America’s first major prima ballerina was born on January 24, 1925, in Fairfax, Oklahoma. The daughter of Alexander Joseph Tall Chief and Ruth (née Porter), she was of Osage and Scottish-Irish descent, and her Osage name was Wa-Xthe-Thomba, meaning “Woman of Two Worlds.” Because her paternal grandfather, Peter Bigheart had helped with negotiations on oil reserves on behalf of the Osage nation, her father grew up rich and came to own the local movie theater as well as a pool hall.
At the age of three, Tallchief was enrolled in ballet classes in Colorado Springs, where her family spent the summer. In 1930, Mrs. Sabin, a ballet teacher from Tulsa, came to Fairfax and began to instruct both Tallchief and her sister Marjorie. According to Tallchief, Sabin never taught her the basics and put her on pointe at five, which risks serious injury. Her family moved to Los Angeles in 1933 to try to get the girls into Hollywood musicals. Once there, her mother asked a drugstore clerk about dance teachers, and, with that recommendation, Tallchief began learning under Ernest Belcher who began to correct her technique and took her off pointe, thus saving her from injury. While there, she also learned tap, Spanish dancing, and acrobatics.
Eventually, her family moved to Beverly Hills in pursuit of better academics, but she faced discrimination, which led her to begin spelling her name as one word. She continued studying piano, which she also began early in life, and, throughout high school, she appeared as a soloist with small orchestras. It wasn’t until Tallchief started to dance under Bronislava Nijinska at age 12, that she began to focus intensely on ballet.
When Tallchief was 15, Nijinska staged three ballets in the Hollywood Bowl, but Tallchief’s disappointment at her role in the corps de ballet led her to work harder.
The Beginnings Of Her Career
Although she wanted to go to college when she graduated from high school, her father did not support it, telling her that it was time for her to find a job, which she did. She had a bit part in Presenting Lily Mars, but she did not find dancing in the movie to be fulfilling, and in 1942, left for New York. Once there, she began working with Sergei Denham and the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo; when they toured in Canada, because she had a passport, unlike the Russian émigrés who were part of the company, she became an apprentice. After the tour, she was offered the place to replace a woman who had become pregnant. Then, when Nijinska came to New York, she cast Tallchief as an understudy for the lead role in Chopin Concerto.
Early in her career, Denham suggested that she change her name to Tallchieva to make it more Russian sounding, but she refused. Later, when she was preparing for Agnes de Mille’s Rodeo of the Courting at Burnt Ranch, de Mille also suggested a name change which Tallchief agreed to: modifying her middle name as her first. Thus, Elizabeth Marie Tall Chief became Maria Tallchief. By her second year with Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo, she landed more significant roles, and in the spring of 1944, George Balanchine joined Ballet Russe to choreograph Song of Norway. Balanchine gave her a solo in the ballet and assigned her the role of Danilova’s understudy. Tallchief was then promoted to “soloist” and received a raise, bringing her salary to $50 a week. Because of the success of Song of Norway, Balanchine was signed to a contract for the remainder of the season, and he continued to cast Tallchief in important roles.
Balanchine Transformed Her
In Sanguinic. Source: (Pinterest).
Over time, Balanchine and Tallchief became friends, and, while on tour in 1945, Balanchine advised her to learn how to properly do battement tendu, one of the most basic ballet moves; this led to a transformation, as she kept her chest held high, straightened her back, arched her feet, and changed her turnout from a weakness into a strength. She continued to have important roles and became the first person to perform the role of Coquette in Night Shadow, one of the most technically challenging roles in this particular ballet.
Then, on August 16, 1946, Tallchief and Balanchine married. After her contract with Ballet Russe ended, she joined Balanchine in France, where he was the guest choreographer for the Paris Opera Ballet. While there, she became the first American to perform with the Paris Opera Ballet. The couple remained in Paris for six months, and upon their return to the United States, she became the first prima ballerina of the New York City Ballet which opened in 1948.
Her Performance In The Nutcracker Helped To Make It A Christmas Classic
In 1949, Balanchine created the lead for “The Firebird” specifically for Tallchief. John Martin, critic for The New York Times, wrote that Tallchief had to “do everything except spin on her head, and she does it with complete and incomparable brilliance.” In 1954, she performed the role of Sugar Plum Fairy in Balanchine’s revision of The Nutcracker, and her performance helped to turn an obscure ballet into a Christmas classic. The critic Walter Terry remarked that she danced “with effortless beauty of movement, electrifying us with her brilliance, enchanting us with her radiance of being. Does she have any equals anywhere, inside or outside of fairyland? While watching her in The Nutcracker, one is tempted to doubt it." By 1955, she became the highest paid ballerina in the world.
Although she continued to dance with the New York City Ballet until 1960, where her presence helped to define Balanchine as the most influential choreographer for the time period, she worked with other dance companies.
Her Later Career
Source: (Center for American Indian Studies-Arizona State University)
Once she left the New York City Ballet, she joined American Ballet Theater, eventually becoming prima ballerina, and became the first American ballerina to perform at Moscow’s Bolshoi Theater. She also appeared on multiple television shows and played the role of Anna Pavlova in Million Dollar Mermaid (1952). She was also on national television when Rudolf Nureyev chose her as his dancing partner for his American debut. She then moved to Germany, where she became the lead dancer in the Hamburg Ballet and retired shortly after.
She then moved to Chicago, where her third husband, Buzz Paschen, lived and was the director of ballet for the Lyric Opera of Chicago starting in 1973. While there, she founded the Lyric Opera’s ballet school. As a teacher, she taught the Balanchine method. In 1981, she founded the Chicago City Ballet with her sister Marjorie, who had become a well-respected ballerina herself. She was a co-artistic director until the company closed in 1987.
Her Legacy Endures
Source: (School of American Ballet/colorized).
Although she was the first Native American prima ballerina, she wanted to be appreciated first as a dancer, but she did remain closely connected to her Osage heritage. As her Kennedy Center biography states, Tallchief was "both the inspiration and the living expression of the best [the United States] has given the world. Her individualism and her genius came together to create one of the most vital and beautiful chapters in the history of American dance."
In December 2012, she broke her hip and died from complications on April 11, 2013.
