Bettie de Jong (born May 1, 1933 in Sumatra, Indonesia) is a Dutch rehearsal director and former lead dancer at the Paul Taylor Dance Company. [1] [2] [3] In November 2007 Bettie de Jong received the Dance Magazine Award to recognize her contributions to dance. [4]
De Jong was born in Tanjungbalai on Sumatra and moved to the Netherlands in 1946. After Indonesia she continued her early training in dance and mime in Wageningen. De Jong lived for more than 35 years with her husband Victor Laredo.
Her first professional engagement was with the Netherlands Pantomime Company. After coming to New York in 1958 to study at the Martha Graham Center of Contemporary Dance, she performed with the Martha Graham Dance Company, the Pearl Lang Dance Theater, John Butler and Lucas Hoving and was seen on CBS with Rudolf Nureyev in a duet choreographed by choreographer Paul Tayor. [5]
Bettie de Jong [6] joined the Taylor Company in 1962. Noted for her strong stage presence and long line, she was Paul Taylor's favorite dancing partner [7] and, as Rehearsal Director, [8] has been his right arm for the past 35 years. Bettie de Jong belonged to the best dancers in USA and finished her active dancing career in 1985. During those 24 years Paul Taylor set 24 parts in these dances for her:
In Nine Variations on a Dance Theme [13] [14] from 1966/1967, filmed by Hilary Harris, Bettie de Jong performed the same dance nine times, starting and ending in a recline position. As the film proceeds the camera becomes more and more adventurous. The film was shown at the Museum of Modern Art for a very long time as an example for dance film-making.
Company is a musical with music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim and book by George Furth. The original 1970 production was nominated for a record-setting 14 Tony Awards, winning six. Company was among the first book musicals to deal with contemporary dating, marriage, and divorce, and is a notable example of a concept musical lacking a linear plot. In a series of vignettes, Company follows bachelor Bobby interacting with his married friends, who throw a party for his 35th birthday.
Julie Newmar is an American actress, dancer, and singer, known for a variety of stage, screen, and television roles. She is also a writer, lingerie designer, and real-estate mogul. She won the Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play for her role as Katrin Sveg in the 1958 Broadway production of The Marriage-Go-Round and reprised the role in the 1961 film version. In the 1960s, she starred for two seasons as Catwoman in the television series Batman (1966–1967). Her other stage credits include the Ziegfeld Follies in 1956, Lola in Damn Yankees! in 1961, and Irma in Irma la Douce in 1965 in regional productions.
Lydia Susanna "Linda" Hunt is an American actress of stage and screen.
Margaret Leighton, CBE was an English actress, active on stage and television, and in film. Her film appearances included in Anthony Asquith's The Winslow Boy, Alfred Hitchcock's Under Capricorn, Powell and Pressburger's The Elusive Pimpernel, George More O'Ferrall's The Holly and the Ivy, Martin Ritt's The Sound and the Fury, John Guillermin's Waltz of the Toreadors, Franklin J. Schaffner's The Best Man, Tony Richardson's The Loved One, John Ford's 7 Women, and Joseph Losey's The Go-Between and Galileo. For The Go-Between, she won the BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role and was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress.
Ida Estelle Taylor was an American actress, singer, model, and animal rights activist who was the second of world heavyweight champion Jack Dempsey's four wives. With "dark-brown, almost black hair and brown eyes," she was regarded as one of the most beautiful silent film stars of the 1920s.
Frances J. de Lautour, better known as Frances de la Tour, is an English actress. She is known for her role as Miss Ruth Jones in the television sitcom Rising Damp from 1974 until 1978. She is a Tony Award winner and three-time Olivier Award winner.
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Howard da Silva was an American actor, director and musical performer on stage, film, television and radio. He was cast in dozens of productions on the New York stage, appeared in more than two dozen television programs, and acted in more than fifty feature films. Adept at both drama and musicals on the stage, he originated the role of Jud Fry in the original 1943 run of the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical Oklahoma!, and also portrayed the prosecuting attorney in the 1957 stage production of Compulsion. Da Silva was nominated for a 1960 Tony Award as Best Featured Actor in a Musical for his work in Fiorello!, a musical about New York City mayor LaGuardia. In 1961, da Silva directed Purlie Victorious, by Ossie Davis.
Twentieth Century is a 1932 play by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur based on the unproduced play Napoleon of Broadway by Charles B. Millholland, inspired by his experience working for the eccentric Broadway impresario David Belasco.
Paul Taylor Dance Company is a modern dance company, formed by dancer and choreographer Paul Taylor (1930—2018). The modern dance company is based in New York, New York and was founded in 1954.
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Ruthanna Boris was the first American Ballerina to star with the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo troupes of the 1940s. She was born in Brooklyn. She was among the first students at George Balanchine and Lincoln Kirstein’s School of American Ballet when it opened in 1934. As a choreographer her ballets Cirque de Deux and Cakewalk, are often revived. She died in El Cerrito, California and her papers are held at Houghton Library, Harvard University.
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