Carmen De Lavallade
Encyclopedia
Carmen De Lavallade is a dancer, choreographer, professor
and stage
and film
actress.
on March 6, 1931, to Afro-Creole parents from New Orleans, Louisiana
. She was raised by her aunt who owned one of the first African American history
bookshops on Central Avenue. Her cousin, Janet Collins
, was the first African American prima ballerina at the Metropolitan Opera
. De Lavallade began studying ballet with Melissa Blake at the age of 16 and after graduation from Thomas Jefferson High School in L.A., was awarded a scholarship to study dance with Lester Horton
.
in 1949 where she danced as a lead dancer until her departure for New York City
with Alvin Ailey
in 1954. De Lavallade, like all of Horton's
students, studied other art forms including painting, acting, music, set design and costuming as well as ballet and other forms of modern and ethnic dance. She studied dancing with ballerina Carmelita Maracci
and acting with Stella Adler
. In 1954, De Lavallade made her Broadway debut partnered with Alvin Ailey
in Truman Capote's
House of Flowers.
In 1955, she married dancer and actor Geoffrey Holder
who she had met while working on House of Flowers. It was with Holder that De Lavallade choreographed her signature solo, Come Sunday, to a black spiritual
sung by Odetta Gordon. The following year, De Lavallade danced as the prima ballerina in Samson and Delilah
, and Aida
at the Metropolitan Opera
. She also made her television debut in John Butler's ballet Flight, and in 1957, she appeared in the television production of Duke Ellington's
A Drum is a Woman. De Lavallade also appeared in several off-Broadway productions, including Othello
and Death of a Salesman
. An introduction to Twentieth Century Fox executives by Lena Horne lead to more acting roles between 1952 and 1955. She appeared in several films including Carmen Jones with Dorothy Dandridge
and Odds Against Tomorrow with Harry Belafonte
.
De Lavallade was a principal guest performer with Alvin Ailey's
Dance Company on the company's tour of Asia and in some countries the company was billed as De Lavallade-Ailey American Dance Company. Other performances included dancing with Donald McKayle
and appearing in Agnes DeMille's American Ballet Theater productions of The Four Marys and The Frail Quarry in 1965. She joined the Yale School of Drama
as a choreographer and performer-in-residence in 1970. She staged musicals, plays and operas, and eventually became a professor
and member of the Yale Repertory Theater. Between 1990 and 1993, De Lavallade returned to the Metropolitan Opera as choreographer for Porgy and Bess
and Die Meistersinger.
In 2003 she appeared in the rotating cast of the Off-Broadway staged reading of Wit & Wisdom
. In 2010, she appeared in an one-night only concert semi staged reading of Evening Primrose by Stephen Sondheim
.
. Their lives were the subject of the Linda Atkinson and Nick Doob documentary Carmen and Geoffrey.
In 2004, De Lavallade received the Black History Month
Lifetime Achievement Award, the Rosie Award and the Bessie Award in 2006 and the
Capezio Dance Award (in 2007), as well as an honorary Doctor of Fine Arts from Juilliard in 2007.
Professor
A professor is a scholarly teacher; the precise meaning of the term varies by country. Literally, professor derives from Latin as a "person who professes" being usually an expert in arts or sciences; a teacher of high rank...
and stage
Theatre
Theatre is a collaborative form of fine art that uses live performers to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place. The performers may communicate this experience to the audience through combinations of gesture, speech, song, music or dance...
and film
Film
A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...
actress.
Early Years
Carmen De Lavallade was born in Los AngelesLos Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
on March 6, 1931, to Afro-Creole parents from New Orleans, Louisiana
New Orleans, Louisiana
New Orleans is a major United States port and the largest city and metropolitan area in the state of Louisiana. The New Orleans metropolitan area has a population of 1,235,650 as of 2009, the 46th largest in the USA. The New Orleans – Metairie – Bogalusa combined statistical area has a population...
. She was raised by her aunt who owned one of the first African American history
African American history
African-American history is the portion of American history that specifically discusses the African American or Black American ethnic group in the United States. Most African Americans are the descendants of captive Africans held in the United States from 1619 to 1865...
bookshops on Central Avenue. Her cousin, Janet Collins
Janet Collins
Janet Collins was a ballet dancer and choreographer.Janet Collins was one of the few classically trained Black dancers of her generation. In 1951 she won the Donaldson Award for best dancer on Broadway for her work in Cole Porter's Out of This World...
, was the first African American prima ballerina at the Metropolitan Opera
Metropolitan Opera
The Metropolitan Opera is an opera company, located in New York City. Originally founded in 1880, the company gave its first performance on October 22, 1883. The company is operated by the non-profit Metropolitan Opera Association, with Peter Gelb as general manager...
. De Lavallade began studying ballet with Melissa Blake at the age of 16 and after graduation from Thomas Jefferson High School in L.A., was awarded a scholarship to study dance with Lester Horton
Lester Horton
Lester Horton was an American dancer, choreographer, and teacher.-Early years:Lester Iradell Horton was born in Indianapolis, Indiana on January 23, 1906. His parents were Iradell Horton and Pollyanna Horton....
.
Career
De Lavallade became a member of the Lester Horton Dance TheaterLester Horton
Lester Horton was an American dancer, choreographer, and teacher.-Early years:Lester Iradell Horton was born in Indianapolis, Indiana on January 23, 1906. His parents were Iradell Horton and Pollyanna Horton....
in 1949 where she danced as a lead dancer until her departure for New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
with Alvin Ailey
Alvin Ailey
Alvin Ailey, Jr. was an American choreographer and activist who founded the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater in New York. Ailey is credited with popularizing modern dance and revolutionizing African-American participation in 20th century concert dance...
in 1954. De Lavallade, like all of Horton's
Lester Horton
Lester Horton was an American dancer, choreographer, and teacher.-Early years:Lester Iradell Horton was born in Indianapolis, Indiana on January 23, 1906. His parents were Iradell Horton and Pollyanna Horton....
students, studied other art forms including painting, acting, music, set design and costuming as well as ballet and other forms of modern and ethnic dance. She studied dancing with ballerina Carmelita Maracci
Carmelita Maracci
Carmelita Maracci was a dancer and choreographer.Her students included Paul Godkin, Donald Saddler, Allegra Kent, Geraldine Chaplin, Janet Collins, Tommy Rall, Julie Newmar, and Cynthia Gregory....
and acting with Stella Adler
Stella Adler
Stella Adler was an American actress and an acclaimed acting teacher, who founded the Stella Adler Studio of Acting in New York City and the The Stella Adler Academy of Acting in Los Angeles with long-time protege Joanne Linville, who continues to teach and furthers Adler's legacy...
. In 1954, De Lavallade made her Broadway debut partnered with Alvin Ailey
Alvin Ailey
Alvin Ailey, Jr. was an American choreographer and activist who founded the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater in New York. Ailey is credited with popularizing modern dance and revolutionizing African-American participation in 20th century concert dance...
in Truman Capote's
Truman Capote
Truman Streckfus Persons , known as Truman Capote , was an American author, many of whose short stories, novels, plays, and nonfiction are recognized literary classics, including the novella Breakfast at Tiffany's and the true crime novel In Cold Blood , which he labeled a "nonfiction novel." At...
House of Flowers.
In 1955, she married dancer and actor Geoffrey Holder
Geoffrey Holder
Geoffrey Richard Holder is a Trinidadian actor, choreographer, director, dancer, painter, costume designer, singer and voice-over artist.-Early life:...
who she had met while working on House of Flowers. It was with Holder that De Lavallade choreographed her signature solo, Come Sunday, to a black spiritual
Spiritual (music)
Spirituals are religious songs which were created by enslaved African people in America.-Terminology and origin:...
sung by Odetta Gordon. The following year, De Lavallade danced as the prima ballerina in Samson and Delilah
Samson and Delilah
Samson and Delilah may refer to:*Samson, a Biblical figure*Delilah, a Biblical figure*Samson and Delilah, a Biblical narrative* Samson and Delilah , a painting by Peter Paul Rubens* Samson and Delilah, the club mascots of the Sunderland A.F.C...
, and Aida
Aida
Aida sometimes spelled Aïda, is an opera in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Antonio Ghislanzoni, based on a scenario written by French Egyptologist Auguste Mariette...
at the Metropolitan Opera
Metropolitan Opera
The Metropolitan Opera is an opera company, located in New York City. Originally founded in 1880, the company gave its first performance on October 22, 1883. The company is operated by the non-profit Metropolitan Opera Association, with Peter Gelb as general manager...
. She also made her television debut in John Butler's ballet Flight, and in 1957, she appeared in the television production of Duke Ellington's
Duke Ellington
Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington was an American composer, pianist, and big band leader. Ellington wrote over 1,000 compositions...
A Drum is a Woman. De Lavallade also appeared in several off-Broadway productions, including Othello
Othello
The Tragedy of Othello, the Moor of Venice is a tragedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in approximately 1603, and based on the Italian short story "Un Capitano Moro" by Cinthio, a disciple of Boccaccio, first published in 1565...
and Death of a Salesman
Death of a Salesman
Death of a Salesman is a 1949 play written by American playwright Arthur Miller. It was the recipient of the 1949 Pulitzer Prize for Drama and Tony Award for Best Play. Premiered at the Morosco Theatre in February 1949, the original production ran for a total of 742 performances.-Plot :Willy Loman...
. An introduction to Twentieth Century Fox executives by Lena Horne lead to more acting roles between 1952 and 1955. She appeared in several films including Carmen Jones with Dorothy Dandridge
Dorothy Dandridge
Dorothy Jean Dandridge was an American actress and popular singer, and was the first African-American to be nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress...
and Odds Against Tomorrow with Harry Belafonte
Harry Belafonte
Harold George "Harry" Belafonte, Jr. is an American singer, songwriter, actor and social activist. He was dubbed the "King of Calypso" for popularizing the Caribbean musical style with an international audience in the 1950s...
.
De Lavallade was a principal guest performer with Alvin Ailey's
Alvin Ailey
Alvin Ailey, Jr. was an American choreographer and activist who founded the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater in New York. Ailey is credited with popularizing modern dance and revolutionizing African-American participation in 20th century concert dance...
Dance Company on the company's tour of Asia and in some countries the company was billed as De Lavallade-Ailey American Dance Company. Other performances included dancing with Donald McKayle
Donald McKayle
Donald McKayle is an African American modern dancer, choreographer, teacher, director and writer best known for creating socially conscious concert works during the 1950s and 60s that focus on expressing the human condition and more specifically, the black experience in America...
and appearing in Agnes DeMille's American Ballet Theater productions of The Four Marys and The Frail Quarry in 1965. She joined the Yale School of Drama
Yale School of Drama
The Yale School of Drama is a graduate professional school of Yale University providing training in every discipline of the theatre: acting, design , directing, dramaturgy and dramatic criticism, playwriting, stage management, sound design, technical design and production, and theater...
as a choreographer and performer-in-residence in 1970. She staged musicals, plays and operas, and eventually became a professor
Professor
A professor is a scholarly teacher; the precise meaning of the term varies by country. Literally, professor derives from Latin as a "person who professes" being usually an expert in arts or sciences; a teacher of high rank...
and member of the Yale Repertory Theater. Between 1990 and 1993, De Lavallade returned to the Metropolitan Opera as choreographer for Porgy and Bess
Porgy and Bess
Porgy and Bess is an opera, first performed in 1935, with music by George Gershwin, libretto by DuBose Heyward, and lyrics by Ira Gershwin and DuBose Heyward. It was based on DuBose Heyward's novel Porgy and subsequent play of the same title, which he co-wrote with his wife Dorothy Heyward...
and Die Meistersinger.
In 2003 she appeared in the rotating cast of the Off-Broadway staged reading of Wit & Wisdom
Wit & Wisdom
Wit & Wisdom is a play conceived and put together by Vivian Gornick and Nora Eisenberg and done by the Colleagues Theatre Company which premiered at the Off-Broadway Arclight Theatre in New York City, New York. It ran from March 5 to March 30, 2003.-Plot:...
. In 2010, she appeared in an one-night only concert semi staged reading of Evening Primrose by Stephen Sondheim
Stephen Sondheim
Stephen Joshua Sondheim is an American composer and lyricist for stage and film. He is the winner of an Academy Award, multiple Tony Awards including the Special Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre, multiple Grammy Awards, a Pulitzer Prize and the Laurence Olivier Award...
.
Personal life
De Lavallade resides in New York City with her husband, Geoffrey HolderGeoffrey Holder
Geoffrey Richard Holder is a Trinidadian actor, choreographer, director, dancer, painter, costume designer, singer and voice-over artist.-Early life:...
. Their lives were the subject of the Linda Atkinson and Nick Doob documentary Carmen and Geoffrey.
In 2004, De Lavallade received the Black History Month
Black History Month
Black History Month is an observance of the history of the African diaspora in a number of countries outside of Africa. Since 1976, it is observed annually in the United States and Canada in February, while in the United Kingdom it is observed in October...
Lifetime Achievement Award, the Rosie Award and the Bessie Award in 2006 and the
Capezio Dance Award (in 2007), as well as an honorary Doctor of Fine Arts from Juilliard in 2007.
External links
- Carmen de Lavallade's oral history video excerpts at The National Visionary Leadership Project
- History Makers
- Archive film of Carmen De Lavallade performing Portrait of Billie in 1992 at Jacob's Pillow