GROWING OLD GRACEFULLY
The Gold Coast ballet stars who were among world’s best
TWO special guests will keep the cast of London’s The Royal Ballet on their toes when they attend a matinee performance of The Winter’s Tale in Brisbane this week.
Gold Coast couple Rowena Jackson MBE and Philip Chatfield, two of The Royal Ballet’s greatest living principal dancers, will be the company’s guests of honour on Thursday as part of its exclusive Australian season in QPAC’s Lyric Theatre.
Perfect partners on and off the stage, Ms Jackson, 91, and her British-born husband, 89, toured the world as principal dancers with The Royal Ballet during the 1950s, performing for the royal family and dignitaries around the world and starring alongside some of ballet’s biggest names.
The first student from New Zealand to win a Royal Academy of Dancing International Scholarship in 1941, Ms Jackson met Mr Chatfield at Sadler’s Wells Ballet (later The Royal Ballet) school in London in 1946.
Renowned for her special gift for fast and brilliant turns, Ms Jackson had set a world record for the number of fouttés en tournant sur place (fast turns) performed by a dancer – 121 – in 1940. The feat and her scholarship win made headlines around the world – and brought her to Mr Chatfield’s attention.
“In the war, I was reading The Dancing Times and I saw the photograph of this little girl from New Zealand and I don’t know why I did it, but I cut it out,” he said.
“It was fate in a way. He cut out that picture when I was still in New Zealand,” Ms Jackson said.
Ms Jackson was 21 when she travelled to the UK by boat – alongside the 26th Prime Minister of New Zealand Sir Keith Holyoake – to attend ballet school.
“I had to wait until the war was over,” she said.
“There were no planes in those days – I had to go over by ship. Holyoake was on the same ship and I’ll never forget it – he said to me ‘Rowena, is ballet very remunerative?’
“I didn’t know what rumenerative meant so I said, ‘well, yes and no’.” Mr Chatfield was recovering from an injury when he met the gifted young Kiwi ballerina later dubbed “the spinning top”.
“I’d been off for two years with a knee injury and I’d gone back to school to get into practice and she came to the same class,” he said. Ms Jackson said the students were asked to fuette at the end of their class.
“It was usually hard for them to reach 34. I went on and got to 80 and I felt embarrassed because everyone was standing looking so I stopped at 86.”
Mr Chatfield was one those watching in awe.
“I said who’s that wonderful girl and somebody said ‘oh she’s new, she’s from New Zealand’ and I said she’s going to go a long way,” he said.
“I said later, I didn’t know I was going with her. The (Royal Ballet) heard of her of wonderful turns and they took her into the company.”
The couple were friends and fellow dancers for 11 years before they married in February, 1958, their wedding frontpage news at the time.
“We didn’t dance together until we were married because Philip had to dance with the tallest ballerina, who was (Dame) Beryl Grey, who was matron of honour at our wedding,” Ms Jackson said.
“Once we were married – box office draw.”
The newlyweds made their debut together as principals in 1958 starring in Giselle.
“The audience loved our first Sleeping Beauty because the prince has to kiss her ... come to life,” Mr Whitfield said, puckering up.
“I do that in the morning sometimes. I come into the bedroom and I go daa daa da, daa, daa, da and then there’s a gong, gong and I kiss her and she wakes up,” he said, the couple bursting into giggles.”
After retiring from The Royal Ballet in 1959, the couple moved to New Zealand, where they served as directors of the National Ballet School, before moving to the Coast in 1993, teaching dance at the Ransley Ballet School for many years.
WE DIDN’T DANCE TOGETHER UNTIL WE WERE MARRIED BECAUSE PHILIP HAD TO DANCE WITH THE TALLEST BALLERINA ROWENA JACKSON