Australia Dancing - Coleman, Ross (1949

Coleman, Ross (1949 - 2009)

Born in Marrickville, New South Wales, Ross Coleman began dance lessons with Helen de Paul at the age of six. As a child he danced in shows and on television and in 1957 he and his brother Barry featured in the original 'Happy Little Vegemites' advertisement. Coleman won a Cecchetti Society award for ballet at the age of 12 and was dux of Canterbury Boys High at the age of 15. By 16 he had left school and was choreographing go-go dancing for the television show Seven au go go. While still a teenager he choreographed diverse productions ranging from Kings Cross cabarets to television commercials. In the late 1960s he performed with Dusty Springfield and on the club circuit in Australia and Asia, and performed and choreographed - as the 'King of Go Go' - for the television shows It's All Happening and Bandstand.

By the early 1970s Coleman was a regular performer on Australian television variety shows such as Bandstand and The Don Lane Show, and had formed his own troupe, The Ross Coleman Dancers. He launched his professional choreographic career in 1972 with the Melbourne production of Grease. The performance highlight of his career came in 1976 when he was critically acclaimed in the role of the troubled young homosexual Paul in the original Australian production of A Chorus Line.

In 1984 Coleman and his brother Barry opened the Ross Coleman Performing Arts Studio in Castlereagh Street Sydney, but financial difficulties forced the closure of this school two years later. After some time in Europe, Coleman returned to Australia and choreographed the Royal Bicentennial Concert in Sydney, winning a Mo Award for choreographer of the year in 1988 and cementing his reputation as an acclaimed choreographer and director during the years that followed.

While renowned for his work on musicals, Coleman also choreographed for contemporary dance companies including Australian Dance Theatre and the Dance Company (later Sydney Dance Company) as well as for the Sydney Theatre Company, the Melbourne Theatre Company, the Australian Opera, Kookaburra and the Production Company in Melbourne. Highlights of his choreographic career include Jerry’s Girls, Grease – the Arena Spectacular, Funny Girl, Bye Bye Birdie, Sweet Charity, The Rocky Horror Show, Side by Side with Sondheim, The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, Cabaret, Shout!, Dusty (Helpmann award 2006), Sweet Charity, Hedwig and the Angry Inch, and his own versions of three Bob Fosse musicals- Chicago, Pippin and How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying. His expression of Australian idiom through his choreography was perhaps most successfully demonstrated in Priscilla - Queen of the Desert.

Coleman also received international acclaim. Career highlights included High Society (UK tour), The Demon (Bregenzerfestspiel, Austria and Zurich Opernhaus), The Merry Widow (Metropole Theatre and Friedrichstaadtplast, Berlin, St Petersburg Music Hall) and Pomp, Duck and Circumstance (Berlin and New York).

Bibliography:

Note: Programs for most productions featuring Ross Coleman's choreography are held in the National Library of Australia's PROMPT collection. Material is housed under the name of the company involved, eg Sydney Theatre Company, or under the name of the production, eg Dusty.

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