IN HER OWN WORDS
“I was clearly marked as though she had looked me in the face and called my name.”
On seeing Anna Pavlova dance, aged 13 (1951)
“I would never be more than a glorified parlor entertainer.” (1951)
“I like the pure classic ballets. I like abstract ballets. I would very much like to do ballets like George Balanchine. I can’t. That’s a fact.” (1973)
“I’m really like a playwright. I tell a story and I tell it well.”
“This is the story of an American dancer, a spoiled egocentric wealthy girl, who learned with difficulty to become a worker, to set and meet standards, to brace a Victorian sensibility to contemporary roughhousing, and who, with happy good fortune, participated by the side of great colleagues in a renaissance of the most ancient and magical of all the arts.”
About herself, in her autobiography Dance to the Piper (1951)
“When I see my work I take for granted what other people value in it. I see only its ineptitude, inorganic flaws, and crudities. I am not pleased or satisfied.” (1943)
“I would like one word on my tombstone: dancer.” (1987)
“I didn’t set out to try to change the world of dance. I had to do it because nobody cared a damn about dancing and I got fed up with people’s ignorance and indifference.” (1981)
“There are very few people in the world who are truly creative. I wanted to be one of them. It takes great energy to do anything creative… You have to care so much that you can’t sleep, you can’t eat, you can’t talk to people. It’s just got to be right. You can’t do it without that passion.” (1981)
IN OTHERS’ WORDS
“Here is undoubtedly one of the brightest stars now rising above our native horizon.”
New York Times critic John Martin, after her first performance (1928)
“We think your work is enchanting. Come talk to us on Monday.”
Rodgers & Hammerstein, after seeing Rodeo: they would go on hiring her for Oklahoma! (1942)
“Agnes de Mille’s genetic cards were dealt from a deck stacked with the qualities of women born to prevail. Her mother and grandmothers had the strength and the stamina of pioneers. They planned, pushed, and applauded not for their own dreams, but for those of their husbands and children.”
Carol Easton, biographer (1996)
“Agnes de Mille, the feisty doyenne of American dance who with the landmark Oklahoma! was the first to integrate dance and story, forever changing the direction of the Broadway musical.”
Los Angeles Times (1993)
BIOGRAPHY
Agnes de Mille came from a theatrical family and, being desperate to dance, she began to create her own small works (solos and duets) incorporating a variety of dance styles. In 1932 she moved to London where she continued to give recitals of witty and dramatic works but it became a workshop period in which she could experiment.
Working alongside Antony Tudor and Hugh Lang she developed her own dance style that drew on the American vernacular. Works created in Britain became sketches for the more significant creations of the 1940s. In 1935, thanks to her links with the world of film through her uncle, Cecil B de Mille, she choreographed the film Romeo and Juliet in Hollywood but then returned to London until 1938.
The 1940s and early 1950s were de Mille’s most successful period. She became a pioneer member of (American) Ballet Theatre for whom she choreographed a number of productions most notably Fall River Legend in 1948. She created Rodeo for the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo – a watershed moment for American dance and for her career (she received 22 curtain calls and standing ovations when she performed in the leading role in 1943 at the Met) and the choreography for a succession of musicals including Oklahoma! in 1943. She was also an excellent writer and penned a biography of her friend Martha Graham.
KEY WORKS
Ballet: Rodeo, Fall River Legend
Musicals: Oklahoma!, Carousel, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, Brigadoon
KEY COLLABORATORS
Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II, Aaron Copland
LEARN MORE
Memoir: Dance to the Piper
Obiturary, New York Times (1993)
TV interview: Day at Night (1973)