Director helped revive indebted RNZB
Philip Chatfield
dancer, ballet director
b December 2, 1927
d July 25, 2021
Philip Chatfield, who has died aged 93, was artistic director of the Royal New Zealand Ballet in the mid-1970s. With his New Zealand wife, dancer Rowena Jackson, he influenced many young dancers in this country.
Chatfield was born near Southampton, southern England, ‘‘in the same village as Benny Hill’’, he would later be pleased to claim. His own cheerful humour is remembered by all who knew him.
He learned ballet from the age of 6. He wrote (in Royal New Zealand Ballet at Sixty, 2013): ‘‘I was the only boy in the school. I absolutely loved it . . . in 1939, at the age of 11, Ninette de Valois awarded me a five-year scholarship to Sadler’s Wells Ballet School . . . I became a fulltime member of the Royal Ballet company at age 15.’’
By any standards, this is a meteoric path for a young dancer, and Philip was also particularly fortunate to be tutored by Nikolai Sergeyev, who had escaped from the Russian Revolution, and brought many 19th-century ballet classics from the Russian repertoire to the British company.
The extensive collection of Royal Ballet programmes in the Alexander Turnbull library (from the Alexander Grant bequest) provides evidence of Chatfield’s leading and solo roles. Tall and handsome, with an elegant physique, he danced classical roles with aplomb, and was cast in Frederick Ashton’s talisman choreography, Symphonic Variations (1946), and in ballets by John Cranko among many others.
World War II had depleted the ranks of male dancers at Royal Ballet, so New Zealanders Alexander Grant and Bryan Ashbridge, not ravaged by wartime service and years of food rationing, together with Rowena Jackson, made an encouraging and welcome impact on the Royal Ballet stage after the war years.
Soon after their arrival in London, Jackson and Ashbridge each won a gold medal in the Adeline Gene´ e awards in an unprecedented scoop from the colonies. Chatfield had noticed a photo in The Dancing Times of a young New Zealand dancer recently arrived in England. He saved the photo and was thus easily able to recognise Rowena when she turned up to the Royal Ballet’s company class.
A few years later Russell Kerr and Anne Rowse also travelled from New Zealand to England for further ballet studies and both found success in careers in the London company, Festival Ballet. Nicholas Beriosov, another Russian emigre´ , was there mounting the Diaghilev company’s works, a heritage
20th-century repertoire that would in turn make its way back to New Zealand when Russell Kerr became artistic director of New Zealand Ballet in 1963, thus keeping the company on the world ballet map where Poul Gnatt had already placed it in 1953.
In 1958, Chatfield married Rowena Jackson, who was by then also a soloist in the Royal Ballet. They toured widely in Europe and America then an extended tour to New Zealand and Australia in
1958-59. Soon afterwards the couple retired from performing and settled in New Zealand, starting a family.
They helped with the New Zealand Ballet venture, and the associated National School of Ballet, becoming directors there in the mid-1970s, a committed rapport between company and school closer than any pairing between the two institutions before or since. Later they moved to Brisbane to be closer to family. Philip has died there, at age 93. ‘‘I am overwhelmed with people’s kindness – and the house is full of flowers,’’ Rowena reports in the days after his death.
Despite having retired from performing, the Chatfields agreed to involvement in the United Ballet season here in 1959-60 (an exciting combination of Gnatt’s New Zealand Ballet and Kerr’s Auckland Repertory Ballet) for which they staged and danced in Ashton’s Les Patineurs (The Skaters). The programme included the Danish work, Dream Visions by Gnatt, Kerr’s fabulous Prince Igor, and the legendary Prismatic Variations, cochoreographed by Kerr and Gnatt.
‘‘Who needs England when we can stage seasons like this here?’’ they asked themselves. Raymond Boyce, designer, Richard Campion, entrepreneur, and John Todd, patron, knew how to make it happen, and the dancers weathered all manner of pioneering conditions to keep the show on the road. Back then, ballet in this country was punching well above its weight, funds always low but production values consistently high and pedigree repertoire guaranteed.
Settling in Auckland with two children, Paul and Rosetta, Philip and Rowena found ways to make ends meet (running a coffee lounge, a beauty salon, a grocery store, as well as guest teaching, making dance programmes for television, working for the Auckland Festival Society). They were persuaded by Dorothy Daniels to replace her when she retired as director of the National School of Ballet. Philip became director with Rowena as associate, inviting colleagues Anne Rowse and Deirdre Tarrant as tutors. Many students remember the pedigree training they received.
In 1975 Philip was appointed artistic director of New Zealand Ballet. The company had fallen into debt, confidence was low, and the board planned to close it down. Philip was offered the job ‘‘for six weeks’’ – he accepted the challenge, insisted on a few years, and brought the bank account back into the black. He persuaded Jon Trimmer to rejoin the company after some time at Auckland Dance Centre.
His own choreography included The Kiss and Last Reunion. The full-length The Sleeping Beauty had Patricia Rianne and Linda Anning alternating in the lead role, partnered by Jon Trimmer. There was also ‘‘memorably a collaboration with local Ma¯ ori who were so helpful when I choreographed a work, Tohu Aroha ,to music composed by Christopher Norton’’. In 1978, the company’s 25th anniversary, he resigned from the directorship. Artistic director Harry Haythorne invited him back from Australia to stage The Kiss and Last Reunion for the company’s 30th anniversary season in 1983.
Russell Kerr writes: ‘‘Philip Chatfield I saw many times as a dancer, as producer, teacher and finally as artistic director. Always a pleasant straight-forward personality, a quick wit when this suited the occasion . . . an extremely nice person who will be missed by those fortunate enough to have been a friend or acquaintance.’’ Anne Rowse remembers ‘‘such a strong partnership between Rowena and Philip. They really were a team.’’
Kerry-Anne Gilberd says: ‘‘I remember Philip’s love of dance, music, and his humour too. He and Rowena were most instrumental in the beginning of my dance career, for which I am forever grateful’’; Dawn Sanders writes: ‘‘Philip had an incredible memory, having stood at the back of the stage at ‘The Garden’ (Covent), watching, noticing, absorbing the finest of details of the ballets. When he reproduced The Sleeping Beauty here he knew everyone’s roles and always delivered with elegance.’’
From Sue Nicholls: ‘‘The door would open to the vast space of the National Ballet School, Marion St studio, and in would walk Philip Chatfield like he was presenting himself onto the Covent Garden stage. He had charisma and it was inspiring. His classes made us eat up space, his choreography was emotional. I for one loved it. There were some funny moments as Philip and Rowena would argue as politely as they could, the differences in the way past repertoire was remembered, and to be passed on to us novices. I can’t remember who won.’’
From Martin James: ‘‘Dear Philip Chatfield, you were the one to see some talent in me, which led to a lengthy career. Thank you.The Kiss pas de deux you created I’ll never forget as the music still resonates with me, apart from the choreography itself!’’
I personally remember Philip and Rowena attending a dance-drama I had choreographed in a University of Auckland arts festival in 1969 – Landfall in Unknown Seas, to Douglas Lilburn’s music, poetry by Allen Curnow. Both venue and content were outside their normal comfort zone of ballet in the theatre, but they attended and made kind comments afterwards. Dance is, in the main, unscored and only sketchily documented, so this kind of personal interest and connection between those involved becomes the warp to its weft, the plie´ to its jete´, the memory to the moment danced on the night.
Philip is survived by Rowena, his wife for 63 years, son Paul, daughter Rosetta (Clark) and their families, including nine great-grandchildren. – By Jennifer Shennan