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 Born and raised in Seattle, Robert Joffrey dreamed of having his own ballet
company from childhood. And in 1956 he gave up his own promising career as a dancer to
found that company – an ensemble of American dancers for whom he choreographed, taught,
commissioned original ballets and reconstructed rare classics. In the process, he built
what is now acknowledged to be one of the major international dance companies, a company
cited for its virtuosity and its exciting, original repertoire.
Joffrey’s ballet teacher, Mary Ann Wells, instilled in him and
his fellow student Gerald Arpino, company co-founder and now artistic director, a belief
in dance as many-faceted. This was an idea which Joffrey carried with him as he continued
his training in other dance disciplines, including modern dance with Gertrude Shurr and
May O’Donnell. He also studied classical ballet in New York with the renowned
Alexandra Fedorova and at the School of American Ballet. Later, his own ballets would
reflect these varied interests, from the classical Pas Des Deesses to the
multimedia Astarte, from the romantic Remembrances to the evocative Postcards.
Joffrey made his professional dance debut as a soloist with Roland
Petit’s Ballets de Paris (1949-1950), the first American male dancer invited to join
that company. For the following years the young Joffrey was a member of May
O’Donnell’s modern dance company; this was highly unusual in those days when one
was either a ballet or modern dancer, but not both.
 By 1952, Joffrey had choreographed his first ballet, Perephone, and
by 1953 had founded the American Ballet Center/The Joffrey Ballet School – New York. At
the school Joffrey was able to maintain his interest in training gifted students and young
professionals.
In 1955, he was invited to London by Marie Rambert to set his
ballets Persephone and Pas Des Deesses on Ballet Rambert. (When Ballet
Rambert took Pas Des Deesses on tour, Joffrey became the first American
choreographer to have his work performed in Communist China.) It was a year later, when
Joffrey was only 25, that his company was born.
Joffrey always had a strong interest in grafting his American roots
to the great international traditions of ballet, and in furthering American dance and
dancers. With this in mind, Joffrey sought to extend the international horizons of his
company while maintaining its uniquely American perspective.
While his dancers were out on tour, Joffrey remained behind to call
on his ever-increasing experience as a teacher and choreographer. Joffrey was a pioneer in
choreographing for television; The Joffrey Ballet inaugurated public television’s
“Dance in America” for PBS “Great Performances” series. Teaching,
television, commercials, fashion shows and, most importantly, choreography for the New
York City Opera, not to mention choreography for his own company, kept him busy.
As the company developed, Joffrey began to achieve his primary
artistic goals: commissioning new ballets from contemporary choreographers, while also
reviving 20th century classics and reconstructing rare works. Joffrey invited Kurt Jooss
and Leonide Massine to revive some of their “lost” masterworks; and assembled
the largest number of Frederick Ashton ballets in the United States. He was the first
American director to present the work of Denmark’s Auguste Bournonville, and he was
especially noted for his meticulous recreations of the legendary Diaghilev-era ballets.
But his own ballets continued to be the touchstone of The Joffrey
repertoire. In 1967, his multimedia Astarte was an enormous success that appeared
on the covers of Time and Life magazines. This innovative ballet brought
into the theater for the first time the popular technology and culture of the time and
juxtaposed it with a mythical encounter between a Moon Goddess and an Everyman. Remembrances,
in 1973, set to music by Richard Wagner, re-established Joffrey as a choreographer of
great fluidity and sensitivity. His last work, Postcards (1980), a suite of dances
to music by Erik Satie, has among its dancers a sort of “master of ceremonies;”
an enigmatic, yearning figure who suggests both Satie and Joffrey himself.
The world premiere of the Robert Joffrey production of The
Nutcracker in 1987 was a collaboration with Gerald Arpino and George Verdak that set
the classic in Victorian America, while maintaining the spirit of the original Ivanov
production for the Maryinsky Theater. At the same time, Joffrey was working with Millicent
Hodson and Kenneth Archer on the reconstruction of Vaslav Nijinsky;s Le Sacre du
Printemps, which had not been performed in over 74 years and was premiered in America
by The Joffrey Ballet in Fall 1987.
Among his many dance affiliations, he was a member of the National
Council of the Arts; one of three jurors of Denmark’s Hans Christian Andersen Ballet
Awards; honorary chairman of the American Choreographer Awards; and co-president with
Bolshoi Ballet director Yuri Grigorovich of the International Dance Section of the
International Theater Institute.
 Joffrey’s citation as a winner of the coveted Capezio Award in
1974 called him “an ardent spokesman for and a stern but loving guide to youth, be
they gifted children, teenage students with dreams, or dedicated professionals, whom he
has served as dancer, teacher and director for 25 years.”
Over the years, he received many honors, and among those he most
cherished were his Honorary Doctorate from Pacific Lutheran University in Tacoma,
Washington; his Dance Magazine Award; the Handel Medallion presented to him by New York
Mayor Edward Koch; and the 1988 Dance/USA Honor.
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