Mary Anthony (11 November 1916, in

Newport, Kentucky Newport is a list of Kentucky cities, home rule-class city at the confluence of the Ohio River, Ohio and Licking River (Kentucky), Licking rivers in Campbell County, Kentucky, Campbell County, Kentucky. The population was 15,273 at the 2010 United ...

– 31 May 2014, in

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

) was an American choreographer, modern dancer, and dance teacher. Both her work as a dancer and choreographer were highly influenced by

Martha Graham Martha Graham (May 11, 1894 – April 1, 1991) was an American modern dancer and choreographer. Her style, the Graham technique, reshaped American dance and is still taught worldwide. Graham danced and taught for over seventy years. She wa ...

and

Hanya Holm Hanya Holm (born Johanna Eckert; 3 March 1893 – 3 November 1992) is known as one of the "Big Four" founders of American modern dance. She was a dancer, choreographer, and above all, a dance educator. Early life, connection with Mary Wigman Bo ...

Life and career

Born and raised in Kentucky, Anthony studied theater at

Grinnell College Grinnell College is a private liberal arts college in Grinnell, Iowa, United States. It was founded in 1846 when a group of New England Congregationalists established the Trustees of Iowa College. Grinnell has the fifth highest endowment-to-st ...

in Iowa before pursuing studies in dance at the Hanya Holm School in New York City. She later studied dance with

. She also studied acting at

HB Studio The HB Studio (Herbert Berghof Studio) is a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization offering professional training in the performing arts through classes, workshops, free lectures, theater productions, theater rentals, a theater artist residency prog ...

in Greenwich Village. From 1943 to 1949 she danced as a member of Hanya Holm's dance company. In 1949–50 she was a featured dancer in the Broadway musical '' Touch and Go'', which was choreographed by

Helen Tamiris Helen Tamiris (born Helen Becker; April 24, 1905 – August 4, 1966) was an American choreographer, modern dancer, and teacher. Biography Tamiris was born in New York City on April 23, 1902. She adopted Tamiris, her stage name, from a fragment ...

. She danced in several productions with the

New York City Opera The New York City Opera (NYCO) is an American opera company located in Manhattan in New York City. The company has been active from 1943 through 2013 (when it filed for bankruptcy), and again since 2016 when it was revived. The opera company, du ...

during the 1950s and also choreographed several musicals in

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical re ...

during that decade. In 1956 Anthony founded the Mary Anthony Dance Company. The company included two of her previous dance partners, Joseph Gifford and Cameron McCosh. The company presented Anthony's own choreography which frequently utilized literary sources as subjects. Her two most well known works were ''Lady Macbeth'', after the

Shakespeare play Shakespeare's plays are a canon of approximately 39 dramatic works written by English poet, playwright, and actor William Shakespeare. The exact number of plays—as well as their classifications as tragedy, history, comedy, or otherwise—is a ...

, and ''Threnody'', based on

John Millington Synge Edmund John Millington Synge (; 16 April 1871 – 24 March 1909) was an Irish playwright, poet, writer, collector of folklore, and a key figure in the Irish Literary Revival. His best known play ''The Playboy of the Western World'' was poorly r ...

's play ''

Riders to the Sea ''Riders to the Sea'' is a play written by Irish Literary Renaissance playwright John Millington Synge. It was first performed on 25 February 1904 at the Molesworth Hall, Dublin, by the Irish National Theater Society with Helen Laird playing Ma ...

''. During the 1970s her company reached a pinnacle of success with a group of highly dynamic dancers, including renowned dancer and teacher Ross Parkes. In 1946 Anthony began teaching at the

New Dance Group New Dance Group, or more casually NDG, is a performing arts organization in New York City, United States. History New Dance Group was established in 1932 by a group of artists and choreographers dedicated to social change through dance and movem ...

where she taught for many years. Several of her pupils became highly successful choreographers and dancers, including Ronald K. Brown,

Ulysses Dove Ulysses Dove (January 17, 1947 in Columbia, South Carolina – June 11, 1996 in Manhattan) was a choreographer. Dove began his dance training at Boggs Academy in Georgia. Dove gave up his premedical studies at Howard University to transfer to ...

Yuriko Kimura Yuriko Kimura (木村百合子) is a modern dancer, and was a primary dancer for the Martha Graham Dance Company from 1967 to 1985. Various dance critics, such as Anna Kisselgoff and Clive Barnes from the New York Times, who often reviewed Yuriko ...

, Richard Kuch, Daniel Maloney,

Donald McKayle Donald McKayle (July 6, 1930 – April 6, 2018) was an American modern dancer, choreographer, teacher, director and writer best known for creating socially conscious concert works during the 1950s and '60s that focus on expressing the human con ...

, Arthur Mitchell, Elisa Monte, Ross Parkes, Steve Rooks, and Richard Siegal.

also danced with her, on occasion. In 1988, she was a guest modern dance teacher at the

University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (U of I, Illinois, University of Illinois, or UIUC) is a public land-grant research university in Illinois in the twin cities of Champaign and Urbana. It is the Flagship#Colleges and universities in ...

in the Department of Dance where she reconstructed

Charles Weidman Charles Weidman (July 22, 1901 – July 15, 1975) was a renowned choreographer, modern dancer and teacher. He is well known as one of the pioneers of modern dance in America. He wanted to break free from the traditional movements of dance f ...

’s “Fables for our Times,” which was based on

James Thurber James Grover Thurber (December 8, 1894 – November 2, 1961) was an American cartoonist, writer, humorist, journalist and playwright. He was best known for his cartoons and short stories, published mainly in ''The New Yorker'' and collected in ...

’s “Fables For Our Times and Famous Poems Illustrated.”"Program Archive, 1988 Department of Dance choreography for February Concert, University of Illinois, Urbana-Chaplain, Krannert Center for the Performing Arts, Urbana, IL

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Anthony, Mary 1916 births 2014 deaths American women choreographers American choreographers American female dancers American dancers Grinnell College alumni People from Newport, Kentucky Kentucky women dancers 21st-century American women