De Mille, Agnes

de Mille, Agnes (George)

(1905–93) choreographer; born in New York City. The daughter of the playwright William C. de Mille and niece of movie producer Cecil B. De Mille, she made her dancing debut in 1928. During the 1930s she worked in America and Europe as a dancer and actress. In 1936 she had her first commission as a choreographer, creating the dance sequences for an English film version of Romeo and Juliet. This led to her joining the New York Ballet Theater, for which she choreographed Rodeo (1942). In the 1940s she choreographed a series of hits both on Broadway and in the subsequent films, including Oklahoma! (1943), Carousel (1945), Brigadoon (1947), and Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1949). She founded her own ballet company, toured widely, and was regarded as one of the preeminent 20th-century American choreographers. Her books include Dance to the Piper (1952) and The Book of the Dance (1963).

The Cambridge Dictionary of American Biography, by John S. Bowman. Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1995. Reproduced with permission.

The following article is from The Great Soviet Encyclopedia (1979). It might be outdated or ideologically biased.

De Mille, Agnes

 

Born 1909 in New York. American dancer and choreographer.

Agnes De Mille graduated from the University of California. She studied dance under F. M. Kozlov, M. Rambert, A. Tudor, and other teachers. In 1929 she made her stage debut and from 1938 to 1956 (with intervals) was prima ballerina of the Ballet Rambert (Great Britain) and Ballet Theater (USA). The founder and director of the Agnes De Mille Dance Theater (1953-54), she began her choreographic work in 1940. Her choreography is characterized by the use of ethnic dances (especially from American folklore) as the basis of choreographic dramaturgy. The best known ballet staged by A. De Mille is Copland’s Rodeo. It has been in the repertoire of ballet companies since 1942; in 1960 it was performed in the USSR by the American Ballet Theater. Among the ballets she has staged are Three Virgins and the Devil to music by Respighi (1941); Gould’s Fall River Legend (1948); Bitter Weird to Loewe’s music arranged by Rittmann (1953); Rosenthal’s The Wind in the Mountains (1965); Four Marys to music arranged by Rittmann (1965); and Golden Age to Rossini’s music arranged by Pitot (1967). A. De Mille had a great influence on the development of the musical; she staged the dances in Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Oklahoma (1943) and other musicals.

WORKS

Dance to the Piper. New York, 1952.
And Promenade Home. New York, 1958.
To a Young Dancer…. Toronto, 1962.
The Book of the Dance. New York, 1963.
Lizzie Borden. New York, 1968.

N. P. ROSLAVLEVA

The Great Soviet Encyclopedia, 3rd Edition (1970-1979). © 2010 The Gale Group, Inc. All rights reserved.