Geraldine Stephenson, who has died aged 92, was a dancer, choreographer, movement director and teacher on more than 150 films and television programmes and more than 200 stage productions. Her work was characterised by its immense range: from productions by young people to historical pageants and serious drama, with routines for The Two Ronnies along the way.
In a typical year she would be involved in four or five TV and film productions, and as many more for stage. She worked closely with a number of BBC directors, including Jane Howell on her productions of Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale (1982), Henry VI Parts 1–3 and Richard III (both 1983), and her former pupil David Giles on Vanity Fair (1967), Sense and Sensibility (1971) and Mansfield Park (1982).
She choreographed dance and movement for some of the BBC’s landmark costume dramas such as War and Peace (1972), and classic series including The Pallisers (1974), Poldark (1975) and The House of Elliot (1991-93). Her film credits include Stanley Kubrick’s period piece Barry Lyndon (1975) and Notting Hill (1999). Geraldine also worked regularly with the National Theatre, the Royal Shakespeare Company, Regent’s Park Open Air theatre and the Chichester Festival theatre – indeed, her stage career involved most of the major theatres across London and England. She enjoyed long professional relationships with the actors Edward Petherbridge and Maureen Lipman, notably with the latter on her portrait of Joyce Grenfell, Re-Joyce, for both stage and television.
Geraldine became an expert in period dance and movement, a fund of knowledge on which many television and stage directors drew. She was one of the select group who had studied with the charismatic pioneer of modern dance, Rudolf Laban, and during the early years of her career she also developed Laban’s idea of movement choirs, creating huge pageants in venues ranging from Llandaff Cathedral to the Royal Albert Hall, where she worked with 1,000 girl guides.
She was born in Hull, daughter of Eleanor (nee Quibell) and Gordon Stephenson. Her father owned a building company that built the greater part of the University of Hull. On leaving Newland school for girls in the city, Geraldine studied physiotherapy at Bedford College of Physical Education. One of her teachers there, Joan Goodrich, had connections with Laban, and after Geraldine took part in the inaugural gathering of the Laban Guild, in Sheffield in 1946, she went to study at his Art of Movement Studio in Manchester. Among her fellow students were Warren Lamb, Marion North and Valerie Preston-Dunlop, all of whom continued and developed Laban’s work.
Her nascent career might have ended when she found herself unable to pay her second-year tuition fees, but by working for the studio as a pianist and physical trainer she was able to carry on. By 1948 she was working closely enough with Laban to travel once a week with him to Bradford, where he taught a class at Esmée Church’s Northern theatre school, whose students included Giles, Petherbridge and another future notable actor, Tom Bell.
Her first major engagement, in 1951, came directly through Laban. He was offered the job of movement director for E Martin Browne’s revival of the York Mystery Plays but passed it on to Geraldine. Her role was crucial in turning what might have been no more than a worthy literary experiment into visually arresting and emotionally engaging theatre.
Geraldine’s work was twofold, creating large set-pieces such as the fall of the angels from heaven (she used a set of stairs), and also helping actors find movement qualities for their characters – be it the simple gravity of Christ carrying the cross or the unpredictable capers of Lucifer. She was invited back for the 1954 revival.
By then her solo performance career was under way, having begun in 1950 with her first dance recital, which consisted of danced and mimed character pieces. In subsequent recitals she often worked with the pianist and performer John Dalby.
Geraldine was a pioneer of what is now called independent dance, creating and touring her own dance-theatre pieces; in 1954 her enterprise extended to hiring and filling the Park Lane theatre in London, while a 1956 programme called Centuries in Dance consisted of dances from the middle ages to the 19th century.
In 1953 the Art of Movement Studio moved from Manchester to Addlestone in Surrey. Geraldine missed “the bright lights and the big city”, as she put it, and she gradually reduced her teaching at the studio as her career on stage and television gathered momentum. Her CV lists 163 credits as choreographer or movement director in films and TV between 1956 and 2000.
Her final professional stage show was in 2004, the 28th Johann Strauss Gala produced by Raymond Gubbay between Christmas and New Year at the Royal Festival Hall and the Fairfield Halls, Croydon.
Geraldine is survived by her nephews, Jeremy and Nigel.
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