WEBVTT 1 00:00:13.160 --> 00:00:15.300 This is statement number 8. 2 00:00:15.300 --> 00:00:16.820 It's 20-25. 3 00:00:17.280 --> 00:00:20.200 That'll be the total on page 33, number 8. 4 00:00:20.340 --> 00:00:21.980 We are doing like a page. 5 00:00:22.240 --> 00:00:24.200 This is the company of T.L.T. 6 00:00:25.120 --> 00:00:25.680 Peterson. 7 00:00:44.960 --> 00:00:50.100 I would like to. 8 00:00:50.100 --> 00:00:53.640 I have to find somewhere to go with because I don't have to go out alone at night. 9 00:00:53.820 --> 00:00:54.900 I'm scared to death. 10 00:00:54.960 --> 00:00:55.080 I'm scared to death. 11 00:00:55.080 --> 00:00:55.080 12 00:00:55.080 --> 00:00:55.080 13 00:00:55.080 --> 00:00:55.080 14 00:00:55.080 --> 00:00:55.080 15 00:00:55.080 --> 00:00:55.080 16 00:00:55.080 --> 00:00:55.080 17 00:00:55.080 --> 00:00:55.080 18 00:00:55.080 --> 00:00:55.080 19 00:00:55.080 --> 00:00:55.080 20 00:00:55.080 --> 00:00:55.080 21 00:00:55.080 --> 00:00:55.080 22 00:00:55.080 --> 00:00:55.080 23 00:00:55.080 --> 00:00:55.080 24 00:00:55.080 --> 00:00:55.080 25 00:00:55.080 --> 00:00:55.080 26 00:00:55.080 --> 00:00:55.080 27 00:00:55.080 --> 00:00:55.080 28 00:00:55.080 --> 00:00:55.080 29 00:00:55.080 --> 00:00:55.080 30 00:00:55.080 --> 00:00:55.080 31 00:00:55.080 --> 00:00:55.100 I'm scared to death. 32 00:00:55.100 --> 00:00:55.480 I'm scared to death. 33 00:00:56.480 --> 00:00:59.200 And I've got to find somebody to talk to. 34 00:01:00.340 --> 00:01:02.580 Teachers, actually, we were talking about. 35 00:01:04.280 --> 00:01:09.480 Then, when you went to... 36 00:01:10.600 --> 00:01:11.460 Jumping ahead. 37 00:01:11.500 --> 00:01:19.840 Well, in 1920, in London, Adolf Bohm introduced you to another teacher. 38 00:01:21.500 --> 00:01:21.820 Cicchetti? 39 00:01:22.140 --> 00:01:22.500 Uh-huh. 40 00:01:22.840 --> 00:01:23.360 Oh, yes. 41 00:01:23.360 --> 00:01:25.360 He's supposed to be the greatest teacher in the world. 42 00:01:25.960 --> 00:01:31.660 He was sent from Italy just to teach Pavlova, and he spent a great deal of his life in Russia 43 00:01:31.660 --> 00:01:34.840 teaching Pavlova because he was considered so great. 44 00:01:35.200 --> 00:01:38.720 He had a system, a real system. 45 00:01:41.020 --> 00:01:44.200 I appreciate the fact that Bohm sent me to him. 46 00:01:44.760 --> 00:01:45.480 I got a lot of... 47 00:01:45.480 --> 00:01:47.060 I had two séances with him. 48 00:01:47.060 --> 00:01:53.120 I started with him in London and again in Monte Carlo. 49 00:01:53.120 --> 00:01:53.520 In Monte Carlo. 50 00:01:54.080 --> 00:01:54.260 Uh-huh. 51 00:01:57.320 --> 00:02:02.560 And different from the teaching of today, every Monday you did the same thing, every 52 00:02:02.560 --> 00:02:07.040 Tuesday you did the same thing, the same adagio so that you knew them all. 53 00:02:07.400 --> 00:02:10.900 Nobody teaches that way anymore, I don't think. 54 00:02:10.900 --> 00:02:19.660 And when you did Barr, he was an old, old man, at least he seemed a million years old 55 00:02:19.660 --> 00:02:25.540 to me, but he would sit with his head down, pound it on... 56 00:02:25.540 --> 00:02:30.120 And you'd think he wasn't looking, but believe me or me, if you did anything wrong, that 57 00:02:30.120 --> 00:02:31.740 stick was thrown at you. 58 00:02:32.840 --> 00:02:34.860 He got up and really whacked you. 59 00:02:37.020 --> 00:02:37.560 Why? 60 00:02:37.780 --> 00:02:38.500 Uh-huh. 61 00:02:39.040 --> 00:02:39.820 I really did. 62 00:02:39.820 --> 00:02:43.620 And how was he especially helpful, his emphasis on technique? 63 00:02:43.620 --> 00:02:51.000 Yes, he was so correct, his whole port de bras, nothing left to the imagination, it was just 64 00:02:51.000 --> 00:02:55.260 all the way it should be, real classical, you know. 65 00:02:56.060 --> 00:03:01.320 And was that good discipline for you because that was different from really embarrassing 66 00:03:01.320 --> 00:03:01.320 67 00:03:01.320 --> 00:03:05.120 Well, it was just so perfect, the way he did it was so perfect. 68 00:03:05.120 --> 00:03:05.340 Yes. 69 00:03:07.680 --> 00:03:15.240 Although there's a photograph of you, and it, in what Cicchetti calls, in a pose, Cicchetti 70 00:03:15.240 --> 00:03:18.140 is called the world's most perfect arabesque. 71 00:03:19.540 --> 00:03:23.240 Well, it's a perfect arabesque, and I got into it quite by accident, I assure you, and 72 00:03:23.240 --> 00:03:24.700 the camera just happened to be there. 73 00:03:25.680 --> 00:03:28.520 Yeah, it is a perfect arabesque, I think so myself. 74 00:03:29.100 --> 00:03:29.900 It's beautiful. 75 00:03:29.900 --> 00:03:35.900 Yes, as I said, it was just, the camera happened to be there when I got into it. 76 00:03:37.220 --> 00:03:37.440 Luck. 77 00:03:38.080 --> 00:03:39.920 It's just luck, it really was just luck. 78 00:03:40.220 --> 00:03:46.220 I use that picture all the time because it's so correct, the pose, everything about it's 79 00:03:46.220 --> 00:03:46.480 correct. 80 00:03:47.220 --> 00:03:48.060 And the pose is beautiful. 81 00:03:49.220 --> 00:03:50.500 I think so too. 82 00:03:52.360 --> 00:03:58.060 So you didn't study with Cicchetti for very long, it was just over the summer in London 83 00:03:58.060 --> 00:04:01.180 when you were touring with the Ballet on Team. 84 00:04:02.360 --> 00:04:06.660 I think I studied with him when I was dancing at the London Coliseum, wasn't it? 85 00:04:07.560 --> 00:04:14.820 Yes, I danced, Balm took his company there, and I danced at the London Coliseum with Balm, 86 00:04:15.000 --> 00:04:17.720 and that's when I had the lessons with Cicchetti at night. 87 00:04:20.500 --> 00:04:29.820 But then later when you went to Monte Carlo on your honeymoon and you were going to audition 88 00:04:29.820 --> 00:04:36.500 for Diaghilev, then Cicchetti was your teacher then again at that time. 89 00:04:37.720 --> 00:04:42.200 And there's some wonderful stories connected with that audition. 90 00:04:43.160 --> 00:04:44.280 Oh, with Diaghilev? 91 00:04:46.200 --> 00:04:54.420 Well, he was such a great man, you know, and he recognized talent right away and he wouldn't 92 00:04:54.420 --> 00:04:56.400 pay any attention to anybody who didn't have talent. 93 00:04:57.800 --> 00:05:03.140 And I was scared to death of course to dance for him, but I did, and he asked me to be 94 00:05:03.140 --> 00:05:07.180 in the company, and I was so sort of taken aback. 95 00:05:07.300 --> 00:05:11.000 He came to Cicchetti's class and saw me in the class, and that's when he asked me if 96 00:05:11.000 --> 00:05:12.180 I would be in the company. 97 00:05:12.180 --> 00:05:19.440 And so I said yes, I forgot I was on my honeymoon, so my husband came home on his honeymoon 98 00:05:19.440 --> 00:05:23.580 all alone, and I joined the Diaghilev Company. 99 00:05:23.600 --> 00:05:32.020 But I didn't stay long because I knew that I would either have to stay within seven years, 100 00:05:32.020 --> 00:05:37.180 something like that, to be anything really, to be really in the company, or I would have 101 00:05:37.180 --> 00:05:40.240 to have my career in America, and I figured I didn't want to stay in here. 102 00:05:40.240 --> 00:05:49.220 I would have liked to, but I was already married, and so I had an offer to go to Buenos Aires 103 00:05:49.220 --> 00:05:55.300 to do the Coq d'Or with Balm, which I'd always wanted to do, and that was a long trip 104 00:05:55.300 --> 00:05:57.720 in those days because you had to go by boat. 105 00:05:59.000 --> 00:06:06.060 And so I came home for one day and then went right off to Buenos Aires. 106 00:06:06.360 --> 00:06:09.680 Now that was a very important role for you, you said one time. 107 00:06:09.680 --> 00:06:10.880 It was, yeah. 108 00:06:11.040 --> 00:06:15.340 The Queen of Shemekind was a role that you would go to the ends of the earth, what an 109 00:06:15.340 --> 00:06:15.440 interesting role. 110 00:06:15.460 --> 00:06:16.180 Yes, I did. 111 00:06:16.380 --> 00:06:20.760 I said, oh, if anybody would offer me that role, I'd go to the ends of the earth to 112 00:06:20.760 --> 00:06:22.380 do it, so of course I had to do it. 113 00:06:22.520 --> 00:06:23.460 I had to go. 114 00:06:23.680 --> 00:06:24.480 You had to go. 115 00:06:25.240 --> 00:06:28.560 So what was there about the role that you liked so much about it? 116 00:06:28.560 --> 00:06:30.800 It's very exotic, but what else? 117 00:06:30.920 --> 00:06:33.840 Oh, I don't know, I liked the music and I liked the idea. 118 00:06:33.840 --> 00:06:40.360 I liked coming out of the tent and dancing for the old do-do, wasn't that his name? 119 00:06:41.200 --> 00:06:43.480 King Do-do, I think that was his name. 120 00:06:44.040 --> 00:06:46.120 I don't remember much about the story. 121 00:06:46.640 --> 00:06:47.220 I can't either. 122 00:06:47.880 --> 00:06:48.640 It's not a ballet. 123 00:06:48.640 --> 00:06:50.580 I can sing it for you if you like. 124 00:06:52.280 --> 00:06:54.380 You can sing it, sing the music, really? 125 00:06:55.220 --> 00:06:57.840 That's what you remember more than the stories, the music, you mean? 126 00:06:58.160 --> 00:07:00.160 Oh, all the music, I guess, keeps running in your mind. 127 00:07:00.300 --> 00:07:00.740 Yeah. 128 00:07:02.280 --> 00:07:03.160 I don't want to sing it. 129 00:07:03.160 --> 00:07:05.260 I can't sing it all, but I mean I... 130 00:07:05.260 --> 00:07:07.140 But you would remember the music, I know it. 131 00:07:08.020 --> 00:07:08.020 132 00:07:08.020 --> 00:07:17.420 So that role was...why was that role, Ruth, I mean, was it the exoticism, the romanticism? 133 00:07:17.420 --> 00:07:18.700 I think so, yes. 134 00:07:19.420 --> 00:07:26.000 I never wanted to do any, oh, Swan Lake or Sleeping Beauty or any of those classical ballets. 135 00:07:26.420 --> 00:07:27.680 I wasn't interested in them at all. 136 00:07:27.980 --> 00:07:31.560 I really was only interested in creating dances myself. 137 00:07:31.560 --> 00:07:35.080 But that one was not mine and I just wanted to do it. 138 00:07:35.300 --> 00:07:37.440 That's the only one I ever wanted to do. 139 00:07:37.520 --> 00:07:40.980 I never danced any of the classic roles, any of them. 140 00:07:41.480 --> 00:07:42.300 I didn't want to. 141 00:07:42.340 --> 00:07:43.060 It wasn't interesting. 142 00:07:45.100 --> 00:07:52.900 It seems as though in the kinds of roles that you danced before you ever started doing your own choreography 143 00:07:52.900 --> 00:07:54.620 so that you could create roles for yourself, 144 00:07:54.620 --> 00:08:05.060 but the kind of roles that you danced with foam, with just kind of in general were exotic 145 00:08:06.020 --> 00:08:14.040 and sort of elfin and do you know what I mean, kind of romantic roles, 146 00:08:14.040 --> 00:08:16.680 but not in the classical Swan Lake tradition. 147 00:08:16.920 --> 00:08:17.640 They were sort of... 148 00:08:17.640 --> 00:08:20.020 No, I don't remember really. 149 00:08:20.900 --> 00:08:27.280 I guess what I'm saying is that the roles that seem to seek you out 150 00:08:27.280 --> 00:08:35.020 or that you seemed especially suited for seem to be perhaps a reflection of the kind of person that you are. 151 00:08:37.280 --> 00:08:39.100 Some of them with a humor to them. 152 00:08:39.140 --> 00:08:39.360 What? 153 00:08:40.000 --> 00:08:47.840 Humor and a kind of a gay, elfin quality or also very exotic kind of... 154 00:08:47.840 --> 00:08:49.860 Oh, I did all kinds of different dances. 155 00:08:49.940 --> 00:08:53.880 It was fun to do different kinds of dances. 156 00:08:54.200 --> 00:08:54.700 It was. 157 00:08:56.940 --> 00:09:03.260 Tell me about the dancing that you did as Natasha Stepanova. 158 00:09:04.400 --> 00:09:06.540 Well, that was just in the Court of Ballet with Pavel. 159 00:09:07.360 --> 00:09:13.140 And then wasn't that also the name you used when you danced at the movie theaters? 160 00:09:13.780 --> 00:09:14.780 Maybe I did. 161 00:09:14.780 --> 00:09:18.340 I guess I still didn't use it because I didn't want to use my own name. 162 00:09:19.220 --> 00:09:20.780 But you did the dances to... 163 00:09:21.560 --> 00:09:22.300 Make money. 164 00:09:23.000 --> 00:09:23.000 165 00:09:23.220 --> 00:09:24.340 Whenever I needed money. 166 00:09:25.060 --> 00:09:27.140 Explain how that worked exactly. 167 00:09:27.200 --> 00:09:29.420 There was the movie and then you would perform or how did that work? 168 00:09:29.420 --> 00:09:31.900 Well, I remember there were two. 169 00:09:31.960 --> 00:09:36.740 There was the Rialto and the Rivoli in New York and they gave regular movies, 170 00:09:36.800 --> 00:09:41.460 but they always did a little preface to them, a prologue to them of, 171 00:09:41.460 --> 00:09:43.720 somebody would sing or somebody would dance. 172 00:09:45.720 --> 00:09:47.980 And so they paid very well. 173 00:09:48.040 --> 00:09:50.640 And so I would go whenever I needed money. 174 00:09:51.360 --> 00:09:57.120 But it was hard because you had to dance four times a day and then five times on Saturday and Sunday. 175 00:09:57.380 --> 00:09:59.960 But I think that's one thing that made me very strong. 176 00:10:01.820 --> 00:10:05.000 And the name, you didn't want the name to get... 177 00:10:05.000 --> 00:10:07.860 You didn't want to do it as Ruth Page because it was after all. 178 00:10:08.060 --> 00:10:09.840 Yes, the meaning, I guess. 179 00:10:09.840 --> 00:10:11.600 I don't know what I thought. 180 00:10:12.840 --> 00:10:16.260 I don't know that you thought it was demeaning and so the things that you've written, you said, 181 00:10:16.280 --> 00:10:17.460 well, it was a good way to make money. 182 00:10:17.860 --> 00:10:19.340 I had to make money, had to live. 183 00:10:19.560 --> 00:10:20.440 So it was fine to do. 184 00:10:20.540 --> 00:10:21.060 That's right. 185 00:10:24.060 --> 00:10:27.980 Going back again, one of your very first roles when you came to New York, 186 00:10:29.700 --> 00:10:36.340 you danced in a choreographic poem called Falling Leaves. 187 00:10:36.520 --> 00:10:37.120 Do you remember that? 188 00:10:37.300 --> 00:10:38.120 Victor Herbert. 189 00:10:38.120 --> 00:10:40.120 Oh, yes, that was a show that... 190 00:10:41.660 --> 00:10:42.640 I remember that. 191 00:10:42.680 --> 00:10:44.440 It was up at the Century Theater. 192 00:10:45.360 --> 00:10:48.020 And it was a Victor Herbert thing. 193 00:10:48.400 --> 00:10:50.120 And there was a ballet called Falling Leaves. 194 00:10:50.920 --> 00:10:51.820 And I was in that. 195 00:10:51.860 --> 00:10:52.700 I remember that. 196 00:10:53.120 --> 00:10:56.300 Yeah, it was called Miss 1917 was the name of the review. 197 00:10:56.460 --> 00:10:57.880 Miss 1917, was it? 198 00:10:57.880 --> 00:10:58.260 Yes. 199 00:10:58.740 --> 00:11:01.320 And the rehearsal pianist was George Gershwin. 200 00:11:02.120 --> 00:11:04.720 Oh, I'd forgotten that last name. 201 00:11:05.380 --> 00:11:06.120 That's interesting. 202 00:11:06.400 --> 00:11:07.480 What was that like? 203 00:11:07.480 --> 00:11:09.440 I don't remember him from then. 204 00:11:09.740 --> 00:11:14.360 What I remember, George Gershwin, was we were in Cuba at the same time. 205 00:11:15.120 --> 00:11:20.680 I was dancing and he came to Cuba and was, of course, he was so great and famous 206 00:11:20.680 --> 00:11:23.620 that everybody got out all the best music in Cuba for him. 207 00:11:23.860 --> 00:11:26.940 So I would go around with him and listen to all this wonderful music 208 00:11:26.940 --> 00:11:28.460 that they had in Cuba at that time. 209 00:11:28.800 --> 00:11:33.140 I don't know what it's like now, but he was a wonderful pianist, you know. 210 00:11:33.160 --> 00:11:33.560 Oh, yes. 211 00:11:33.560 --> 00:11:37.000 And when he played the rap scene, it was just so exciting. 212 00:11:38.020 --> 00:11:40.340 I'm sure, yeah, until you had him play it himself. 213 00:11:40.480 --> 00:11:42.460 Yes, it was very, very exciting. 214 00:11:43.080 --> 00:11:46.660 And yet, there he was making money as your rehearsal pianist 215 00:11:46.660 --> 00:11:49.720 and nothing special that stands out about it, just doing your job. 216 00:11:49.720 --> 00:11:50.140 I don't remember. 217 00:11:50.560 --> 00:11:52.020 Yeah, just probably doing your job. 218 00:11:52.340 --> 00:11:54.380 Everybody has to start somehow, you know. 219 00:11:54.480 --> 00:11:55.000 Oh, yeah. 220 00:11:57.580 --> 00:11:59.640 That's very words of wisdom. 221 00:12:00.380 --> 00:12:02.700 Although I don't know, Ruth, you always, I think, you know, 222 00:12:02.700 --> 00:12:07.000 you very quickly started at the top and went right out in front. 223 00:12:07.080 --> 00:12:08.400 Went right backwards. 224 00:12:09.200 --> 00:12:09.400 Right. 225 00:12:10.180 --> 00:12:12.700 I don't think many people would agree with you about that. 226 00:12:15.800 --> 00:12:20.820 Okay, we talked a little bit about the film, 227 00:12:20.940 --> 00:12:23.840 the film Dance Macabre that you did with Adolf Bomm. 228 00:12:23.840 --> 00:12:29.140 It was the first ballet film ever done with music. 229 00:12:29.140 --> 00:12:29.560 It's a good film. 230 00:12:29.960 --> 00:12:31.420 It's still a good film. 231 00:12:31.420 --> 00:12:32.900 It's only, it's very short. 232 00:12:33.700 --> 00:12:36.580 I forget, it's only about 20 minutes, I think. 233 00:12:37.560 --> 00:12:39.800 And it's done in the Goya style. 234 00:12:40.020 --> 00:12:43.900 I remember the Goya kind of a wig and the Goya kind of a costume. 235 00:12:44.620 --> 00:12:46.240 And Francis Bruguier took it. 236 00:12:46.240 --> 00:12:49.020 He was a very great photographer. 237 00:12:50.900 --> 00:12:56.580 And Bomm and I, and I don't know what happened to it. 238 00:12:56.600 --> 00:12:59.940 That film, I don't know where it is or anything about it. 239 00:12:59.940 --> 00:13:02.640 Probably, maybe in the archives. 240 00:13:02.660 --> 00:13:05.420 Oh, it's probably where all my stuff is in New York, 241 00:13:06.220 --> 00:13:07.660 the Library of the Performing Arts. 242 00:13:07.700 --> 00:13:09.140 I suppose it's there. 243 00:13:09.780 --> 00:13:12.040 Or maybe Bomm did something with it. 244 00:13:12.080 --> 00:13:12.300 I don't know. 245 00:13:12.300 --> 00:13:13.580 Maybe I never had a copy of it. 246 00:13:13.580 --> 00:13:15.240 I don't know at all. 247 00:13:16.440 --> 00:13:17.160 How was it? 248 00:13:17.300 --> 00:13:20.200 Were you very flattered when Bomm picked you as a partner? 249 00:13:21.340 --> 00:13:24.760 When he started his ballet on team after the school? 250 00:13:24.880 --> 00:13:29.080 I mean, after all, you were really quite young once you started dancing with him 251 00:13:29.080 --> 00:13:29.600 as your partner. 252 00:13:29.800 --> 00:13:32.680 You were barely even out of your teens. 253 00:13:33.100 --> 00:13:35.260 Well, I wasn't especially flattered. 254 00:13:35.460 --> 00:13:37.920 No, I thought he should. 255 00:13:38.640 --> 00:13:39.400 Of course. 256 00:13:39.480 --> 00:13:40.740 I was the best one around. 257 00:13:40.960 --> 00:13:42.080 Why shouldn't he take me? 258 00:13:44.320 --> 00:13:45.800 You were the best one around. 259 00:13:45.980 --> 00:13:51.320 It's clear when you look at the photographs of you in all kinds of different poses 260 00:13:51.320 --> 00:13:53.780 and all kinds of different costumes from that period. 261 00:13:53.780 --> 00:13:58.220 It looks as though you could be anybody and you could do anything. 262 00:13:59.220 --> 00:14:00.920 Oh, well, that's a little exaggerated. 263 00:14:01.460 --> 00:14:02.040 Well, exactly. 264 00:14:02.580 --> 00:14:04.280 But a lot of different things. 265 00:14:08.560 --> 00:14:11.100 In the Music Box Review, 266 00:14:12.600 --> 00:14:18.900 I went into that in 1922 to 1924. 267 00:14:18.900 --> 00:14:22.480 You danced two numbers. 268 00:14:23.500 --> 00:14:26.380 One was called Under the Chandelier. 269 00:14:26.880 --> 00:14:29.340 That was just a straight, what we call, toe dance. 270 00:14:29.440 --> 00:14:33.260 It was toe solo, a classical dance on point. 271 00:14:33.740 --> 00:14:36.400 It had an entourage of a corda ballet, 272 00:14:36.720 --> 00:14:38.980 but I came out and ended this toe solo. 273 00:14:39.840 --> 00:14:41.300 It was in the second act. 274 00:14:41.560 --> 00:14:42.440 It was nice. 275 00:14:44.160 --> 00:14:47.700 I understand they took it out of the show and then put it back in. 276 00:14:47.700 --> 00:14:48.980 It wasn't supposed to. 277 00:14:49.400 --> 00:14:50.580 Yes, they didn't want it. 278 00:14:50.740 --> 00:14:53.060 Irving Berlin didn't want it because it wasn't his music. 279 00:14:53.640 --> 00:14:55.840 He could never write dance music. 280 00:14:56.260 --> 00:14:58.520 Then we did it at a benefit. 281 00:14:59.800 --> 00:15:01.560 I can't remember what benefit it was, 282 00:15:01.760 --> 00:15:04.600 but it was such a hit at that benefit that they put it back in the show. 283 00:15:04.940 --> 00:15:06.580 It was the Actors' Equity benefit. 284 00:15:07.040 --> 00:15:10.640 You danced it with Chester Hale and everyone got so excited. 285 00:15:10.720 --> 00:15:13.000 It had been out of the show and now it got put back in. 286 00:15:13.000 --> 00:15:17.840 You also did a ballet called a dance called Porcelain Maid. 287 00:15:18.040 --> 00:15:19.260 What do you remember about that one? 288 00:15:20.820 --> 00:15:23.480 That's the one I did with Hubert Stowatz. 289 00:15:27.660 --> 00:15:32.180 It was a character dance where I was Chinese. 290 00:15:32.520 --> 00:15:34.000 I wasn't even Chinese. 291 00:15:34.100 --> 00:15:35.740 I was just something imaginary. 292 00:15:36.440 --> 00:15:37.580 It was a cute little dance. 293 00:15:38.060 --> 00:15:38.800 Stowatz did it. 294 00:15:38.840 --> 00:15:40.640 I didn't choreograph it. 295 00:15:40.640 --> 00:15:41.860 I think he did it. 296 00:15:42.500 --> 00:15:45.520 You hadn't been to the Orient yet. 297 00:15:45.520 --> 00:15:48.480 No, this was just imaginary. 298 00:15:58.700 --> 00:16:01.480 When you were dancing with the Ballet Russe, 299 00:16:01.640 --> 00:16:08.620 were you the first and I believe only American ever to be part of the Ballet Russe? 300 00:16:08.700 --> 00:16:09.280 Is that right? 301 00:16:09.280 --> 00:16:11.520 No, that was the Diaghilev Company. 302 00:16:11.660 --> 00:16:13.040 That was the only American left. 303 00:16:13.120 --> 00:16:15.180 That wasn't the Ballet Russe at all. 304 00:16:15.200 --> 00:16:17.300 It was Diaghilev's company called? 305 00:16:18.200 --> 00:16:21.800 No, the Diaghilev's company never was called the Ballet Russe, I don't think. 306 00:16:22.320 --> 00:16:24.120 Ballet Russe Monte Carlo. 307 00:16:24.520 --> 00:16:28.080 That was, well, in this one, it finally got to this country. 308 00:16:28.080 --> 00:16:31.900 It was run by a Russian named Sergei Denim. 309 00:16:34.300 --> 00:16:38.920 It was an entirely different thing from the one that Diaghilev had. 310 00:16:40.280 --> 00:16:44.360 When you danced with Diaghilev, though, you were, I think, the only American in the company. 311 00:16:45.020 --> 00:16:46.000 The only American ever. 312 00:16:47.320 --> 00:16:53.260 George Balanchine, that's where he was very young and very true. 313 00:16:53.380 --> 00:16:54.400 What did you think about him? 314 00:16:54.880 --> 00:16:56.980 Well, I thought he was great. 315 00:16:57.840 --> 00:17:02.180 He had his wife, Tamara Teperjerova. 316 00:17:02.520 --> 00:17:05.880 I don't think they were married, but anyway, he was with her at that time. 317 00:17:05.960 --> 00:17:10.320 They did all these very interesting pas de deuxs. 318 00:17:10.440 --> 00:17:11.420 I loved them. 319 00:17:11.420 --> 00:17:13.780 Most people didn't like them, but I thought they were marvelous. 320 00:17:16.140 --> 00:17:18.520 So I asked him to do a dance for me, and he did one. 321 00:17:18.600 --> 00:17:20.720 It was called the Polka Melancholique. 322 00:17:21.340 --> 00:17:22.980 I remember that very well. 323 00:17:24.040 --> 00:17:26.120 Of course, he didn't stay there very long. 324 00:17:26.120 --> 00:17:30.140 When he came to America right away, Lincoln Kirstein brought him over. 325 00:17:33.520 --> 00:17:36.280 He was a great choreographer, I think. 326 00:17:36.660 --> 00:17:37.480 Everybody thinks so. 327 00:17:37.500 --> 00:17:38.620 It's not only just me. 328 00:17:40.880 --> 00:17:44.120 What do you remember of the Polka Melancholique? 329 00:17:45.340 --> 00:17:47.220 Do you remember even what the music was? 330 00:17:47.760 --> 00:17:51.480 No, I don't remember what some ordinary music was. 331 00:17:52.240 --> 00:17:53.120 It was just a very charming little... 332 00:17:53.310 --> 00:17:55.290 It was very short, about five minutes. 333 00:17:55.310 --> 00:17:56.470 It was a little toe dance. 334 00:17:57.650 --> 00:17:59.030 I don't know if I ever did it or not. 335 00:17:59.030 --> 00:17:59.970 I can't remember. 336 00:18:00.950 --> 00:18:08.090 The notes on it are still around the notes in your notebook, the notations of what it was. 337 00:18:08.570 --> 00:18:12.350 But it was something you just commissioned for the fun of it. 338 00:18:12.410 --> 00:18:16.730 Well, I gave him $50, and it was hard for me to get up to find the $50, 339 00:18:16.790 --> 00:18:18.310 and he was still to death to get it. 340 00:18:25.890 --> 00:18:28.810 I thought he was marvelous. 341 00:18:29.970 --> 00:18:31.270 Now you love the Ballet Rose.