Marion Rice
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Marion Burbank Stevens Rice (September 9, 1904 – April 12, 1995) was an American modern dance choreographer, dance teacher and producer.


Early life

Rice was born in
Hingham, Massachusetts Hingham ( ) is a town in northern Plymouth County, Massachusetts, Plymouth County in the U.S. state of Massachusetts. Part of the Greater Boston region, it is located on the South Shore (Massachusetts), South Shore of Massachusetts. At the 2020 ...
. She studied ballet at
Sullins College Sullins College was a Methodist junior college for women in Bristol, Virginia, United States. Founded about 1868 and named for David Sullins, a Methodist minister, it ceased operations after the class of 1976 graduated. History The institution wa ...
. She settled in Fitchburg, Massachusetts and founded the "Marion Rice Studio of the Dance" where she taught and performed
Denishawn The Denishawn School of Dancing and Related Arts, founded in 1915 by Ruth St. Denis and Ted Shawn in Los Angeles, California, helped many perfect their dancing talents and became the first dance academy in the United States to produce a professional ...
technique for over 60 years. She studied in the late 1920s and early 1930s with Ted Shawn, Ruth St. Denis, Miriam Winslow and the Braggiotti sisters at the Braggiotti-Denishawn School of Dance in Boston, often performing Denishawn works in their concerts.


Other work

She produced work by
Ruth St. Denis Ruth St. Denis (born Ruth Dennis; January 20, 1879 – July 21, 1968) was an American pioneer of modern dance, introducing eastern ideas into the art and paving the way for other women in dance. She was inspired by the Delsarte advocate Gene ...
and
Ted Shawn Ted Shawn (born Edwin Myers Shawn; October 21, 1891 – January 9, 1972) was an American dancer and choreographer. Considered a pioneer of American modern dance, he created the Denishawn School together with his wife Ruth St. Denis. After their ...
as well as her own choreography. Among the dancers and choreographers she trained were her daughter Carolyn Brown of the
Merce Cunningham Mercier Philip "Merce" Cunningham (April 16, 1919 – July 26, 2009) was an American dancer and choreographer who was at the forefront of American modern dance for more than 50 years. He frequently collaborated with artists of other discipl ...
Dance Company, her daughter-in-law Mona Irvine Rice, and her granddaughters Robin Rice and Rebecca Rice.


Dance company

She also operated her own dance company, the Marion Rice Denishawn Dancers, and in 1980 staged her version of "Soaring," for
Les Grands Ballets Canadiens Les Grands Ballets Canadiens de Montréal (GBCM) is a ballet company based in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. A creative and repertory company, it performs works that reflect the diverse trends of contemporary ballet. History Les Grands Ballets Canadien ...
in Montreal. Marion Rice Denishawn performed at the
Jacob's Pillow Jacob's Pillow is a Dance studio, dance center, school and performance space located in Becket, Massachusetts, in the Berkshires. The facility itself was listed as a National Historic Landmark District in 2003. History The site of Jacob's Pi ...
Dance Festival in 1972, the Marymount Manhattan Theater (New York) in 1976 and City College (New York) in 1986 at the "Roots: Foundations of American Modern Dance Festival". Marion Rice Denishawn or Marion Rice Denishawn Dancers is a dance company devoted to preserving
Denishawn The Denishawn School of Dancing and Related Arts, founded in 1915 by Ruth St. Denis and Ted Shawn in Los Angeles, California, helped many perfect their dancing talents and became the first dance academy in the United States to produce a professional ...
dance, the choreography of modern dance pioneers
Ruth St. Denis Ruth St. Denis (born Ruth Dennis; January 20, 1879 – July 21, 1968) was an American pioneer of modern dance, introducing eastern ideas into the art and paving the way for other women in dance. She was inspired by the Delsarte advocate Gene ...
and
Ted Shawn Ted Shawn (born Edwin Myers Shawn; October 21, 1891 – January 9, 1972) was an American dancer and choreographer. Considered a pioneer of American modern dance, he created the Denishawn School together with his wife Ruth St. Denis. After their ...
, taught and staged by Marion Rice. Marion Rice dedicated her creative life to teaching, preserving, protecting and performing the fifty or so dance works taught to her by Ruth St. Denis, Ted Shawn, Miriam Winslow and other modern dance luminaries while she was a student and performer at the Boston Braggiotti School in
Boston Boston is the capital and most populous city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the United States. The city serves as the cultural and Financial centre, financial center of New England, a region of the Northeas ...
in the early 1900s. Along with members of her family, daughter Carolyn Brown, daughter-in-law Mona Irvine Rice, granddaughters Robin Rice and Rebecca Rice, these Denishawn dances have been performed by Marion Rice and her students for over 75 years. Marion Rice Denishawn performed in Fitchburg, Massachusetts as well as at the Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival in 1972, the Marymount Manhattan Theater (New York) in 1976 and City College (New York) in 1986 at the 'Roots: Foundations of American Modern Dance Festival'. In 2000, ''Marion Rice Denishawn'' performed at the "Dance in Millennium" Festival in Washington. The company presented "Boston Braggiotti and Denishawn", a lecture demonstration illuminating a select number of the early
Denishawn The Denishawn School of Dancing and Related Arts, founded in 1915 by Ruth St. Denis and Ted Shawn in Los Angeles, California, helped many perfect their dancing talents and became the first dance academy in the United States to produce a professional ...
works.
Village Voice ''The Village Voice'' is an American news and culture publication based in Greenwich Village, New York City, known for being the country's first alternative newsweekly. Founded in 1955 by Dan Wolf, Ed Fancher, John Wilcock, and Norman Ma ...
critic
Deborah Jowitt Deborah Jowitt (born 1934) is an American dance critic, author, and choreographer. Her career in dance began as a performer and choreographer. Jowitt has received several awards for her work, including a Bessie (New York Dance and Performance ...
wrote about the performance in the following review:
Ruth St. Denis Ruth St. Denis (born Ruth Dennis; January 20, 1879 – July 21, 1968) was an American pioneer of modern dance, introducing eastern ideas into the art and paving the way for other women in dance. She was inspired by the Delsarte advocate Gene ...
, American mystic, and
Ted Shawn Ted Shawn (born Edwin Myers Shawn; October 21, 1891 – January 9, 1972) was an American dancer and choreographer. Considered a pioneer of American modern dance, he created the Denishawn School together with his wife Ruth St. Denis. After their ...
, entrepreneur, were a great team. During the glory days of their Denishawn company—roughly 1916 to 1931—a gifted disciple could obtain a franchise and open a
Denishawn The Denishawn School of Dancing and Related Arts, founded in 1915 by Ruth St. Denis and Ted Shawn in Los Angeles, California, helped many perfect their dancing talents and became the first dance academy in the United States to produce a professional ...
school. For a price, a young dancer could learn a colorful routine and secure its sheet music and costume design. Last month, two companies—the Marion Rice Denishawn dancers at the "Dancing in the Millennium" conference in Washington, D.C., and Dansarté, at
Jacob's Pillow Jacob's Pillow is a Dance studio, dance center, school and performance space located in Becket, Massachusetts, in the Berkshires. The facility itself was listed as a National Historic Landmark District in 2003. History The site of Jacob's Pi ...
—presented programs of dances by St. Denis, Shawn, and their pupils. What's intriguing about these dances—learned by Robin and Rebecca Rice at their grandmother's studio, and from Shawn at Jacob's Pillow in 1942 and 1943 by Dansarté's director, Sharry Underwood—is the way they combine the notion of art dance with a vaudeville structure. They tend to be about three minutes long, with reassuring amounts of repetition, structured in A-B-A form. Shawn and St. Denis captured the look and ambience of "exotic" styles, if not their steps. Dansarté's beautiful Maris Wolff, gorgeously costumed, performs an orientalist's dream of an Indian "nautch" dance—all rippling midriff, swaying steps, and flirtatious glances. Rice dancer Laurie Cameron appears for the circa 1930 fantasy La Peri (by either St. Denis or Miriam Winslow, who took over the Boston Denishawn school of the Braggiotti sisters), wafting swags of material that depend from her cap. The heelwork that Dansarté's Jean-Marie Mellichamp beats out in Viva Faroan has the air of flamenco without its now familiar complexities. In the early 20th century, what did American audiences know or care about authenticity? On these fine programs, you can see the influence of
Isadora Duncan Angela Isadora Duncan (May 26, 1877, or May 27, 1878 – September 14, 1927) was an American-born dancer and choreographer, who was a pioneer of modern contemporary dance and performed to great acclaim throughout Europe and the United States. Bor ...
in Chopin dances performed with lovely sincerity by the Rices, or get a whiff of German modernism in Miriam Marmein's circa 1932 mime, Argument des Boulevardiers, in which Valerie Farias Newton and Rebecca Rice wear mannish attire and gesticulate with rhythmic fury. Jess Meeker's music for Shawn's Gypsy-Rondo-Bout-Town nudges Dansarté's Genevieve Pellman and Neth Urkiel-Taylor from Haydn to swing. In all these early pieces, theatrical traditions, fashion, and experiment tiptoe toward modern dance.


Current events

In 2000, Marion Rice Denishawn performed in the "Dance in Millennium" Festival in Washington, DC. The company presented "Boston Braggiotti and Denishawn", a lecture demonstration illuminating a select number of the early Denishawn works. Anna Kisselgoff wrote in the ''New York Times'':
"Marion Rice's stagings of Denishawn works are always fresh and beautiful – the perfect example was the St. Denis ''Valse No. 14'' in which Robin Rice and Rebecca Rice were also swathed in swirling fabric – but much more actively so than in theFuller solo. The amount of basic ballet taught in the Denishawn schools was evident in Robin Rice's luminous performance of Shawn's ''Red Radiance.''


References


External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Rice, Marion People from Hingham, Massachusetts American women choreographers American choreographers American female dancers American modern dancers American dance teachers Sullins College alumni 1904 births 1995 deaths 20th-century American dancers 20th-century American women