U. S. ballerina danced with Bruhn, Nureyev
Maria Tallchief known for her artistry, outstanding musicality and intense expressiveness
Maria Tallchief, who died April 11 aged 88, was the definitive American ballerina of the 1940s and 1950s. The exotically beautiful daughter of an Osage American Indian, she became an emblem for social mobility as well as for her dazzling artistry.
She was both wife and muse to the 20th century’s master choreographer George Balanchine, and the leading ballerina of New York City Ballet from its launch in 1948. She became a sought- after partner to both Rudolf Nureyev and Erik Bruhn, the world’s leading male ballet stars, as well as the lover of both of them.
Tall and long- legged, with the darkly aquiline looks of her father Alexander Tall Chief, she set a superb standard for speed around the stage and intense expressiveness. “I wanted to be appreciated as a prima ballerina who happened to be an American Indian, never as someone who was an American Indian ballerina,” she told an interviewer.
Elizabeth Marie Tall Chief was born in Fairfax, Okla., on Jan. 24, 1925, one of three children of Alexander and Ruth Tall Chief. Her younger sister, Marjorie, would also become a ballerina. Home was the Osage reservation on which oil was plentiful, making her family wealthy. Her father was the grandson of Chief Bigheart Tall Chief, who had led negotiations with the United States government on behalf of the Osage tribe over oil revenues. As a result, she wrote in her autobiography, her father never had to work a day in his life.
Betty Marie, as Tallchief was known, had a fine musical ear and took lessons in piano at three and dancing at four. She and her sister often danced in Osage Indian ceremonies, but their mother instigated the family’s move to Los Angeles where a better education could be found.
While at Beverly Hills High School, Tallchief also trained in ballet for five years under the great choreographer Bronislava Nijinska, sister of the legendary Vaslav Nijinsky; Cyd Charisse was a classmate and, at age 15, the two danced Nijinska ballets in the Hollywood Bowl.
Nijinska’s illustrious visiting colleagues enabled young Betty Marie to go to New York to join the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo, then stranded by war in the United States. In 1942, aged 17, she began her professional career, changing her name to Maria Tallchief.
Two years later, choreographer Balanchine joined the troupe, and despite the age gap, Tallchief became his third wife in 1946, when she was 21 and he 42.
Balanchine adored Tallchief’s leggy, dark glamour as well as her outstanding musicality, and she became his muse when he founded Ballet Society, the forerunner of the future New York City Ballet. He taught her how to become “more Russian.” She shed weight and held herself more haughtily. When New York City Ballet launched in 1948, Tallchief was already recognized as a magnetic talent.
However, Balanchine’s marriages tended to last only until the next muse caught his eye. Tallchief was cast in ballets alongside young ballerina Tanaquil Le Clercq who would become his fourth wife in 1952. Tallchief and Balanchine ended their marriage amicably without disturbing their artistic relationship. The choreographer continued to create masterly ballets for her, and she assumed a worldwide mantle as the epitome of American ballerinadom.
In 1952 Tallchief briefly married a pilot, Elmourza Natirboff, before taking Chicago construction magnate Henry ( Buzz) Paschen for her third husband in 1956.
Tallchief won many American honours: the Osage tribe named her Princess Wa- Xthe- Thonba ( The Woman of Two Standards), and she was inducted into the National Women’s Hall of Fame. She is survived by her daughter, the poet Elise Paschen, and sister, the former ballerina Marjorie Tallchief.