And then I met Harold Lang. Becoming his student and then his friend I
suddenly realized, here was one of the original cowboys from Ballet Russe
de Monte Carlo's Rodeo!Here was one of the three sailors she wrote
about in that jaw-dropping Ballet Theatre opening night of the Jerome Robbins
classic, "Fancy Free"!! And did he want to talk about Agnes de Mille? No.
Whatever happened between them (and I never did try to find out) all Harold
would say was that she was a "naughty girl who didn't remember things right."
But it's hard to argue with a person's legacy of work over a lifetime -
especially when it's being presented by someone else long after their death.
There were so many interesting facets to her life. Being raised in Los Angeles
where her uncle was the famous director Cecil B. de Mille, trying to force her
UNperfect body to develop the skills of a ballerina, finding she had the ability
choreograph but trying to get somebody to hire her. She was a woman, an American
when the only "real ballet" was Russian... and, yes, there was a world war going on.
Her life never lacked for drama. Read the book.