Collins, Janet, 1917-2003

Janet Collins (March 2, 1917 – May 28, 2003) was an African American dancer, choreographer, and teacher. She performed on Broadway, in films, and on television. She was among the pioneers of Black ballet dancing, one of the few classically trained Black dancers of her generation.

Born Janet Fay Collins in New Orleans, Louisiana, at the age of four, she moved with her family to Los Angeles, California, where she received her first dance training at a Catholic community center. At various times, Collins studied ballet with Carmelita Maracci, Adolph Bolm, and Mia Slavenska, and trained in modern dance with Lester Horton. She also had fond memories of studying with Los Angeles dance teacher Dorothy Lyndall. Collins acquired performing experience while still a teenager, appearing in vaudeville as a member of an adagio dance team, "Three Shades of Brown" with Al Dixon and Graham Fain. She continued to face discrimination, however, as an aspiring ballerina. After the vaudeville act broke up, Collins sought advanced training in ballet, but was repeatedly turned away from ballet academies in Los Angeles. She persevered and tried the Arnold Tamon School of Ballet. Tamon's sister, Charlotte, who also was a teacher at the school, agreed to give Collins private lessons at a reduced rate. Collins made arrangements with a local tap dance instructor to use his studio for her ballet practice in exchange for her giving ballet lessons to some of his students. Collins began teaching dance to neighborhood children as well in order to help pay for her own classes. In 1934 or 1935, encouraged by her aunt, she auditioned with success for the prestigious Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo, impressing ballet master Léonide Massine, but as she would have been required to paint her face and skin white in order to be able to perform in a limited repertory, she refused to join the company.

Collins continued with her dance studies in Los Angeles and also pursued her interest in painting, receiving a scholarship to attend the Art Center School for formal training. After graduating from Jefferson High School, Collins attended L.A. Junior College, where one of her fellow students was Willa Kim (the two would reconnect later in New York, where Kim had become a noted theatrical costme designer). In 1937, modern dance choreographer, Lester Horton, invited Collins to join the cast of a new version of Le Sacre du Printemps he was preparing to be performed at the Hollywood Bowl that summer. Collins trained at Horton's school and appeared with other members of the Lester Horton Dance Group when the work was performed on August 5, 1937. Her next major performing opportunity came when she was cast in the Los Angeles Negro Unit of the Federal Theater Project's staging of Hall Johnson's Run, Little Chillun, which opened at the Mayan Theatre on July 22, 1938, proving so popular it moved to another venue for an extended run. The following year, Collins appeared in the Los Angeles production of Swing Mikado and toured in vaudeville with radio and film star Eddie Anderson during 1940. During this period, Collins was married briefly to the singer, Charles Holland; the couple divorced in 1941 and Collins would have the marriage annulled by the Catholic Church many years later.

In 1941, Collins joined the Katherine Dunham Company, touring with the troupe and appearing in the film, Stormy Weather (1943). Collins, however, would leave the company with another fellow dancer, Talley Beatty, by the summer of 1943. Billed as themselves, the two had appeared in a dance sequence in Flamingo (1942), a Soundie with Duke Ellington and His Orchestra. They also formed a nightclub act, sometimes billed as "Spanish" dancers, Ria and Rico, to increase their bookings. In addition to working in nightclubs, the dance team appeared in the all-Black revue, Sweet 'N Hot (1944), featuring Dorothy Dandridge, which played in Los Angeles for several months. By 1945, Collins had received a grant from the Rosenwald Fund, which enabled her to focus on creating choreography in preparation for a solo recital. She studied with composer Ernest Bloch for a time and continued exploring various dance forms, training intensively with Carmelita Maracci. Collins also appeared as an uncredited specialty dancer in a number choreographed by Jack Cole for the film, The Thrill of Brazil (1946). A turning point in her dance career came in 1947, when she performed in a one-night program of her own choreography at the Las Palmas Theatre in Los Angeles, earning excellent notices.

To continue to further advance her career as a dancer, Collins moved to New York in 1948. Her breakthrough performance came in a joint recital with other dance artists given at the 92nd Street YM-YWHA on February 20, 1949 that was seen by influential dance critics. She was invited back for a solo concert on April 2, 1949 and performed one of her pieces, Apre le Mardi Gras, in an episode of the television series, The Admiral Broadway Revue, which aired on April 29, 1949. Collins also earned glowing reviews for her performance in the the Cole Porter musical, Out of This World (1950), to choreography by Hanya Holm. She received the Donaldson Award for her dancing in this Broadway production in 1951. During the show's run, she was noticed by Zachary Solov, then the ballet master of the Metropolitan Opera. In 1951, Collins made her Met debut in Aida, becoming the first Black ballerina to perform with the Metropolitan Opera Ballet, and also danced in Carmen that season. She became a member of the company the following year and remained through 1954, appearing in New York and on cross-country tours at venues where she still encountered racial segregation.

In addition to touring with her own small concert group, Collins was engaged actively in teaching during the years in which she lived in New York. She taught modern dance at the School of American Ballet, the 92nd Street Y, and had a long affiliation with Marymount Manhattan College, where her work, Genesis (1965), to a score Collins had commissioned from Heitor Villa-Lobos several years earlier, had its premiere. She also taught a form of dance therapy at the St. Joseph's School for the Deaf. In 1969, Collins returned to Los Angeles, and, by the late 1970s, she had settled in Seattle, Washington. In 1974, Collins retired from performing and teaching. That same year, the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theatre paid tribute to Collins and Pearl Primus as pioneering Black women in dance. Collins presented a new work, Canticle for the Elements, choreographed for the company, in a program at New York's City Center on May 21, 1974. The following evening, Judith Jamison appeared in a revival of Collins' solo piece, Spirituals.

In later years, Collins turned to religion, finding comfort as an Oblate in the Benedictine order. She also was an accomplished painter, specializing in spiritual themes. Her health failing, Collins moved to Fort Worth, Texas in 2000 to be closer to her brother, Ernest Patrick Collins. She died in 2003 in Fort Worth at the age of 86.