Natasha Simon: My name is Natasha Simon, and it is May 7th, 2015 and we are sitting in Ruth Grauert’s solarium, or back porch, at 83 Sanford Place in Jersey City. And I’m about to embark on an adventure with Ruth, who is the narrator of this epic.
Ruth Grauert: What does that mean?
NS: It means that it’s your story to tell. I’m simply here to facilitate and to prod you. So I think that the first prodding that I want to make is in thinking about your relationship with Nik [Alwin Nikolais, 1910-1993] What do you think you taught him?
RG: Hmm. [pause] God knows, because... What did I teach Nik? Well, maybe you can’t dance for 20 minutes on your knees on a splintery floor (laughter) without some damage. ’Cause I knew Nik before he went into the Army, and that happened --
NS: So let’s place that in time. That -- you knew Nik --
RG: Nineteen forty... Nineteen forty-one, end of September. -- before Pearl Harbor?
NS: Correct.
RG: The war, war was on in Europe. Just before I met Nik the Germans had surrounded St. Petersburg. And in St. Petersburg is Catherine the Great’s collection of art. And all of the artists in Hartford [Connecticut] centered around the Athenaeum were upset and frantic about what is happening to all of the European masterpieces that are in St. Petersburg.
Chick Austin [Arthur Everett “Chick” Austin, 1900-1957], who was head of the Wadsworth Atheneum there [Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art], and also fancied himself as a ballet dancer, and was, patron -- Wadsworth Atheneum was patron of Nikolais. He was a man who danced, OK? (laughs) Very important. (sighs) Well, where was I? Talking about, oh, OK. So they made this committee called Artists for the War Relief of Russia, all right?[1]
And I was living in a group home where we had two White Russians, we had a woman who was a potter, we had someone who was trying to be a singer, and me. And we lived together in this group on -- it was a large house, and one of the... Oh, and a Danish lady ran it who had married an American doctor and divorced him, and... (laughs) And she was sort of the kingpin that collected all of our contributions and so forth for the group home, and saw that we did the shopping, and, you know... She was the house mother.
Because we had this big house, they had decided -- and because people were interested in the arts living in it -- they decided that this is where they should hold [00:05:00] a cocktail party to raise money, OK? So, of course, I was teaching school, so I got home a little late, and the cocktail party had been on, and everybody was sitting around with half empty glasses, and so forth and so on, and I got a half empty glass, (laughs) and decided that I would -- looked around for someplace to sit, and all the chairs were full, and on the floor was this long-legged man sitting, who said, “Oh, come sit next -- sit down here, why don’t you?” So I sat down. And he looked at me up and down, ’cause I sat down with a glass of (laughs) liquor in my hand, all right. He said, “Do you dance?” And I said, “Well, I’ve had a semester of Martha Graham [1894-1991] and a semester of Hanya Holm [1893-1992]. If that’s dancing, yes.” He said, “Oh my God. You’ve got to come down to the studio.” And I looked him over, this long-legged guy with thinning blond hair, not very good teeth, a chin that was a little recessive. And I thought, “Well, I’ll see,” I told him. So I asked around after the cocktail party, “Who’s this guy?” “Oh, he’s the darling of dance in Hartford.” OK. So I said, well, all right, I’ll go down to the studio. But what I didn’t know is that because I showed up I joined his company.
NS: Ah!
RG: (laughs) He had to use everybody he could get his hands on that could, could stand up.
NS: This is the Hartford Nikolais Dance Company, or --
RG: No, it was the --
NS: -- Nikolais Hartford Dance?
RG: Well, it was before Nikolais was Nikolais. I mean, he was a... He had been to Bennington [Bennington School of the Dance, Bennington, Vermont] three or four summers. He had been to Bennington and went -- moved out to Chi-- uh, California. One summer. They went out there -- And he had danced with Merce Cunningham [1919-2009] and studied with Graham and Holm and Doris [Doris Humphrey, 1895-1958] and Charles [Charles Weidman, 1901-1975]. I mean, he, he knew all these people. And, (dog barking) (laughs) The dog is chasing the birds. Anyway, where was I? Oh, this was Nikolais.
NS: So little did you know that when you showed up at the studio --
RG: I joined his company, all right. So, of course, some of his work was reflective. I mean, he had a rigid piece, more or less like Martha Graham would’ve done. He had, uh, a wiggly piece, his own solo. This rigid piece was a pavane for something or other, something -- I forget what the title was -- but it was a beast to do because you were all off, off center. (laughs) You danced the whole thing in a lean. Oh, God. All right. So anyway, he got called away after a year or so, he got called away for -- Hawaii got hit in November of that year, or December.
NS: December.
RG: December of that year. And then Nikolais was in the draft. He was in the last age group that got called up, (laughs) but he was called up in the draft in a year. It was toward the end of the draft situations.
They had hit the bottom of the barrel by that time. That’s sad to think of, isn’t it?
NS: During that time though you were concerned as a group -- I, I need to backtrack for just a moment to find out... You mentioned that you were living in Hartford in a group home with several other women, some of whom were potters and -- And why were you there?
RG: Teaching school. I got a job teaching school for something like $18 a week. And it cost me $15 a week to live, and I had $3 a week cash to drive my car. That’s the way things were in those days.
NS: And because you were in an environment with other people in the arts it was a natural segue.
RG: Uh, no. At Nikolais’s company -- at that time, one of ’em was a music teacher who was an employee teaching music, one of them was an office worker who had a nine-to-five job. I mean, they all had other jobs. [00:10:00] It was not a company that was dedicated to being a company for Nikolais. That’s the way everybody functioned --
NS: Sure. Well, never quit your day job, right?
RG: Right, absolutely. And, uh... Does that answer your question?
NS: Yes.
RG: OK. So I don’t know where I’m going now.
NS: So, so at some point during 1941-42, you’re dancing with Nik, however, after you’ve, you’ve come home from school and then you go to the studio --
RG: -- everybody -- they finished their day jobs and we’d have classes at night, and we’d have rehearsals at night, and we’d have whatever.
NS: So the classes that you took there were taught -- Nikolais taught you?
RG: Oh, yeah. It was still -- it was already, as far as I can remember Holm oriented. He never went in for (sighs) grunt and groan. (laughs) And it always ended with glorious jumping, and I, I, I loved it. (laughs) ’Cause I was a mover.
NS: -- you loved jumping.
RG: Yeah.
NS: And how many of there were you?
RG: Oh, there was Rose [Rose Lischner] and Olga [Olga Dzurick] and me and another young lady whose name I don’t remember. There was also -- including their four fellows. One of them was a young man who was recovering from infantile paralysis that became quite a well-known photographer. I can’t remember his name, but he was a motion photographer in New York City for years. And a couple of other fellows that, that escape me. But there were four fellows available, for the first year. I mean, war took ’em away.
NS: So, as was the case with probably many groups or organizations there’s this hiatus. However, I, I even want to go back a little further, because you might be one of the few people that knows from either the cocktail party with Nik --
RG: Right.
NS: -- or with, chatting after class -- or... Where was Nik coming from at that point?
RG: He was influenced in some measure by modern music. He was influenced by Gertrude Stein. I mean, in the arts, this is what, Thompson -- can’t remember his first name, the musician --
NS: Virgil?
RG: Virgil Thompson. He had met them through -- mostly through Chick Austin in the Hartford Atheneum. And Gertrude Stein and, that kind of art was where he was gravitating, as opposed to contraction and release -- and the ancient --
NS: Greek mythology.
RG: -- Greek mythology -- and so forth. (sighs) I think in all of the three -- all of the major techniques at the time, he was most gravitated toward Humphrey. And, of course, Charles didn’t have a real, real aesthetic of his own, but Doris did -- with her (sighs) -- her gravity and so forth, and really -- and you can see that, if you think about it for a minute, if you know Nikolais’s stuff at all, that this, I think, sent him into his philosophic decisions of time, space, shape, and, and motion.
NS: So do you -- so that it’s, it’s your sense of Nikolais as someone who gravitated towards fall and recovery --
RG: No.
NS: -- if you want to say --
RG: No.
NS: -- that, that led him into his investigations of space, time, shape, and --
RG: It was --
NS: -- motion.
RG: -- it was -- to put it specifically, I think that Doris’s, uh, connection to, uh... On specifics (laughs) --
NS: OK.
RG: -- right, into the things -- the, the large things of the Earth and the universe [00:15:00] that led him, yes --
NS: A-ha.
RG: -- very definitely, and he had a great respect for her.
NS: And that those -- I hesitate to say abstractions, but they were big ideas.
RG: Big ideas, right. Big idea.
NS: That led to...
RG: It was that big idea, fall and recovery, of Doris’s that led him into, obviously, into gravity, right? (laughs)
NS: -- then Nik goes off into the Army. He comes back. But there’s always maintained this connection between you and -
RG: Well, unfortunately all of my letters from Nik during the war were destroyed by Betty Young[2],(laughs) OK, because it was my notebook that I, my scrapbook I had lent to -- who wrote the book about Michael? [Michael Ballard, 1942-1991]
NS: Kitty Cunningham? [Katherine “Kitty” Cunningham 1935-2023]
RG: Kitty Cunningham. I’d lent it to Kitty. And it was a big volume, and Kitty didn’t want to return it to New Jersey, so she left it at the studio. It was put up in the shelf. It didn’t belong to Nik, so Betty threw it out when they had to move.
NS: That’s an archivist’s nightmare.
RG: Oh, absolutely. Absolutely -- because, uh, I mean, there were letters in there from Nik from -- that he had written in the foxhole in France. And I can -- I can still see his writing on the page.
NS: Which was how -- what kind of writing was it?
RG: Oh, he, he wrote small.
NS: Tiny?
RG: Not tiny, but small. And it was script. It was not manuscript. I mean, I write manuscript, so I... (laughter) But it was script. And it was small wri--
Of course he didn’t have much paper; you know, he was in the foxhole.
NS: Do you remember any of the content of any of the letters?
RG: Oh, “I’m so scared I shit myself.” “I, I can’t move. I’m cramped. So I’m, I’m doing some thinking.” “I have some paper. I’m trying to conceive of a way of, of getting dance done on paper.” He conceived of Choroscript in the trenches in France, if you can imagine that, but he had to have something to take his mind off the horror, you know?
NS: Why do you suppose he was writing to you?
RG: Well, it was a company member.
NS: -- I’m assuming that he was writing to ev-- to a lot of people --
RG: Uh, a lot of people -- But he wrote to -- he wrote to, I think, the three women who had been in his company. And I don’t know where the, the correspondence from them might be, because they’re deceased. And, whether any of it got into... (sighs) Maybe it might be worth, worth a trip to the, to the archives at Lincoln Center to see if their names are there, and if any – if they have any material there.
NS: As dancers. Gonna make a note...
RG: -- it would be Rose Lischner, L-I-S-C-H-N-E-R, and Olga Dzurick, D-Z-U-R-I-C-K. Those were the two main women that were dancing in his company, and who -- to whom he would have written as well as me. And if they -- if they had deposited their archives, they may be still examined, and it may be worth an investigation.
NS: It’s like a detective story. Let’s bemoan the loss of those letters but you have recollected, you know, some very important --
RG: My, my, my -- I’m, I’m, I’m pretty good still -- ’cause I’m 96, you know. (laughs) And I don’t believe it.
NS: I know. I don’t think anybody does. (laughs)
RG: I don’t believe it. Except once in a while, you know. (laughter)
NS: Well, there must be one letter that you remember that said “I’ve got my discharge papers, I’m coming back.”
RG: I don’t remember that. Now isn’t that funny? I got a call from him. [00:20:00] Of course, what happened was I left Hartford, and I came down to New York, because my father had lost all of his workers to the Army and he needed somebody to run some of his machines. My father was processing color rolls -- color -- hot press stamping leaf in rolls that imprinted airplane wire with numbers so that it had number 246, number 246, number 372, number 372, and the cables in airplanes, run from tail to the controls, right? Run through the whole body. In the, in the Coral Sea -- we lost the battle of the Coral Sea, we lost so many planes because they were shot through the gut, and the controls were gone.
So, my father was in this leaf processing business. One of his customers was in the hot press stamping business who decided, let’s do something about this. He devised curved tape of different -- t-turred dyes of different sizes that could go in and be heated. The tape would roll through and the hot, hot thing would come down and print a number on the wire as it went through so that your 246 could match 246, bingo, not counting 16 threads of blue and two of red -- That was a vital industry that my father was in. So I -- uh --
NS: You were the manpower.
RG: H-his only -- I was the manpower that -- that got into that. So that’s why I was in New York. And, while I was in New York, of course, I went to mostly Humphrey-Weidman. And I was in to keep in shape, right? And, I was dancing in Weidman’s company. But Weidman never warmed up his company, you know? “Here, let’s do this,” and I hurt my knee. So I was out of commission for quite a long time -- if he had us come back and go back and lean back on our legs and... I did something wrong. Anyway, so that, that knocked me out. But that’s what I spent my time doing.
NS: So you, your nine-to-five day job was at your father’s factory --
RG: And I was taking classes from the bigwigs. Some of which I had studied with. I had studied with Martha Graham and Hanya Holm before, before the w-- while I was still in, in Columbia [Columbia University] before I went to Hartford, before I knew Nik. Where do we go from here? Oh, right. So he gets out of the Army, and he gives me a phone call, “Well, I’m in New York.” He came directly to New York, rather than back home to Hartford. His mother had died in the meanwhile. And he came home to New York and started studying with all the bigwigs (laughs) again, to get himself in shape, all right? And he gradually gravitated toward Hanya.
NS: So, in 1946 are we now?
RG: We’re in 1946, ’47 --
NS: And he naturally gravitated to Hanya because he knew Hanya from Bennington in the ’30s.
RG: And he also knew -- he -- but he also knew Martha. He also knew Doris. But it was her approach to, to dance that he gravitated toward. And I, I understand it. Her work was much more like his than the others. OK. Where do we go from here? Oh, he calls me up, “I’ve got a job teaching school at night, teaching classes at an” -- in his school at night -- “I’ve got 40 students, and I need help.” So I said, “Oh, all right, I can do that.” So I went and I helped him at night, and I got stuck, and I was there ever since. (laughter)
NS: Ah! Now, when you say that he’s, he’s in a school and he’s teaching at night, he’s teaching dance/movement.
RG: Dance – to laypeople. And there were 40 people in the class. Really, you know. [00:25:00]
NS: Can you describe what kind of classes he taught at that point?
RG: Oh, he taught, taught floor stretches, familiar to all of us. Actually the Holm series modulated to where he -- where he was using it. And of course we had done that (laughs) in Hartford, and I had studied with Hanya. I knew what he was talking about. And it was my job to go around, and somebody didn’t know which was the left leg or the right leg. (laughs) You know, what, what does an assistant do? A little bit of straightening out here, a little bit of saying, “Now, you do this” (laughs) quietly behind them -- you know, whatever. So that’s what I was doing with him. Then he got the appointment to the Playhouse. [Henry Street Settlement Playhouse]
NS: Can I ask you one question before we get to the Playhouse which is were these primarily technique classes, or did he start --
RG: -- a technique and across the floor. OK? Because, I mean, it was not a creative class, necessarily.
NS: Do you remember where it was?
RG: In different high schools -- it was the public schools at night.
NS: OK.
RG: It was in the public school system, all right? So in 1947, or forty-- it was 1948, I think, he got the commission from Hanya to go to the Playhouse. We had a class of, I think, about ten men and four women, because the men could study dance on the GI Bill.
And this is a story. I don’t know whether this is kind of fun, all right? Gladys and Phyllis [Gladys Bailin, 1930- ; Phyllis Lamhut, 1933- ] had been dancing ballet, at the Henry Street Playhouse, and Gladys calls up Phyllis and says, “Oh, there’s this man, Alwin Nikolais, is gonna be teaching at the Playhouse. It’s gonna be five days a week classes and all this jazz, you know, real dance, dance, dance.” OK. “You gotta come.” All right. So Phyllis gets her f-- tells her family, and Papa says, “Well, I’ve gotta go down and see about this.” And, so they get there, and I’m there, and Nik’s there. Nik’s the bigwig, but I’m there, right? So Papa looks around and he sees a woman. So it’s OK for his daughter, (laughs) who was -- I think she was 15 or 16 at the time -- to study with this man because there would be a woman there.
NS: (laughter) Ah, yeah.
RG: And always through every time -- every time her father saw me, he called me Mama. (laughter) Which is kind of fun. So I’m Phyllis’s dance mama. She mustn’t forget that. (laughter)
NS: Nor will she. You are --
RG: Oh, she thinks I’m outrageous. (laughter) I know that. I know it.
NS: Now, you are -- at this point you are Nikolais’s assistant.
RG: Right.
NS: So I still -- I want to go back a little bit at that point and say why do you think... I mean, that -- I know there’s a Rose and I know there’s an Olga and I know that there are these men and GI Bills.
RG: They were not available. I was.
NS: You were available, but he also probably... Why else do you think --
RG: Intellectually, I understood what in the hell he was after. I mean my master’s degree was in aesthetic philosophy. OK?
NS: And so there’s this natural gravitation that he has --
RG: Intellectually.
NS: If I were to be a fly on the wall, and the two of you are talking in those days he’s engaging you in a -- in aesthetics, and in --
RG: Right, right. OK, and, uh, over the years he would write and he would say -- he would come to me to collect -- correct his English. He wasn’t sure about it. (laughs) So I would correct it. And sometimes he would say, “Now, look: you’re saying what you think, not what I think.” And I said, “Let’s talk about this. [00:30:00] Let’s get this straight. I want to know what you’re thinking.” And he was -- uh, he was not... He had not been trained to write (laughs) -- you know, uh, so that his English sometimes was a little awkward, needed straightening out so people could understand it.
NS: Sure.
RG: And, uh... And so I straightened it out, and a couple of times I straightened it out in a way that didn’t suit him, ’cause it didn’t say what he wanted to say. (laughter) OK?
NS: OK.
RG: But anyway, that, that went on for quite a while.
NS: So then begins the Henry Street Playhouse journey --
RG: This business of writing went on for ‘til 1990.
NS: But the movement experimentation, the movement exploration, now you’re in the crucible.
RG: When, when Henry Street started we had classes in technique, which was more or less Holm based. We had classes in theory, which also grew out of the Holm thing. We had classes in notation, his system of notation which was Choroscript, which I taught because I had that kind of mind. And we had classes in composition.
NS: Now let’s transport ourselves back to 1949 --
RG: Well the first, the first piece that Nik did in 1949 –
NS: Before you do even pieces, I don’t want to talk about the piece, per se. I want to talk about the theory class in November of 1949.
RG: Well, I can tell you one of the things that he said in composition class. I can remember this very specifically.
NS: OK.
RG: “Make a phrase that can be repeated over and over and over.” So everybody would make a phrase that they could repeat over and over and over. That I remember specifically, because I can remember Beverly Blossom’s [Beverly Schmidt Blossom, 1926-2014] presentation that was so clear, and so fast, and so specific in its turns and so forth, that it’s, it’s in my head, it won’t go away. (laughs)
NS: That’s an imprint, right?
RG: Oh, it was imprinted, right.
NS: And she repeated it over – and over and over.
RG: That’s the phrase -- 16, 16 beats, or 24 beats, or something, and it was repeated over and over, turning this way and that way, this way and that way, this way and that way. And I can remember Phyllis’s -- one of Phyllis’s compositions. She will tell it didn’t happen, but it did. One of Phyllis’s compositions, she stood on a box and wore a pointed hat, and stuck her finger in the air. (laughs)
NS: Do you remember what the problem was -- the assignment at that point?
RG: I think the problem was, was things -- us-- using --
NS: Props.
RG: Yeah. And I think that was the problem. But Phyllis will deny it, (laughter) uh, ’cause we had talked about it. But this is imprinted in my... And she also repeated that dance at New Dance -- at The New School in a program. So she did it, (laughs) whether she says so or not.
NS: But what you’re pointing to, actually, is -- (laughs) and I don’t -- no pun intended -- but what you are indicating, however, is that what Nik was also assigning or investigating was the use of props.
RG: The use of props -- he was investigating the use of props. The -- (sighs) the use of reiteration. [00:35:00] The use of sound. He encouraged everything in these classes, actually. I can’t remember... Well, of course, then, it didn’t take long. I mean, it was 1952 or 3 -- 1952, I think in the fall, that suddenly we had to make a composition with properties for a big ballet. And we had Masks, Props, and Mobiles. And I think it was 1953. And we -- we were assigned -- I was assigned Beverly, Dorothy, and Murray for a trio. [Beverly Schmidt Blossom, Dorothy Vislocky, 1927-2013; Murray Louis, 1926-2016] (laughs)
NS: When you say you were assigned, what does that mean?
RG: Well, that they were giving me to work with, to dance with -- to choreograph for.
NS: You choreographed --
RG: For them.
NS: -- for those three.
RG: Those three. And, it was a structure made of elastic (laughs) that grew into Nikolais’s “Tensile Involvement" [a section of Masks, Props, and Mobiles, 1953]. These things are so interesting that, the [pause] generation of idea and how it grows from one concept to the next to the next to the next, ‘til... Now, my structure was sort of static, and it was just elastic going back and forth from one place with a trio, right? And his -- it swapped his vision of the elastics coming in and going out.
NS: So from this germ that you had -- grew
RG: And this happens, I’m sure, aesthetically all over the world at all times. This is not... This is not something -
NS: Not specific or particular to Nikolais.
RG: Yeah, right.
NS: But what it does illuminate is the relationship of Nikolais to colleagues and students.
RG: Oh, course, of course. And I’m, I’m sure that that is not the only instance of this having happened.
NS: Do you remember what that process for you was like with the elastics?
RG: What do you mean?
NS: Well, who brought the elastic in?
RG: I did.
NS: Why did you bring the elastic in?
RG: ’Cause I conceived of it as a moving thing. It moves.
Elastic moves.
NS: But elastic is different from someone who would bring in a scarf.
RG: Well, I, I don’t know. How does one get an idea? But what I made was a, an elastic structure that was hung from the rafters, that had a framework in it, and they moved this thing around, and related to it, and so forth, and so on.
NS: Did you ask them to do certain movements, or did you...?
RG: Both. I mean, it’s a give and take.
NS: The reason I’m asking these kinds of questions is that I think the only place we’re going to know about process -- is in a conversation, because what people see is the end product.
RG: No, I think that -- I think that... Where did I get my idea from?
NS: Yeah.
RG: I don’t know. But when you think about moving stuff, elastic does come into mind. And I can remember another thing. I was asked to do something for one of the Christmas shows. (laughs) So what is Christmas? Well, Christmas is bringing presents. So I had my lineup each make a box, and we did a dance with bringing in the boxes, and so forth and so on. I mean, that’s... [pause]
Nik did a dance with some sticks, right? Years later, I wanted to do a dance with sticks, so I got myself some bamboo sticks, real lightweight. [00:40:00] And I, I have a dance that the kids do in the summer. With sticks, and with hats that pop open. (laughs) And in a striped slide, with different colors and the bamboo picks up flashes of this color as it turns and moves. It worked out fine. (laughs) But, you know, that’s the way ideas generate over the years. I mean, who knows where an idea comes from, you know? I mean, you must know that yourself.
NS: Oh, I, I-I’m, I’m totally with you there.
RG: You have a dance that Phyllis gives you of vomiting – and what’s that going to ev--
NS: -- and where did that come from?
RG: And where does it go to? Did it go anywhere?
NS: Yeah. I’m sure that there’s a spot in a work that Phyllis has done that I’m reminded of that. And then it -- then it becomes part of --
RG: More about you yourself. (pause) Are you moving?
NS: Am I moving?
RG: Mm-hmm.
NS: Not with this knee at the moment, I’m not, but -- so I relate to your knee --
RG: What are you using for your knee?
NS: Well, I’m going to the physiatrist tomorrow.
RG: Do you use Arnica -- tablets?
NS: Yes.
RG: Because I have no cartilage in either of my knees. But I keep moving as you know.
NS: And, and you should. That’s what’s keeping you as vital as you are.
RG: And Arnica is what supports it.
NS: Let’s get back, though, to fifty-- 1952, 3.
RG: OK.
NS: Because at this point --
RG: That’s a long time ago, lady. (laughter)
NS: I know! You’re... You know, I... In looking at the Bearnstow Journal,[3]and reading some of your essays, and, of course, working with you over the years -- But because I’m really very much more interested now in, in relating you and Nikolais, and then the Nikolais aesthetic as it is now, but --
RG: I don’t know what the Nikolais aesthetic is now.
NS: I don’t know either, and that’s why we -- I, I know it’s a short -- it’s a shortcut to, to... However, one of the questions, before we even get there, is -- because you’ve described Hartford, and then you’ve described being in New York, and now you’ve described being at Henry Street, so if I were to say how would you describe your relationship with Nik: collaborator, friend, associate, employee, regisseur, all of the above?
RG: No. Not employee. I mean, I never felt that he was the boss and I was the underling. Never felt that.
NS: And that was because you felt far more a strength in collaboration?
RG: Well, because we’re more or less [the same] in age. We were -- we were -- he was 10, 12 years older than I, but I was the oldest one of the other group. (laugh) And we had known each other before he was Nikolais. We were friends.
NS: So that when you are now at Henry Street with him, and you’re also -- you’re mama --
RG: Phyllis’s mama. (laughs)
NS: -- Phyllis’s mama, and now -- and you’re, you’re also sitting next to him in the theater while he’s...
RG: You’re right, absolutely --
NS: You know, while he’s --
RG: -- while he’s teaching.
NS: -- or while he’s fiddling with --
RG: Or while he’s creating --
NS: -- or --
RG: -- and he’s gonna say, “I want a light here when that time comes.” (laughs)
NS: So what’s that experience like? Is it a conversation?
RG: Sometimes, but not very often. [pause] Nik would... Well... It’s like the conversation that I described at the Mouth.[4] That, “My God, he’s beautiful.” “I know.” That kind of conversation. I don’t know whether that’s the kind of thing [00:45:00] that you want to know. Our relationship was that of -- not ever of employee and employer, but a friend. And that’s, that’s all I can tell you. And like friends, friends argue. And friends disagree, and friends dominate, and then the other dominates, and so forth, and so on. Friendship is like that. And that’s what my relationship with Nik was like. Like, I, I’m correcting his English, right? And then he says, “Oh no, you changed my idea.” Give and take.
NS: When you were in the theater next to him, sitting in -- at the Playhouse and the students are onstage now and he’s trying to work on a, a particular piece of choreography and we’re still back, like, fifty--three --
RG: OK, in the ’50s --
NS: So you remember sort of the atmosphere there. What were the ideas at that point that he was investigating?
RG: Oh, God. Well, each year it would be something new. If you look at his schedule of performances, “Masks, Props, and Mobiles,” “Village of Whispers” [1955], suddenly you have a switch from things to sound, right? That’s the way it went. His mind would conceive that this is an operative thing in the, the theater of motion. Things. Sticks. Uh, scarves. Uh, waves. Materials.
NS: Discs.
RG: Materials. Uh, Noumenon [1951] (laughs) you know. All right. All of that stuff has motion possibilities. Then part of the theater is sound. Where does that sound come from? Well, in “Village of Whispers,” most of the sound came from the dancers. They, they would go “Uh!”, or “Ah!” They related their mouth sounds (claps) to their clapping sounds and everything to their motion.
NS: So, bottom line: we’re always -- we’re always dealing in motion.
RG: Oh, bottom line, we’re always dealing in motion, yes.
NS: And the emphasis one year, because Nik has now become fascinated, much more so with sound’s impact on motion or, as you’ve described in “Masks” --
RG: Or sound production with motion. [Or] with the visual elements of other things and how they move. I mean, elastic moves differently from a, a scarf. And the motion of that material has an aesthetic impact on the viewer, whether they know it or not. And so, that was the investigation. Then he investigated sound. He investigated structure. Structure. I don’t know whether you’d call it that or not, but other things onstage. Costumes.
NS: Would that be light--
RG: Costumes.
NS: Would that be also lighting?
RG: That was another investigation, but, for instance, he had a panel across the stage, and above the stage environment, and with structures, panels, anything. One of his ballets, he had columns of fabric at each wing. And a slit underneath it, so that you could change the color. I had to make the instruments. I made ’em out of tin cans. I made hats of gel, of color media so that the hats could be put over the can, and it would change the color of the light. And we had to have a gremlin during performance sit at each, (laughs) [00:50:00] wing, so they could take one hat off and put another hat on. I mean, this is the process of visual, the visual, going over into thought, becoming reality. He thinks of these columns changing light, and it has to become a reality.
NS: And so how does that happen?
RG: “Ruth, make it.”
NS: Yeah, yeah.
I’m going to read you an excerpt from diary notes that Walter Sorell has. [1905-1997]
RG: He was perceptive, by the way.
NS: Quote: “He,” Nikolais, “undoubtedly gives his critics a hard time, forcing them to verbalize the visual diversions he is able to evoke with shapes, sounds, lights, projections, and motion, one depending on the others. Dance critics, conditioned to viewing and expecting to see ‘dancing,’” in quotations, “have always been a bit uneasy about reconciling the theater experience he offers with what is considered legitimate dancing…Nikolais called himself a mystic, and going one step further, I would describe him as an alchemist.”[5]
RG: (laughs) OK. Well, it’s -- Walter Sorell was a great guy. Really. And he hits it on the head. [pause] In this day, for all that has happened in dance since Walter Sorell wrote that, I think that the audience today, the person who’s visual-- who sees dance doesn’t expect to see just ballet or tap or so...They expect to see a whole montage of stuff happening. Don’t you?
NS: I don’t, I don’t know that. I recently was at New York City Ballet to see a Balanchine/Robbins [program]. [George Balanchine, 1904-1983; Jerome Robbins, 1918-1998]
RG: Which one?
NS: Uh, “Concerto Barocco,” and --
RG: Which is formalized, yeah.
NS: -- formal – and “Goldberg Variations.” And I went with a young man who is not a dancer at all but had been very much interested, and listened over and over and over again to the “Goldberg Variations” -
RG: Is he a musician?
NS: He -- no.
RG: OK.
NS: He’s a lawyer.
RG: OK, all right.
NS: But he --
RG: He’s a human being. (laughs)
NS: But he was awestruck when we left the theater --
RG: The visualization?
NS: -- because he could hear “Goldberg” differently now, having seen --
RG: That’s -- oh, that’s lovely. That’s lovely! Tell him I love him! (laughs)
NS: Now, that’s a very stark stage.
RG: Yes.
NS: It has -- it’s not -- as I recall, there -- it’s not costumed, except in leotards and tights.
RG: Right, that’s right.
NS: And it’s not lit with fancy...
RG: Doesn’t need it.
NS: Doesn’t need it. It has one stage --
RG: But because -- be--
NS: -- stage right, downstage right is the piano player, and that’s it.
RG: But it’s the way the dance plays with the music. And, it’s the way dance plays with light. It’s the way dance plays with fabric.
NS: I think that, in answer to your question, though --
I think it depends on what you go to see. (laughs)
RG: It depends on your prejudices to begin with. If you come with open mind, there are many things in this world that can reach you. If you close yourself off and say, “This is right and this is wrong, to hell -- (laughs) to hell with you,” you know -- you’re sunk. You’re lost.
NS: What, what at this point -- I mean, we could jump now -- let’s jump even 50 years, and, and go to 2015. [00:55:00] What are particular performances that you’ve seen, not necessarily in dance, or art events, or -- that have been particularly exciting or stimulating or provocative for you? Of late.
RG: I, I think “The Horse’s Mouth” was fabulous [see footnote 4]. I am always, every time I do a “Horse’s Mouth,” I’m always struck with how the different generations of Nikolais people can get together and improvise. They lend themselves to the moment, and the movement, and the atmosphere, and, and away they go. (laughs) I don’t think another technique can do that.
NS: I don’t -- I think you’re right. I do not think that there is another technique that --
RG: -- I, I was a little bit -- I don’t know whether you want to record this or not -- when, when you listen to it, cut it out if you want to.
NS: OK.
RG: OK. I was a little bit perturbed by the stylization of what [some Horse’s Mouth participants] did in improvisation. It wasn’t free.
NS: So let me ask you something: when you say “wasn’t free” and was “stylization” --
RG: “Stylization” is not the right word.
NS: OK, try and find a word, then. I mean, take your time, and, and --
RG: It wasn’t -- they were doing movements that w-- have been in their body. They were not responding to that corner over there. [points to doorway]
NS: I see.
RG: And when I had to work with a couple of them they didn’t really see me. They were doing their movement.
NS: Do you think that is a function of training, or of inexperience, or youth in relation to age?
RG: No, wait a minute.
NS: Well, let’s talk about it. If you were to contrast it, as you have, with generations of Nikolais dancers, do you think that the reason that Nikolais -- the generations of Nikolais dancers move well together is because -- or can you point to the specific training that Nikolais dancers have that gets us to do it?
RG: It’s the going to (sighs) time, space, shape, and motion, and your response to it.
NS: Because we’ve spent a lot of time in theory and composition classes investigating those [concepts motionally].
RG: Right. For instance, at “The Horse’s Mouth,” I picked up the piece of paper that says, “Dance like a penguin.” So I danced like a penguin. That really got me, because that’s not my style, but, [01:00:00] (laughs) but I did what I was told.
NS: But, but you were skilled at -- in the art of imagining, in imagination.
RG: Oh, of course. My body went right into a penguin. (laughs)
NS: Now, which also ties in with [part of our earlier conversation about] Earthwatch, because I’m sure you’ve seen penguins.
RG: No, I haven’t. I haven’t been down -- I haven’t been down to South America or South Africa.
NS: OK. Well, that’s the next trip.
RG: (laughs) Maybe. I want to go to Costa Rica. That’s where I want to go.
NS: This past week, I, I happened to have caught an early film, and I believe it’s in the ’50s, sometime in the early ’50s, that WNET did called A Time to Dance, hosted by Martha Myers [1929- ], and it was showcasing Nik, Nikolais. And the dancers in the, in the film were Phyllis Lamhut, Arlene Laub [1932- ], Murray Louis, Coral Martindale [1936- ], Dorothy Vislocky, Beverly Schmidt Blossom.
RG: The standard company.
NS: The standard company. And they showed excerpts from “Web” [1955] which became “Tensile”
RG: “Tensile,” right.
NS: “Fixation.”
RG: Which was --
NS: Murray’s solo. And then “Discs.” In the interview with Nik, he very clearly states, talks about modern dance as the art of motion. It’s his philosophy. And the eloquence of human motion. He goes on to say that the psyche is the base of operations.
RG: Well, I don’t know what psyche is.
NS: The psyche from -- it’s our mind from which moods and emotion emerge. And he actually, in this film, he references the following, and you see three dancers who personify the following words -- sadness -- low in spirit -- anger, tightening and shakes --embarrassment, anguish -- laughter, fear, hardens. What’s your reaction there? And the reason I’m asking you that is --
RG: I don’t th-- I think -- what’s the date of this?
NS: In the mid-’50s.
RG: In the mid-’70s, Nik would not have said that.
NS: And in fact, he would say that -- I think I have it here -- “I go psychotic every time I hear the word ‘dehumanized.’” (laughter) So you see the evolution.
RG: Right. Well, that’s life, isn’t it?
NS: Now, tell me -- now, let’s talk about that difference… Let’s talk about that journey that --
RG: Nik, Nik --
NS: -- from ’50s to the ’70s.
RG: In the ’50s, Nik was still finding. And when you’re asked a specific question, you have to give an answer. He gave an answer the best he could at that time. He went on to, to probe and to expand, and to grow. And you come to find out that what [were] some of the things that he said, blah, blah, blah, uh, [are] not true. It’s not specific. Nothing in art is that specific. Nothing. That it has got to be what it is, and it’s got to grow where it’s gonna grow. At least, that’s the way I feel about it. And I think Nik felt the same.
NS: I would also add not only nothing is that specific, but also nothing is that static.
RG: Absolutely. Specifity -- specificity is stasis, isn’t it? And if you are stuck with this house here, [01:05:00] you’re never gonna... (laughs)
NS: Yes, yes, you’ll never look over the roof. (laughs)
RG: Right, never. Never. And I -- of course, Nik was not -- he was forced to make an answer. When you’re asked a question, and you’re on television or wherever, you’ve got to make an answer, right? And I think that at that time that was the best answer he could give.
NS: Do you think that he didn’t... You see, I think it’s an interesting quandary, because when you try and investigate a person’s development I think it’s important not to deny the starting points and the beginning points --
RG: Oh no, absolutely.
NS: -- and the next points --
RG: I mean, that --
NS: -- and the next points.
RG: -- that -- his interests, this is the root. Right. And I think -- but I think that, that every artist changes every day. And that they build on what they were yesterday. And if they get stuck in yesterday, heaven help us. They are stuck. They’re no longer creating.
NS: To be fair to Nik, because I’d sort of plucked that right out of the one spot in the, in the film, but, you know, he goes on to say that this range of expressions that he’s just referenced really derived from the interplay between the psychic and the physical. So you can see where, of course, things will be developing.
RG: I think everything we do (laughs) is this. I mean... I just did this. [gestures] Now, what did that come from?
NS: Well, you just shrugged your shoulders.
RG: Right, and, and I lifted my hands, and I...
NS: And it’s an interplay of what’s going on.
RG: Absolutely. Absolutely. You’re shaking your head, and you’ve got your hair in your... (laughter) These things come out of the moment of where we are, and where we have been, and where we are going to go.
NS: I want to jump way off the map now, and go up to Maine. I would like to know because we’re talking about the Nikolais legacy as an overarching theme here, I’d be very interested in knowing how you relate the idea of the Nikolais legacy to your choice of faculty at Bearnstow.[6]
RG: (laughs) Oh. Largely, my choice of faculty are people who want to come, number one. Number two, what Peter -- a lot of them are friends, so that’s number two. What we have this year, number one, we have Peter Kyle, [1967- ] who does not teach a Nikolais technique. He teaches his slow motion.[7] But I sit there. I sit on the porch, which is outside, which has a window into the studio. And I sit there, and I watch class. And I’ve done this for three years. The same class every year. They start from one place and they go to another place, and it takes them forever, and they turn around, and they do -- go from another place to another place, and they may -- he may say, “You’ve got to pick up this on the way,” or whatever. And -- but what it does to that performer, moving at that pace makes them be present. They can’t go places. They can’t dream about it. And it’s a wonderful training in performance. That’s the way I feel about that. That’s why I continue to have Peter, right? (laughs)
Claire -- you know Claire Porter’s [1942- ] work?
NS: No.
RG: All right. She starts off class with -- she starts off her class with a motion, and everybody in the circle moving around. Wonderful. (laughs) That’s -- I, I like that, all right, and I can participate in that, even if I’m sitting in a chair, you know. All right. Uh, then they, it’s a writing and moving thing. They write something, and then they move it, [01:10:00] and they tell a story about -- they tell a story and illustrate it with motions. I saw a concert of hers just this winter in which she does a piece on prepositions. (laughter) She has a singer who works with her, “on, off,” (laughs) and sings this thing. And this motion goes along with it, and she is saying things, and the, the singer
NS: -- in, out -- on, off --
RG: Yes.
NS: -- above, below.
RG: Yeah. And that’s the kind of work that she does. It’s all story: “My dog is lying in the bushes, (laughs) in the sun” -- a story that she makes. She writes these things, and then moves to it. And, I think that although it’s a very specialized kind of performance and art, it’s good. It’s free. It’s not -- this is not -- this -- the technique. We’re not (grunts and laughs), you know? Uh...
NS: It’s not constrained or restraining.
RG: No, no. It is free. I have Robin Gilmore, who is an Alexander person[8]which, of course, is something that’s not creative, but very helpful. And good Alexander people can watch a dancer lift an arm, and it doesn’t fulfill what the arm should fulfill, and they can tell you which muscle is not working right. I’m -- imagine. Imagine! So that this become free because you have freed a muscle in the middle of --
But she works that way. Who else that I got? Oh, I’ve got a new one this year. I call her Melody. Her name isn’t Melody. Her name is Robin, I think. She’s a Black woman. She’s from Baltimore, and she moves like hell. (laughs) A little bit spiritual -- but that doesn’t -- I mean, I can accept spirituality, if I have to.
NS: How did you find her?
RG: She came along with Robin. Because Robin wanted somebody who could teach a -- who could do a moving class and Robin felt that she could not do it. And, I like her classes. (laughs) I take her warmups. I do -- I take Claire’s warmups, too. I can’t take Peter’s warmups. They’re too slow. (laughter) Then we’ve got Holm. (pause) Oh God. Susan Buirge [1940- ]. And Susan Buirge is coming from [Japan]--
NS: But you must tell me why Susan Buirge is someone you want.
RG: Well, she relates the development of the Kagura[9], which comes up from the Earth to American modern dance. It is academic, I am sure, because Susan is like that, but I have seen some of her work. It’s gentle, and slow, and good, and clear. And it is a part of our scene, our dance scene that we don’t know here. And I think that it’s -- would be very good for a few people to know.
NS: Susan is someone, however, that you met because she was a Nikolais --
RG: She came out of Nikolais. She has a great respect for Nikolais theory and technique, and believes that what the Kagura develops [01:15:00] is out of the same principles. Now, whether she’s right or wrong, I don’t know, ’cause I haven’t -- I haven’t really dug enough --
NS: However, you’re very much open to finding out whether it is.
RG: Of course. Of course.
NS: Because you’re not static, and you’re trained not to be --
RG: (laughs) Trained not to be, not to be stuck in a rut.
NS: -- in a state of stasis. Bebe [Bebe Miller, 1950- ] is coming.
RG: Bebe is coming in June with specific people invited to come -- not open to the -- everybody. She is inviting professors from different college universities to discuss their process in teaching.
NS: And that’s also near and dear to your heart.
RG: I don’t know. I don’t know. There are some things in Bebe’s process that I, I question. But, uh... Her, her work is, is very much related to the motion work that Nik would do. Or maybe to Murray’s. But she’s at Ohio State, and Ohio State is Laban, and Laban is very (laughs) structured. [Rudolph von Laban, 1879-1958] I know some of the people who are coming. Angie Hauser and Chris Ro-- Chris, [Aiken] who is a contact improvisation guy. And, uh, they’re from Smith, I think. And there’s the person coming from Ohio State, and so forth. But she has -- she has people coming, only people who are in college dance departments are coming to talk about their processes. Now, what that’s -- what’s gonna happen, I don’t know.
NS: And she -- and you will obviously find out. (laughs)
RG: I will find out.
NS: But I think -- I, I, I sort of want to go back to the part where you say on this -- and the reason for my asking about the faculty there is that this is as an -- combines two aspects of your life that are very, very, very dear to you: one is nature and the outdoors --
RG: Right.
NS: -- and the other is the arts.
RG: Right.
NS: Right? And that this site-specific place, this paradise in the woods is a --
RG: It’s a free place.
NS: -- is a free place --
RG: Right.
NS: -- for you to gather --
RG: People who want --
NS: -- people that excite you. OK. It’s my contention that that’s --
RG: Well, you know who I want to get back.
NS: Who?
RG: Susan Rethorst [1951- ]. Do you know her?
NS: No.
RG: Oh.
NS: Veronique is coming.
RG: Who?
NS: Veronique.
RG: Veronique Mackenzie from Halifax. She’s -- this is her third or fourth year working with me. And she is... I’ll tell you the kind of thing that she does: she was hired by Halifax to do the pageantry for the hundredth anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic. And one of the pieces that she did was underwater, and these figures drifting in the water. And it -- the, the video of it, it was so fantastic! But, but you imagine, imagine conceiving that. Then she did a, a piece, “Snowstorm.” They were dressed in overcoats, and they had their knees bandaged up, because they had (laughs) fallen down, and they’re, they’re battling the snow. I mean, she’s wonderful. She’s wonderful. I love working with her.
NS: What you describe is, is very m--
RG: It’s Nikolais. But never -- Not out of Nikolais at all. Completely isolated. But this is the wonderful part of it. This is Nikolais.
NS: No, you took the words out of my mouth.
RG: This is the wonderful part of it, that this philosophy is not specific to Nik. It’s human.
NS: I think we can stop there.
RG: OK. (laughs)
END OF AUDIO FILE
© all rights reserved 2025, The Nikolais/Louis Foundation for Dance, Inc.
[1] For further information about the organization, Chick Austin, dance in Connecticut, and Nikolais’ early years in Connecticut see Connecticut Dances Compendium: Essays, Articles, and Memories published January 2017 as part of the Connecticut Alliance Dance History Project.
[2] Growing up on the Lower East Side, Betty Young was a member of one of the Henry Street Settlement’s many clubs. She eventually became the school administrator and co-director of the Playhouse with Nikolais. For further information see Helen Hall, Unfinished Business (New York: Macmillan, 1971) and Ellen M. Snyder-Grenier, The House on Henry Street (New York: New York University Press, 2020).
[3] On Parker Pond, Mount Vernon, Maine, Bearnstow began as a children’s summer camp in 1946. Over the years it has attracted artists and students of all ages drawn to its commitment to education in the creative arts and natural sciences.
[4] The Horse’s Mouth: Remembering Nik, Abrons Arts Center, Henry Street Playhouse, April 30, 2010. Created by Tina Croll and Jamie Cunningham, From The Horse’s Mouth is a dance/theater production celebrating various dancers and dance institutions.
[5] Sorell, Walter, Looking Back in Wonder: Diary of a Dance Critic, Columbia University Press, New York 1986, pp. 115, 117.
[6] Bearnstow Camp, offering summer arts retreats. See footnote 3, above.
[7] Slow Tempo: a form of movement study and performance incorporating the physical training method of Japanese theater director Shogo Ohta [1939-2007] with contemporary dance and improvisational techniques.
[8]Alexander Technique, developed by Frederick Mathias Alexander, 1869-1955.
[9] A specific type of Shinto ritual ceremonial dance.
