Twyla Tharp
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Twyla Tharp (born July 1, 1941) is an American dancer and choreographer. She has won Emmy and Tony awards, and currently works as a choreographer in New York City.
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[edit] Personal life and early years
Tharp was born in Portland, Indiana in 1941 and named after Twila Thornburg, the "Pig Princess" of the eighty-ninth Annual Muncie Fair in Indiana. Tharp's family (younger sister Twanette, twin brothers Stanley and Stanford, mother Lecile and father William) moved to Rialto, California in 1951[1], where her parents opened a drive-in movie theater. During this period she studied at the Vera Lynn School of Dance and attended Pacific High School in San Bernardino.
Tharp attended Pomona College in California, but transferred to Barnard College in New York City. It was in New York that she began dancing with Martha Graham and Merce Cunningham. She graduated Barnard with a degree in art history in 1963, and joined the Paul Taylor Dance Company[2]. Two years later she formed her own company, called Twyla Tharp Dance.
[edit] Work
Twyla Tharp Dance merged with American Ballet Theatre in 1988, where Tharp created more than a dozen works. Since that time Ms. Tharp has choreographed dances for many companies including The Paris Opera Ballet, The Royal Ballet, New York City Ballet, The Boston Ballet, The Joffrey Ballet, Hubbard Street Dance and The Martha Graham Dance Company.
Tharp's work first went to Broadway in 1980 with "When We Were Very Young", followed in 1981 by her collaboration with David Byrne on "The Catherine Wheel" at the Winter Garden; and her 1985 staging of Singin' in the Rain, which played at the Gershwin for three hundred sixty seven performances, followed by an extensive national tour. In film, Tharp collaborated with directors Milos Forman on Hair (1978), Ragtime (1980) and Amadeus (1984); with Taylor Hackford on White Nights (1985) and with James Brooks on I'll Do Anything (1994).
In 1991, Tharp regrouped her company Twyla Tharp Dance and created a program with Mikhail Baryshnikov called Cutting Up, which went on to become one of contemporary dance's most successful tours, appearing in twenty eight cities over a two month period. Since 1999 Twyla Tharp Dance and has been touring internationally to critical acclaim.
In 2002, Tharp and Billy Joel's award-winning dance musical Movin' Out premiered on Broadway, and a national tour opened in January, 2004. The recipient of a 2003 Tony Award for Movin' Out, Tharp was also honored with the 2003 Astaire Award; the Drama League Award for Sustained Achievement in Musical Theater; and both the Drama Desk Award and the Outer Critics Circle Award for Outstanding Choreography. It ran for 1331 performances. *
Tharp's work encompasses choreography with classical music, jazz and contemporary pop music. She has also done choreography for several films, including Hair, Ragtime, Amadeus, and White Nights.
Tharp has created more than one hundred twenty five dances, choreographed for five Hollywood movies, directed and choreographed two Broadway shows, written two books and received one Tony Award, two Emmy Awards, seventeen honorary doctorates, the Vietnam Veterans of America President’s Award, the 2004 National Medal of the Arts and numerous grants including the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Fellowship. She is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and an Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters.
Her television credits include choreographing "Sue's Leg" for the inaugural episode of the PBS program Dance in America, co-producing and directing Making Television Dance, which won the Chicago International Film Festival Award; and directing "The Catherine Wheel" for BBC Television. Ms. Tharp co-directed the television special "Baryshnikov by Tharp", which won two Emmy Awards as well as the Director's Guild of America Award for Outstanding Director Achievement.
Tharp wrote her first book in 1992, her autobiography Push Comes to Shove. Her second book, The Creative Habit: Learn It and Use It for Life was published in October 2003.
Tharp continues to create works and lecture around the world.
A recent Broadway venture was The Times They Are a-Changin', which places the music of Bob Dylan in the context of a small family circus, in which the clowns have an uprising against a cruel ringmaster. It closed after 63 performances. The orchestra pit was covered with trampolines, and the folk/rock band was on an elevated platform on stage.*
[edit] Quotes
- "I had to become the greatest choreographer of my time. That was my mission, and that's what I set out to do."
- "You have to be either hopelessly passionate, or very stupid."
- "Art is the only way to run away without leaving home."
- "Dancing is like bank-robbery. It takes split-second timing."
