Moira Shearer
1926 – 2006
Category: Uncategorized
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In 1954 the British impresario Donald Albery produced the play “I am a Camera” for London’s West End stage. It was based on John van Druten’s play that had been staged in New York in 1951 and that, in turn, was based on Christopher Isherwood’s novel about life in Berlin in the 1930s, titled…
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Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger brought in Sir Thomas Beecham, the British conductor and impresario, to conduct the music for the ballet sequence that was the centrepiece of their 1948 film, The Red Shoes. The music was written by Brian Easedale who also served as conductor for the balance of the film. After…
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In 1937 an 18-year-old Michael Benthall, who was then an undergraduate at Oxford, went to see a production of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream staged by Tyrone Guthrie at the Old Vic Theatre in London. Vivien Leigh played the part of Titania and Robert Helpmann was Oberon. The production included music that Mendelssohn…
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Moira Shearer and Fred Ashton, one of the principal choreographers for the Sadler’s Wells Ballet, had a long professional relationship that extended from 1943 to 1967. In that timeframe, he created several ballets that drew upon her extensive and remarkable ballet skills. Moira Shearer and Fred Ashton at Covent Garden in 1967. Photographer not…
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“Ballet makes unceasing and exhausting demands on its votives…..a dancer often spends the whole day in the theatre and is never free from rehearsals, the daily classes and special classes, photo calls and dress fittings”. Peter Craig Raymond, Ballet Today, December 1954. Moira Shearer leaves her parent’s flat in west London and heads off for…
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In 1987 BBC Northwest hired Gillian Lynne to choreograph and direct a ballet based on the life of the Salford-born painter L. S. Lowry. The ballet or, as Lynne preferred to call it, “dance drama”, was to be performed by the Northern Ballet, based in Manchester and directed by the former Royal Ballet dancer…
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During her tenure at the Sadler’s Wells Ballet Moira Shearer was partnered by numerous male dancers. These included Robert Helpmann and Michael Somes. However, as they were primarily matched with the prima ballerina, Margot Fonteyn, Shearer, as the second cast, was usually partnered by other dancers. Chief among them were Alexis Rassine, David Paltenghi…
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In the late 30s Fred Ashton choreographed The Wedding Bouquet based on a play by Gertrude Stein with music by Lord Berners. The ballet was, in fact, the result of a collaboration between Ashton, Berners and Constant Lambert, musical director of the Vic-Wells Ballet. The plot of the ballet concerns a wedding reception…
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Symphonic Variations was the first ballet created after World War 2 by the choreographer, Frederick Aston. Its genesis was Cesar Franck’s concerto of the same name. Ashton had listened to the music a number of times during the war and decided to produce a ballet based on it. The dance critic, Stephen Williams,…
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Ninette de Valois and Moira Shearer rarely seemed to see eye to eye. Their differences as to how Shearer should dance began almost from the moment she joined the Vic Wells school in 1940. Under Nicholas Legat Shearer had been trained in the so-called “Russian” style while de Valois taught the “Italian” style that…
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At one point in his interview with her Dale Harris reminded Moira Shearer that she had once said that she had a gift for comedy and should have been a clown. Harris continued, “we’ve never mentioned Swanhilda”. Shearer responded, “I hated it …. from beginning to end. I was so successful in it…
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When Moira Shearer was with the Sadler’s Wells Ballet in New York in 1950 a reporter asked her if she was pursued by “stage door Johnnies”. She laughed and replied that, thankfully, they were a thing of the past. But there were still fans and, while she didn’t go on record about her obligations…
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One of the remarkable or, perhaps, significant facts about Moira Shearer’s 11-year career at the Sadler’s Wells Ballet is that she rarely danced in the full-length classic ballets such as Lac des Cygnes (Swan Lake) and Sleeping Beauty. She appeared only 21 times in the lead role in Swan Lake and, of those performances…
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On January 17th 1926 at 5.30 pm Moira Shearer was born in Morton Lodge, Dunfermline, Fife, Scotland. Thus, today January 17th 2026 we celebrate her centenary. This portrait was taken by the British photographer Hans Wild in 1949 prior to Sadler’s Wells Ballet’s first tour of North America. It shows Moira Shearer in her simple…
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As recounted by Alastair Macaulay, the former dance critic for the New York Times, Beryl Grey and Moira Shearer approached Ninette de Valois to pay their respects to her after the memorial service for Marie Rambert in 1975. After they had left to have lunch together de Valois turned to her companion, the…
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Moira Shearer’s mother took her daughter to see the ballet company, Les Ballets Russes, when they appeared at Covent Garden in 1935. There she saw Leonide Massine dance in “La Boutique Fantasque”; she was nine years old and he was 39. When he came to dance with the Sadler’s Wells Ballet early in 1947 at…
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The director Michael Powell, in discussing the evolution of his film, ‘The Red Shoes”, stated that its “salient feature …. is simply Moira Shearer. Before this film could be started it was necessary to find a dancer on the brink of becoming a (prima) ballerina, about 20 years of age; beautiful; exquisite figure and…
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Fred Ashton, the principal choreographer for the Sadler’s Wells Ballet, created the three-act ballet, Cinderella, in 1948. It was originally designed to be danced by Sadler’s Wells prima ballerina, Margot Fonteyn, but, when she communicated to Ashton that she would not be able to dance every night of the planned rigorous schedule of performances, Ashton,…
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As quoted in several sources, including The New York Times in April 1951, Moira Shearer stated she had “one cardinal aim in her dancing career: “to dance Giselle really well”. Between 1942 and 1953 Shearer made her way up the rankings of the roles in Giselle at Sadler’s Wells. Initially, in 1942 and 43, she…
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Moira Shearer had an extremely busy schedule at Covent Garden in April and early May of 1950. She danced in 8 performances of Cinderella and 14 of George Balanchine’s Ballet Imperial. Her final performance of Ballet Imperial was a matinee on Saturday May 6th. Then, the following day, she took a train called The Golden…
Moira Shearer 