Actors - Robert Helpmann

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	Actors - Robert Helpmann

Sir Robert Helpmann (April 9 1909 – September 28 1986), Australian dancer, actor, director and choreographer, was born in Mount Gambier, South Australia. Born Robert Helpman, he added the extra 'n' to avoid there being 13 letters in his name. From childhood Helpmann had no desire but to be a dancer - a difficult ambition to fulfill in the rather philistine atmosphere of provincial Australia in the 1920s.

In a 1974 interview he recalled his introduction to dance:

said, ‘But I've never had a boy to dance before’. So I said, ‘That doesn’t matter. I want to come to your ballet classes.’ So she said, ‘Well, all right, you can’. But, of course, never having had a boy pupil, I had to learn all the dances for the little girls, and dance on my pointes, and of course when it came time for her annual display, I had to dance in them because I was better than any of them. And so I always appeared as a little girl, on my pointes. And at the end of the number I would take off my wig, and this was a great success with the audience.

In 1926 he joined the touring dance company of the Russian ballerina Anna Pavlova. Helpmann later recalled:

went on a business trip to Melbourne when I was 14 and when he came back he said, ‘You’re always wanting to be a dancer. There’s a girl dancing in Melbourne and she’s got a company and I’ve been to see her, and she’s going to take you into the company.’ Next week, I left for Melbourne with my mother, and the ‘girl’ was Anna Pavlova.

In 1927 Helpmann first appeared professionally, in Sydney, but opportunities to dance at any serious level in Australia were limited. In 1933 he went to London and joined the Vic-Wells Ballet, which later became Sadler's Wells and later the Royal Ballet. He was principal dancer from 1933 to 1950. While he was not among the ranks of the great male dancers, he was certainly highly accomplished. Here he formed his great professional partnership with Margot Fonteyn. Together they created many roles in ballets choreographed by Frederick Ashton, including a comical pantomime type ballet of "Cinderella" with Ashton and Helpmann creating the roles of the ugly step-sisters for the ballet.

The highpoint of Helpmann's career as a dancer was the Royal Ballet's tour of the United States in 1949, with Fonteyn and Helpmann dancing the leading roles in The Sleeping Beauty. The production caused a sensation which made the names of both the Royal Ballet and its two principals; public and press alike referred to them affectionately as Bobby and Margot. Although Helpmann was past his best as a dancer, the tour opened doors for him in the United States as an actor and director.

In the 1940s, as he passed his peak as a dancer, Helpmann turned to production and to acting. He produced his own ballets — Comus (1942), Hamlet (1942), Miracle in the Gorbals (1946) and Adam Zero (1946). He performed roles from Shakespeare at the Stratford Festival and at the Old Vic theatre company in London, playing the title role in Hamlet two years after having danced the same part. He also appeared in many films, including the two Powell and Pressburger ballet films The Red Shoes
(1948), for which he choreographed the opening sequence, and The Tales of Hoffmann
(1951). He co-directed with Rudolf Nureyev and played the title role in the ballet-film Don Quixote (1973) which was produced in Melbourne. One of his most memorable screen roles was the Child Catcher in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (1968).

In 1965 Helpmann returned to Australia to become co-director of the Australian Ballet. Since he was very obviously gay, his arrival in what was at that time a very conservative country caused some consternation. Australians were proud of his international fame, but not sure what to make of him personally. He did not endear himself with the comment: "I don't despair about the cultural scene in Australia because there isn't one here to despair about."

His most significant contribution to the development of theatre in Australia was his time with the Australian Ballet. Here he joined Peggy van Praagh at the helm of the fledgling company, as her co-director until 1974 and sole director until 1976. He produced ballets including Sun Music, Elektra and The Merry Widow. This was not his first encounter with The Merry Widow - he had directed a production of the operetta in His Majesty's Theatre in London in 1944, with Madge Elliott as "Anna" and Cryil Richard as "Danilo". In the 1930's he had also danced in a production with Gladys Moncrieff as "Anna".

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