled at Texas Christian University in Fort Worth, from which she auditioned for and made the first of five DCC squads. A natural showstopper, she so epitomized the DCC ethic that she is still the only woman to have made her fifth year without being required to audition. Following her retirement and armed with an international marketing degree from the University of North Texas, she was set to join UPS when she was hired by Arkansan and new Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones as an assistant director to the DCC in 1989. She took a brief detour to the sales and promotions department before being promoted to director of the cheerleaders in 1991 at age 27.
Finglass performs in the old Texas Stadium. Photo provided by DCC.
Since then, she has preserved the quality of the team’s reputation while pushing it relentlessly forward. Employing a savvy entrepreneurial sense while keeping out opportunists, exploitation and controversy, her time at the helm has grown DCC into a cultural phenomenon unequaled since its humble founding in the early 1960s. Merchandise, public service and enshrinement of a DCC uniform in the Smithsonian all came on her watch, along with hundreds of television and stage appearances and epic live performances, including with legendary rock band Queen and the iconic Dolly Parton.
Finglass and the squad have also been the centerpiece of reality television for nearly 20 years, starting with CMT’s Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders: Making the Team, for which she served as executive producer and which aired from 2006 to 2021. Netflix’s America’s Sweethearts: Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders followed in 2024. Because of the series, Variety declared Finglass one of its “Most Powerful Women on Reality TV.” The show is currently in production for its third season.
“I was told I was picked for my smile.” A flamboyant performer, Finglass was also a leader of her DCC squads in the mid- to late 1980s before joining the Cowboys front office and the Jones family’s inner circle. Photo provided by DCC.
Arkansas Money & Politics sat down with Finglass to learn of life in the hottest spotlight in sports entertainment.
Q: For little girls growing up in Lindale, Texas, during your era, what did you aspire to be?
A: You know, growing up in east Texas, everything was about Friday-night football. The culture starts early with getting to go to pep rallies that highlight the football team. In Lindale in particular, our marching band was highly, highly acclaimed. I knew I wanted to be in the band, and I wanted to be a twirler. I liked their costumes, I liked music, and I really wanted to someday be the drum major. Fortunately for me, it all came true and laid the groundwork for the career I have right now.
I went to TCU as a dance major, and then, at the end of that year, I tried out for the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders, and when I made cheerleader is when I kind of pressed pause on college. When I did that, my dance appetite was completely fulfilled with being a Dallas Cowboys Cheerleader.
Q: Anyone who saw the Netflix series America’s Team: The Gambler and His Cowboys saw what a culture shock it was when Jerry Jones bought the team. What was that like from the inside?
A: There were cheerleaders at the time that walked out when Jerry bought the team because they’d heard of all these changes he was making. I’d just retired, I was finished with the Cowboys, and they walked out of Valley Ranch over to my apartment to voice their concerns about it. I’m like, “Well, has anybody talked to Jerry? I mean, where are y’all getting this information?”
When Jerry bought the team, I don’t think he realized he was also going to be managing probably the world’s largest ambassadors of dance. I don’t think he realized the visibility of it all, so I called the offices and spoke with his assistant to ask for a meeting and [to] discuss why these cheerleaders walked off and that I thought they needed to communicate with him to know what’s going on. Jerry had that meeting, and I wasn’t there, but he spoke with them, and they all came back the next day. The rest is history.
Photo provided by DCC.
Q: Suzanne Mitchell, who was director while you were on the team, is credited with setting the mold of the modern Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders. What did you learn from her?
A: I had a great relationship with Suzanne. She was the right director for me. She carried a big stick in the entire Dallas Cowboys organization. Besides being our director, she was [former president and general manager] Tex Schramm’s right-hand woman, so she had a lot of power. She led our group with great discipline, perhaps intimidation a little bit. She was a natural leader and my style of leader. Anybody who didn’t want to conform and play by the team rules would not have fared well with Suzanne, but I did, and I thrived under her. She was also the right person because when the cheerleaders really exploded in the 1970s, Hollywood and Playboy and everything in between was coming for the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders, and they needed a strong protector-style director.
Q: Back then, they didn’t necessarily use terms like “creating a brand,” but that is, in fact, what the star and DCC represent. Was that something that really came to be during your time as director?
A: No, that started under Suzanne’s leadership. We were definitely a culture of tradition and pride and honor, almost like the military. It was very natural for me when I became in charge to say, “We’re going to do this over this, and we’re not going to do this.” I’m not a big fan of the word “brand.” I bought into the legacy and the responsibility of it.
Q: You have a degree in marketing. How did you apply business sense to the DCC?
A: Jerry wanted the cheerleaders to at least pay for themselves, not be a cost center. I’ll never forget my first meeting with the department heads. I had my yellow legal pad where I’d written out this list of things that in my heart and my head I thought the cheerleaders could do to help generate a profit while also staying consistent with who they were.
For example, many of the cheerleaders are great dance teachers, so we started dance camps. The cheerleaders are beautiful models. There’s modeling agencies all over Dallas. Why don’t our girls model at corporate appearances? I took what I thought we already did well and tried to build business models while staying aligned with who the cheerleaders were without overcommercializing it.
With Jerry, if you had an idea, he wanted to try it. It was fun. I’m an idea person, and I got to explore all of my ideas.
Finglass has also spent considerable time and energy strengthening the connection between current cheerleaders and the vast DCC alumni. Photo provided by DCC.
Q: Let’s say for the next tryout, you receive an audition video from your younger self. What would your assessment be of this former drum major from Lindale, Texas? Would you have put her on the squad?
A: As a technical dancer, 1984 Kelli compared to the 2025 dancers, I would’ve probably scored, let’s give me a B-minus. Discipline, field projection, showmanship — I would’ve given me an A. I had showmanship, and I was told I was picked for my smile. That came easy to me, the confidence on a football field.
I had a genuineness, thinking back. I wish I could find my original application, which had about 10 essay questions. I probably sent in a 23-page document, so I, as director, would’ve seen me as being an overachiever, someone who would’ve been a good teammate and a good leader on the field.
Also, while I did not initially have the same technical skills that they have today, I got better every year. Our choreographer was a very skilled teacher, and I absolutely became a better dancer because of her. In terms of my style, I was front and center by the end of my career because of projection and power. I was a very clean, powerful dancer. I could do the high kicks with a big smile.
Q: You hold the unique distinction of not having to audition for your final season. What did that mean to you?
A: Everyone auditioned in May, and my fifth year, I was right on the cusp of graduating college and taking that first job. I remember being on the phone with Suzanne, and I wasn’t sure I was going to try out for a fifth year, and she told me, “You don’t need to try out. You have nothing more to prove to me. You can have a spot on the squad without auditioning.” It took the pressure off, so I took my fifth year, and I’m glad I did because it was a great final chapter for me. We’ve never done it since, so that was a big honor, especially coming from her, for sure.
Photo provided by DCC.
Q: Is there something special in the DCC culture about reaching fifth year?
A: Well, it used to be very rare. When I became a fifth-year cheerleader, I can only think of one other girl who’d done it, so it was very unique. I made a big deal of it later. We had a gold necklace made. It was our original logo with a yellow rose. I started giving that after I became director, and when we had a cheerleader that went for five years, I gave her a fifth-year charm. I guess it became one more milestone if somebody could get their fifth-year charm and be in that special group. It’s more common now — I had two five-year cheerleaders last year, and I have five this year — but it’s still an incredibly long commitment. The average is three years.
Q: Talk about the challenges of transitioning from team member to director.
A: It was very natural for me. People had looked to me as a group leader and a team captain and almost Suzanne’s assistant on the team, so I started off strong. In fact, I was pretty ruthless. I was very strict and very stern and very unbendable. I’ve evolved somewhat. Some things are still very black and white for me, but I’ve learned through the years. I think I’m probably more of a cheerleader’s cheerleader now and a motivator and a developer. I like seeing them reach their potential. I like to find the good in people. It’s very rare that I give up on a cheerleader. Even if she’s made a mistake, I try to help correct that. I started with a much more stern, intolerant style, and I guess that’s because that was Suzanne’s style, and that’s just all I knew.
Q: America’s Sweethearts, especially the second season, delves into some really vulnerable moments that show a human side to its cast — including you — that reality TV generally does not capture.
A: The TV show actually helped me because even I was learning things about the girls. Oh my God, I have one cheerleader who takes collect calls from her father who’s incarcerated. I have another cheerleader who just lost her father. I have another cheerleader who’s battling a medical condition that affects her confidence. There were so many backstories of the cheerleaders and their families, and I just see them more holistically than I used to. It’s been a journey.
Finglass with former cheerleader and current DCC head choreographer Judy Trammell. Photo provided by DCC.
Q: What has kept the DCC so far ahead of not just other pro football franchises but pro sports all the way around?
A: Well, I think we had the right idea at the right time in the ‘70s. I give that credit to Tex Schramm and Dee Brock, the original director, and Texie Waterman, the original choreographer, and then eventually Suzanne. They made a conscious decision to have beautiful women in a star-spangled costume that no one had seen on the sidelines of the NFL in the glamor of Dallas, Texas. We were winning Super Bowls in the ‘70s. Dallas was the biggest show on TV. There was just something exceptionally glamorous about being associated with Dallas, and we’ve stayed true to a glamorous line of exceptional dancers.
Sometimes I think people try to be different, and then you’re just not identifiable. The cheerleaders, they’re recognizable all over the world. We have not changed the uniform; we’ve enhanced it. I’ve added crystals and designer buckles and Lucchese boots, but we’ve stayed true to what worked.
We’ve stayed aggressive with our TV real estate. We’ve stayed aggressive with our media appearances. I like the cheerleaders to perform with legendary-
caliber entertainers. I’m a big Queen fan, and I’d just seen the movie Bohemian Rhapsody and got ultraobsessed. Queen was touring, and I made the call and pushed, and when we got to perform with them, I mean, magic happened. The crowd went crazy.
I’ve tried to be very selective with who we’ve performed with and aligned with. It’s the promoter in me. Now, because of the TV show, we have big, big names calling us, wanting us to do things with them. There’s one in particular that I can’t reveal right now, but we have very, very famous artists that want to have a performance or an appearance or this or that. You know, you’ve got to keep moving forward. Otherwise, we very easily, in the ‘80s when we started losing football games, could have just faded into history.
Season 3 of Netflix’s America’s Sweethearts: Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders is on the way. Photo provided by DCC.
Q: The performance with Dolly Parton wearing a tricked-out Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders uniform had to be an all-timer, not to mention the ultimate childhood fantasy of many a middle-aged man.
A: Oh my God, I give her all the credit for that. We talked to her stylist, and I was sending him fabrics and notions, thinking she would do something Cowboysesque. We didn’t know until she walked out on that stage that she literally was in a DCC uniform that they had modified, but just barely. She rocked that uniform.
Q: With everything that’s going on, your schedule must be insane, yet you’ve said you have no immediate plans to call it a career. When all is said and done, what sustains you through everything you have in your career and your personal life?
A: Faith has kept me grounded. I love the word “righteous.” I think that’s a great guide word. I used to go out in my backyard with a cup of coffee, and I’d listen to a devotional, and I’d listen to Proverbs and just have kind of quiet time under my tree. These days, I’m trying to potty train a dog, unfortunately, and she’s just blown that whole formula to hell, but it’s still very important to me.
I do think, when you’re in a position that I’m in where I’m affecting other people’s lives, that it’s important that you have principles and show love. You care about people. You care about their spirit. You understand forgiveness. You understand mistakes. You try to inspire people. If I come to work rattled, which I can, and I do, it’s just not the best place for me to start, so I try to start my day off with quietness and with God.
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