Death and dancing in 1936 through Adelaide's welcoming waltz: the Ballets Russes special South Australia season
Ballets Russes dancer Madeleine Parker (a.k.a. Mira Dimina) collapsed on stage during the company's 1936 Adelaide season at the Theatre Royal in Hindley Street, Adelaide city. She died of leukaemia six weeks later and was buried at Adelaide's West Terrace cemetery. Adelaide turned on a social whirl to win over ensemble members such as dancer Betty Scorer (stage name: Elisabeth Souvorova), top centre, and author and critic Arnold Haskell, top right. Adelaide's unscheduled season was given the go ahead by J. C. Williamson managers E. J. Tait (pictured bottom right with dancer Hélène Kirsova) and his brother.
Including images courtesy National Library of Australia
The grave at Adelaide’s West Terrace cemetery of American ballerina Madeleine Parker (stage name: Mira Dimina) was a permanent memorial of the momentous visit by Colonel de Basil’s Monte Carlo Balletes Russes to South Australia in 1936, its centenary year of European settlement.
The Ballets Russes visit, with its record three-week season at the Theatre Royal in Hindley Street, Adelaide city, had other long-lasting effects, not least the unprecedented financial support from the South Australian government to entice the company otherwise bypassing Adelaide. The other big challenge for Adelaide was winning over the Balletes Russes ensemble during its unscheduled visit.
Author and critic Arnold Haskell, with the ensemble, had a rapid change of attitude towards Adelaide: “On the very first morning I was disgusted and felt like taking the next boat home, by the afternoon I wished never to leave.” In his later book, Waltzing Matilda, Haskell said his initial dire impression of Adelaide was coloured by the Outer Harbour passenger terminus “as drab as anything I had feared and imagined” and a “forbidding” train trip from the port to Adelaide city. What a turned Haskell's opinion was lunch with “my first Australian family”, the Gosses, who greeted him and took him on a picnic to scenic Mount Lofty. The ballet company excited Adelaide's society matrons into turning on a whirl of activity.
One dancer, another American Betty Scorer (stage name: Elisabeth Souvorova) was harder to impress. In a letter to “Mummy” from Powell's Kalgoorlie Hotel in Hindley Street, she described how the company was “met with flowers and acclamation at the boat by all the theatre direction & batteries of cameras ... It appears that we are in Australia under a government guarantee, a state of affairs apparently quite without precedent - the Government of Adelaide (sic) alone have bought 500 seats, so there is no possible chance of failure!” She described Adelaide as “quite a pleasant town – very provincial & ugly really – but full of trees and flowers, & with a lovely park ... All the people are frightful, tho very friendly and hospitable.”
Scorer later described how “last Sunday we drove out to the seaside to the country house of some very nice people called Morris – the wife who is about 28 was on the stage in England for some years – she was called Dulcie Davenport ... beautiful sand dunes & lovely surf to bathe in – but there was an icy wind, only Alyosha (another dancer) was Spartan enough to bathe. We have been to several parties at private houses – all the people are alike & all deadly bores – only one Russian doctor is charming – he is giving another big party on Saturday for some of us.”
Adelaide became attuned to Russian names and accents although one newspaper reported that, at the end of opening night, “Colonel de Basil” had thanked the state premier Richard Layton Butler for his support. But it was more likely to be J.C. Williamson manager E.J. Tait as de Basil wasn’t on the tour.
American ballerina Madeleine Parker (Mira Dimin) complained of headaches during her opening night performance. A few nights later she collapsed on stage and was rushed to Ru Rua private hospital and diagnosed with leukaemia. She died six weeks later. South Australia people raised money in her memory and donated it to the Adelaide Children’s Hospital that used it to buy a cot. Balletes Russes dancers visited Parkers’ grave at West terrace cemetery on their return visit to Adelaide in July 1937. They were photographed with the hospital cot and its then occupant Loureen Day.
In otherwise glowing reviews of the Balletes Russes season, Adelaide critic Hooper Brewster Jones was concerned at the orchestra’s standard and size. He would have been enraged during the company’s return visit in 1937 to read that a Leonard Dyett had been fined £3, with £1 costs, for having “unlawfully played a musical instrument in Rundle Street, City”. The orchestra generally improved in 1937, although Brewster Jones was still concerned at its size.
