#Ninette de Valois

[margotfonteyns]

Elizabeth Schooling in Ninette de Valois' ballet Bar aux Folies-Bergère, c. 1937

The ballet was created in 1934 after a suggestion by Marie Rambert's husband, Ashley Dukes, who had frequently remarked on the resemblance between Schooling and the barmaid depicted in Manet's famous painting. Despite serving as the inspiration for the ballet, Schooling was initially considered too inexperienced for the part, which was given instead to Pearl Argyle. When Argyle left the company, however, Schooling seized her moment and flawlessly embodied the role, being described in one review as 'an almost exact replica of the wistful blonde lady behind the bar'.

[olympic-paris]

THIS DAY IN GAY HISTORY

based on: The White Crane Institute's 'Gay Wisdom', Gay Birthdays, Gay For Today, Famous GLBT, glbt-Gay Encylopedia, Today in Gay History, Wikipedia, and more …

September 17

1730 – Friedrich Wilhelm von Steuben (d.1794), also referred to as the Baron von Steuben, was a Prussian-born military officer who served as inspector general and Major General of the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War. He is credited with being one of the fathers of the Continental Army in teaching them the essentials of military drills, tactics, and disciplines. He wrote the Revolutionary War Drill Manual, the book that served as the standard United States drill manual until the War of 1812.

In Germay, in 1776, he was alleged to be homosexual and was accused of improper sexual behavior with young boys. Whether or not Steuben was actually intimate with other men is not entirely known, but the rumors compelled him to seek employment elsewhere.

On September 26, 1777, the Baron, his Italian greyhound, Azor (which he took with him everywhere), his young aide de camp Louis de Pontière, his military secretary Pierre Etienne Duponceau, and two other companions, reached Portsmouth, New Hampshire and by December 1, was extravagantly entertained in Boston. Congress was in York, Pennsylvania, after being ousted from Philadelphia by the British advance. By February 5, 1778, Steuben had offered to volunteer without pay (for the time), and by the 23rd, Steuben reported for duty to General George Washington at Valley Forge. He served as George Washington's chief of staff in the final years of the war.

Two of the General's soldiers, William North and Ben Walker, were to von Steuben's liking. He legally adopted both men, and they lived together until the Baron's death, at which time they shared in his estate.

The Lafayette Park Memorial

Many places are named in his honor, including Steubenville, Ohio. His monument by Albert Jaegers in Washington, DC, across the street from the White House in Lafayette Park, is perhaps one of the most homoerotic sculptures in America. Make sure and pay a visit the next time you're in town. You will not regret it.

1904 – Sir Frederick Ashton (d.1988) began his career as a dancer but is largely remembered as a choreographer.

Ashton was born at Guayaquil in Ecuador, in the artistic neighbourhood called Las Peñas, the original founding site of the city. When he was 13 he witnessed a life-changing event when he attended a performance by the legendary Anna Pavlova in the Municipal Theatre in Lima, Peru. He was so impressed that from that day on he knew he would become a dancer.

In 1919 he went to England to attend Dover College and then to study under the famous Leonide Massine and established a working relationship with the ballet troupe belonging to Marie Rambert and Ninette de Valois. Rambert discovered Frederick's aptitude for choreography and allowed him to choreograph his first ballet, The Tragedy of Fashion in 1926, starting a tremendously successful career as a choreographer.

He began his career with the Ballet Rambert which was originally called The Ballet Club, but he rose to fame with The Royal Ballet, becoming its resident choreographer in the 1930s. His version of La Fille mal gardée was particularly successful. He worked with Margot Fonteyn among others. His broad travesti performances as one of the comic Ugly Stepsisters in Sergei Prokofiev's Cinderella were annual events for many years.

The choreographer's emotional life focused on the unattainable and the unsuitable, and it often wreaked havoc in his ballet company, as when, in the case of the heterosexual Michael Somes (Fonteyn's principal partner), the beloved enjoyed and exploited favoritism to the point that other dancers signed a petition of protest.

Ashton, like so many other famous gay men of his epoch, including Cecil Beaton and Noël Coward, was necessarily discreet, but he was not closeted. The British high society in which he moved enjoyed the scintillating company.

Ashton was a member of the circle of gay men who surrounded Queen Elizabeth, the late Queen Mother, whom he taught to tango. When she heard that Ashton, a formidable mimic, did imitations of her, she allegedly retaliated by imitating his own queenly manners.

In 1962, he was knighted for his services to ballet. He died in 1988 at his home, Chandos Lodge, in Eye, Suffolk, England.

1926 – Curtis Harrington (d.2007) was an American film and television director whose work included experimental films, horror films, and episodic television. He is considered one of the forerunners of New Queer Cinema.

His memoir, Nice Guys Don’t Work in Hollywood, was recently published by Drag City. The original manuscript was disinterred from a special collection in the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and carefully edited by Lisa Janssen, a Chicago-based poet, archivist, and film buff.

For Harrington, the romance with movies began early. He was stirred as a child by the sight of Mr. Death wilting a bouquet of flowers with his breath in Death Takes a Holiday (1934).

Growing up in Beaumont, California, with parents who gave him leeway to pursue his creative interests, Harrington discovered a soul mate in Edgar Allan Poe, and began his film career at 14 with an abbreviated version of “The Fall of the House of Usher.” The director plays both the death-haunted Roderick and his twin sister, Madeline.

Greatly influenced by Maya Deren, co-creator (with Alexander Hammid) of the trance classic Meshes of the Afternoon (1943), he completed a cycle of 16 mm shorts, several of which – Fragment of Seeking (1946), Picnic (1948), On the Edge (1949) – are now regarded as prime examples of West Coast experimental filmmaking. His friendship with Kenneth Anger, director of Scorpio Rising (1963) and author of the notorious bestseller Hollywood Babylon, fueled an appreciation for the mystical and provided occasion to participate, if only peripherally, in the Southern California occult explosion.

Although he enjoyed unfettered creative license during this period, the pressure to conform weighed heavily on the young filmmaker. The conservative postwar climate was an unlikely breeding ground for the deeply personal, highly stylized "film poems" created by Harrington and his contemporaries. His status as an outsider was no doubt intensified by his orientation as a gay man – a subject on which Harrington remains subdued throughout the memoir. "This seemed perfectly natural to me," Harrington writes of his teenage attractions. "It did not occur to me to attach any sense of guilt or shame to my activities." A screening of Fragment of Seeking and Anger’s Fireworks (1947) stunned an audience of Los Angeles intellectuals with its potently surreal evocations of homoerotic desire. "Everyone in the room was too shocked to say a word," Harrington recalls.

The true turning point in his career was the extraordinary Night Tide (1961), a gently haunting fable about a sailor (an uncharacteristically shy Dennis Hopper) who falls in love with a mermaid impersonator (Linda Lawson). Night Tide was distributed by Roger Corman, who in due course offered Harrington two directing assignments: Voyage to the Prehistoric Planet (1965) and Queen of Blood (1966). Harrington was given the task of repurposing a couple of Russian science fiction films to which Corman had acquired the rights.

In the following years he went on to direct a series of B-movies in the horror genre TV series and Made-for-TV movies including The Killer Bees (1974).

At 75, he managed to summon the remainder of his creative vigor to make Usher (2002), a self-financed short film that brought his career full circle. "I went all the way back to the story that had haunted me so early in my life,"

1928 – Roddy McDowall (d.1998) was born in London on to a Scottish father and an Irish mother. His mother, who had herself aspired to be an actress, enrolled him in elocution lessons at the age of five; and at the age of ten he had his first major film role as the youngest son in Murder in the Family (1938). Over the next two years he appeared in a dozen British films, in parts large and small. McDowall's movie career was interrupted, however, by the German bombardment of London in World War II. Accompanied by his sister and his mother, he was one of many London children evacuated to places abroad.

As a result, he arrived in Hollywood in 1940, and the charming young English lad soon landed a major role as the youngest son in How Green Was My Valley (1941). The film made him a star at thirteen, and he appeared as an endearing boy in numerous Hollywood movies throughout the war years, most notably Lassie, Come Home (1943), with fellow English child star and lifelong friend Elizabeth Taylor, and My Friend Flicka (1943).

By his late teens, McDowall had outgrown the parts in which he had been most successful. Accordingly, he went to New York to study acting and to hone his skills in a wide variety of roles on the Broadway stage.

McDowall was praised for his performance as a gay character in Meyer Levin's Compulsion (1957), a fictionalised account of the Leopold-Loeb murder case; and he won a Tony award for best supporting actor as Tarquin in Jean Anouilh's The Fighting Cock (1960).

After a decade's absence, McDowall returned to Hollywood, and over the last four decades of his life he appeared in more than one hundred films, encompassing a wide range of genres from sophisticated adult comedy to children's fare, from horror to science fiction, usually as a character actor. He also made regular character appearances on TV in such series as the original Twilight Zone, The Carol Burnett Show, Fantasy Island and Quantum Leap.

His best known appearances include those in The Subterraneans (1960), Midnight Lace (1960), Cleopatra (1963), The Loved One (1965), Inside Daisy Clover (1965), Planet of the Apes (1968) and its various sequels, Bedknobs and Broomsticks (1971), The Poseidon Adventure (1973), Funny Lady (1975), and Only the Lonely (1991). His last film role was the voice of Mr Soil, an ant, in A Bug's Life (1997).

Although McDowall never officially came out, the fact that he was gay was one of Hollywood's best known secrets. It is a tribute to his characteristic discretion and the respect with which "Hollywood's Best Friend" was regarded by his peers that his homosexuality was never really an issue or used against him in his six decades in the entertainment business.

Roddy is offered a hot sausage by Tab Hunter

McDowall died of cancer at his home in Studio City, California, on October 3, 1998. At the time of his death, he held several elected posts in the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and was a generous benefactor of many film-related charities.

1965 – Bryan Singer is an American film director. Singer won critical acclaim for his work on The Usual Suspects, and is especially popular among fans of the sci-fi and comic book genres, for his work on the first two X-Men films and Superman Returns.

Singer was born in New York City. He was adopted by Norbert and Grace Singer and grew up in a Jewish household in New Jersey. He attended West Windsor-Plainsboro High School South, then studied film making at New York's School of Visual Arts and later the USC School of Cinematic Arts in Los Angeles. Actors Lori and Marc Singer are his cousins.

Singer is openly bisexual, and has said that his life experiences of growing up as a minority influenced his movies. In October 2014, it was confirmed he was expecting a child with actress Michelle Clunie. The couple's first son was born on January 5, 2015.

Singer is also executive producer and directed the pilot and first episode of highly regarded TV medical drama House.

Singer is said (or rumoured) to be involved in a number of possible or 'in development' projects at present including: a Superman Returns sequel; a remake of Logan's Run; a Warner Bros. film called U Want Me 2 Kill Him? about a 14-year old British boy who was charged with inciting his own murder, a reimagining of Battlestar Galactica, and a film of Augusten Burroughs' Sellevsion.

In April 2014, Singer was accused in a civil lawsuit of sexual assault of a minor. According to the suit filed by attorney Jeff Herman, Singer is alleged to have drugged and raped actor and model Michael Egan in Hawaii and Los Angeles in the late 1990s. On May 22, 2014, Singer's attorney presented evidence to Federal District Judge Susan Oki Mollway stating that neither Singer nor Egan were in Hawaii at the time. In early August 2014, Egan sought to withdraw his lawsuit.

In May 2014, another lawsuit was filed by attorney Jeff Herman on behalf of an anonymous British man. Both Singer and producer Gary Goddard were accused of sexually assaulting "John Doe No. 117." According to the lawsuit, Goddard and Singer met the man for sex when he was a minor and engaged in acts of "gender violence" against him while in London for the premiere of Superman Returns. The charge against Singer in this case was dismissed, at the accuser's request, in July 2014.

1975 – Jade Esteban Estrada, born at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas, is a successful Latin pop singer, comedian, choreographer, actor, political commentator, and human rights activist. Out Magazine called him "the first gay Latin star."

As a young boy, he participated in extracurricular school activities and sang in the school choir, where he first noticed that his talent captivated audiences. Through the encouragement of his choir instructor he began to take voice lessons and eventually moved to New York where he worked as an assistant to Tony award-winning actress Zoe Caldwell.

Estrada appeared in the German production of Starlight Express and also worked as a dancer for Seventeen Magazine. After two popular appearances as a transgender singer/dancer on NBC's The Jerry Springer Show, he won the attention of Latin TV personality Charo and worked as her choreographer and lead dancer. He gained international recognition in 1998 when he released his first Latin pop single, "Reggae Twist" on the Brooklyn-based Total Envision Records label. He later turned his attention to solo theater and stand-up comedy.

His recordings include Fabulous Gay Tunes Vol.2, and Being Out Rocks.

1991 – Scott Hoying is an American singer, musician and songwriter who came to international attention as the baritone of the a cappella group Pentatonix and one-half of the music duo Superfruit. As of June 2021, Pentatonix has released eleven albums (two of which have been number ones) and two EPs, have had four songs in the Billboard Hot 100, and won three Grammy Awards as "the first a cappella group to achieve mainstream success in the modern market". As of November 2021, Superfruit's YouTube channel has over 2.4 million subscribers, and over 444 million views.

Hoying is openly gay and resides in Hollywood. He began dating model Mark Manio in 2017. They got engaged in the Bahamas on April 13, 2022, and were married in Santa Barbara, California on July 7, 2023. Their wedding was officiated by singer-songwriter Christina Perri.

2001 – Paul Holm, the partner of Flight 93 hero Mark Bingham is presented with the folded American flag.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

"When I revisit my memories of his long career in the west, it seems to me that one of the secrets of Nureyev’s success comes from the fact that he did more than was necessary in everything he undertook. He told me that as a dancer he started early and conscientiously developing the possibilities available to male dancers, proving that a principal dancer can be just as gracefully subtle and expressive as a ballerina without any loss of virility. Being a classical dancer par excellence (nobody, it seems to me can equal the perfection of his last solo in 'Sleeping Beauty') he had also to master the contemporary styles of Martha Graham, Paul Taylor, José Limon and Murray Louis. He was always attracted to difficulty.

"When he staged the 'Kingdom of Shades' scene from 'La Bayadère,' one of the members of the Royal Ballet suggested that he change a step to make his solo easier without making it any the less spectacular. Rudolf’s reply was: 'How could I dance if I didn’t force myself to do things that I can’t do?'. (…) When he became director of the Garnier Opera Ballet, his never ending enthusiasm for new experiences as regards ballet, dramaturgy, music and art joined forces with his mastery of ballet and his knowledge of choreography giving him an understanding and an authority, a flair and a perspicacity on a par with those of Dame Ninette de Valois, the great founder of the Royal Ballet.

"No wonder that a number of us from Great Britain went to Paris practically every month following the incredible richness of the choreography he put on offer. (…) Even though Rudolf is no longer with us, his spirit lives on in the bodies of today’s dancers."

--John Percival

Photograph by Francette Levieux.

(Follies of God)

[enchanted-keys]

is there a reason why the RB seems to refuse to perform balanchine outside diamonds/jewels? i really dont understand it

I'd hardly say that's what they're doing.

They had both apollo, tchai pdd and prodigal son on the programme two seasons ago. And right before covid they performed Symphony in C.

I don't see why they should be expected to have balanchine on their programme every year...that's not what their main repertoire or heritage is based on, nor what I'm interested in seeing when I'm watching the Royal Ballet.

Besides the big classics, the work of Ashton and Macmillan are the only ones that should be mandatory for every season. Much more relevant to their heritage and tradition is Ninette de Valois and that's what's hardly performed on the RB stage anymore.

[brookstonalmanac]

Birthdays 6.6

Beer Birthdays

Ernest G.W. Woerz (1834)

Five Favorite Birthdays

Bjorn Borg; tennis player (1956)

Thomas Mann; German writer (1875)

John Trumbull; artist (1756)

Colin Quinn; comedian (1959)

Diego Velazquez; Spanish artist (1599)

Famous Birthdays

Monty Alexander; jazz pianist (1944)

Torsten Andersson; Swedish artist (1926)

V.C. Andrews; writer (1923)

Ruth Benedict; anthropologist (1887)

Sandra Bernhard; comedian, actor (1955)

Gary U.S. Bonds; pop singer (1939)

Max Casella; actor (1967)

Pierre Corneille; French writer (1606)

Sarah Dessen; writer (1970)

Ninette de Valois; Irish dancer (1898)

Bill Dickey; New York Yankees C (1907)

David Dukes; actor (1945)

Robert Englund; actor (1947)

Harvey Fierstein; actor (1952)

Edgar Froese; German artist, electronic musician (1944)

Paul Giamatti; actor (1967)

Nathan Hale; American patriot (1755)

William Ralph Inge; English writer (1860)

Aram Khachaturian; composer (1903)

Uncle Kracker; rock musician (1974)

Edwin G. Krebs; biochemist (1918)

Josie Lawrence; British comedian (1959)

Ted Lewis; jazz bandleader (1890)

Tony Levin; rock bassist (1948)

Jimmie Lunceford; jazz bandleader (1902)

Gianna Michaels; porn actor (1983)

Holly Near; folk singer (1949)

Cam Neely; Boston Bruins RW (1965)

Amanda Pays; actor (1959)

Alexander Pushkin; Russian poet (1799)

Tom Ryan; cartoonist (1926)

David Scott; astronaut (1932)

Robert Falcon Scott "of the Antarctic;" British explorer (1868)

Robert Cedric Sherriff; English writer (1896)

Richard Sinclair; rock musician (1948)

Richard Smalley; chemist (1943)

Yukihiro Takahashi; Japanese rock musician (1952)

Dwight Twilley; country singer (1951)

Steve Vai; rock guitarist (1960)

Danny Webb; actor (1958)

Max August Zorn; mathematician (1906)

[saax2]

Archetipi

The Black Bowl, 1907 | ph., George H. Seeley (1880-1955, USA)

Ritratto di donna (portrait of woman), 1930 ca. | ph., Roberto Baccarini (Italia)

Echos | Simone Geraci (Italia)

Stella Kadmon, actress (1902-1989, Austria), 1932 | ph., Madame D'Ora (1881-1963, Austria)

Fiamma, 1943 (Uffizi, Firenze) | Rudolf Levy (1875-1944, Germany)

Jean-Michel Basquiat (1960-1988, USA)

Ninette de Valois, dancer (1898-2001, Ireland)

The vase and the maid, 1935 ca. | ph., Fred P. Peel (1884-1959, USA)

Lady in Violet, 1874 | Pál Szinyei Merse (1845-1920, Hungary)

[random-racehorses]

Random Real Thoroughbred: BALLETOME

BALLETOME is a horse born in 2011. By FORT WOOD out of NINETTE DE VALOIS. Link to their pedigreequery page: https://www.pedigreequery.com/balletome

[wakamotogarou]

Terence James Stannus Gray, better known by the pen name Wei Wu Wei, was a 20th-century Taoist philosopher and writer. Terence James Stannus Gray was born in Felixstowe, Suffolk, England on 14 September 1895, the son of Harold Stannus Gray and a member of a well-established Irish family. He was raised on an estate at the Gog-Magog Hills outside Cambridge, England. He received a thorough education at Ascham St Vincent's School, Eastbourne, Eton and Oxford University. Early in life he pursued an interest in Egyptology which culminated in the publication of two books on ancient Egyptian history and culture in 1923. This was followed by a period of involvement in the arts in Britain in the 1920s and 1930s as a theorist, theatrical producer, creator of radical "dance-dramas", publisher of several related magazines and author of two related books. He was a major influence on many noted dramatists, poets and dancers of the day, including his cousin Ninette de Valois, founder of the Royal Ballet (which in fact had its origins in his own dance troupe at the Cambridge Festival Theatre which he leased from 1926 to 1933). He maintained his family's racehorses in England and Ireland and in 1957 his horse Zarathrustra won the Ascot Gold Cup, ridden by renowned jockey Lester Piggott in the first of his eleven wins of that race. After he had apparently exhausted his interest in the theatre, his thoughts turned towards philosophy and metaphysics. This led to a period of travel throughout Asia, including time spent at Sri Ramana Maharshi's ashram in Tiruvannamalai, India. In 1958, at the age of 63, he saw the first of the "Wei Wu Wei" titles published. The next 16 years saw the appearance of seven subsequent books, including his final work under the further pseudonym "O.O.O." in 1974. During most of this later period he maintained a residence with his wife Natalia Bagration-Imeretinsky in Monaco. He is believed to have known, among others, Lama Anagarika Govinda, Dr. Hubert Benoit, John Blofeld, Douglas Harding, Robert Linssen, Arthur Osborne, Robert Powell and Dr. D. T. Suzuki. He died in 1986 at the age of 90. Wei Wu Wei's influence, while never widespread, has been profound upon many of those who knew him personally, upon those with whom he corresponded, among them British mathematician and author G. Spencer-Brown and Galen Sharp, as well as upon many who have read his works, including Ramesh Balsekar. It is apparent from his writings that "Wei Wu Wei" had studied in some depth both Eastern and Western philosophy and metaphysics, as well as the more esoteric teachings of all the great religions. It can also be understood from the writings that he regarded himself as merely one of many seeking so-called "liberation", the works themselves being seen in part as a record of this quest.

[roseswitheraway]

Ninette de Valois photographed for The Bystander, a British newspaper (May 2, 1928)

[gramilano]

Countdown to Bayadère – casting and designs for La Scala’s opening

Rudolf Nureyev's La Bayadère has never been performed by any company other than the Paris Opera Ballet. It opens at La Scala with new designs on 15 December.

Costume design by Luisa Spinatelli La Bayadère, one of the key ballets in the classical repertoire, premiered in St Petersburg in 1877. Marius Petipa created a perfect harmony between mass scenes and protagonists, and it was the Kingdom of Shades scene that introduced the ballet to the West and added more lustre to Rudolf Nureyev flourishing career. La Bayadère remained unknown until the ‘60s…

[las-microfisuras]

Dame Ninette de Valois, founder of the Royal Ballet

[celebratingamazingwomen]

Ninette de Valois (1898-2001) was a dancer, choreographer and director of classical ballet. She is known as the ‘godmother’ of English and Irish ballet.

She started dancing from an early age, and in 1927 established her own Academy of Choreographic Art in London. She went on to establish the Royal Ballet, one of the most important companies of its kind in the 20th century.

[galina-ulanova]

Ninette de Valois rehearsing her ballet Job (Sadler’s Wells Ballet, 1948)

[brookstonalmanac]

Birthdays 6.6

Beer Birthdays

None Known

Five Favorite Birthdays

Bjorn Borg; tennis player (1956)

Thomas Mann; German writer (1875)

John Trumbull; artist (1756)

Colin Quinn; comedian (1959)

Diego Velazquez; Spanish artist (1599)

Famous Birthdays

Monty Alexander; jazz pianist (1944)

Torsten Andersson; Swedish artist (1926)

V.C. Andrews; writer (1923)

Ruth Benedict; anthropologist (1887)

Sandra Bernhard; comedian, actor (1955)

Gary U.S. Bonds; pop singer (1939)

Max Casella; actor (1967)

Pierre Corneille; French writer (1606)

Sarah Dessen; writer (1970)

Ninette de Valois; Irish dancer (1898)

Bill Dickey; New York Yankees C (1907)

David Dukes; actor (1945)

Robert Englund; actor (1947)

Harvey Fierstein; actor (1952)

Edgar Froese; German artist, electronic musician (1944)

Paul Giamatti; actor (1967)

Nathan Hale; American patriot (1755)

William Ralph Inge; English writer (1860)

Aram Khachaturian; composer (1903)

Uncle Kracker; rock musician (1974)

Edwin G. Krebs; biochemist (1918)

Josie Lawrence; British comedian (1959)

Ted Lewis; jazz bandleader (1890)

Tony Levin; rock bassist (1948)

Jimmie Lunceford; jazz bandleader (1902)

Gianna Michaels; porn actor (1983)

Holly Near; folk singer (1949)

Cam Neely; Boston Bruins RW (1965)

Amanda Pays; actor (1959)

Alexander Pushkin; Russian poet (1799)

Tom Ryan; cartoonist (1926)

David Scott; astronaut (1932)

Robert Falcon Scott "of the Antarctic;" British explorer (1868)

Robert Cedric Sherriff; English writer (1896)

Richard Sinclair; rock musician (1948)

Richard Smalley; chemist (1943)

Yukihiro Takahashi; Japanese rock musician (1952)

Dwight Twilley; country singer (1951)

Steve Vai; rock guitarist (1960)

Danny Webb; actor (1958)

Max August Zorn; mathematician (1906)

[adelphe]

Ninette de Valois and Robert Helpmann in Douanes. Photographed by Gordon Anthony, 1935

[csuitemind]

Ninette de Valois : Classical ballet will never die