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The Most Famous

DANCERS from United Kingdom

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This page contains a list of the greatest British Dancers. The pantheon dataset contains 76 Dancers, 6 of which were born in United Kingdom. This makes United Kingdom the birth place of the 6th most number of Dancers behind Italy and India.

Top 6

The following people are considered by Pantheon to be the most legendary British Dancers of all time. This list of famous British Dancers is sorted by HPI (Historical Popularity Index), a metric that aggregates information on a biography’s online popularity.

Photo of Margot Fonteyn

1. Margot Fonteyn (1919 - 1991)

With an HPI of 66.30, Margot Fonteyn is the most famous British Dancer.  Her biography has been translated into 53 different languages on wikipedia.

Dame Margaret Evelyn de Arias DBE (née Hookham; 18 May 1919 – 21 February 1991), known by the stage name Margot Fonteyn, was an English ballerina. She spent her entire career as a dancer with the Royal Ballet (formerly the Sadler's Wells Theatre Company), eventually being appointed prima ballerina assoluta of the company by Queen Elizabeth II. Beginning ballet lessons at the age of four, she studied in England and China, where her father was transferred for his work. Her training in Shanghai was with Russian expatriate dancer Georgy Goncharov, contributing to her continuing interest in Russian ballet. Returning to London at the age of 14, she was invited to join the Vic-Wells Ballet School by Ninette de Valois. She succeeded Alicia Markova as prima ballerina of the company in 1935. The Vic-Wells choreographer, Sir Frederick Ashton, wrote numerous parts for Fonteyn and her partner, Robert Helpmann, with whom she danced from the 1930s to the 1940s. In 1946, the company, now renamed the Sadler's Wells Ballet, moved into the Royal Opera House at Covent Garden where Fonteyn's most frequent partner throughout the next decade was Michael Somes. Her performance in Tchaikovsky's The Sleeping Beauty became a distinguishing role for both Fonteyn and the company, but she was also well known for the ballets created by Ashton, including Symphonic Variations, Cinderella, Daphnis and Chloe, Ondine and Sylvia. In 1949, she led the company in a tour of the United States and became an international celebrity. Before and after the Second World War, Fonteyn performed in televised broadcasts of ballet performances in Britain and in the early 1950s appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show, consequently increasing the popularity of dance in the United States. In 1955, she married the Panamanian politician Roberto Arias and appeared in a live colour production of The Sleeping Beauty aired on NBC. Three years later, she and Somes danced for the BBC television adaptation of The Nutcracker. Thanks to her international acclaim and many guest artist requests, the Royal Ballet allowed Fonteyn to become a freelance dancer in 1959. In 1961, when Fonteyn was considering retirement, Rudolf Nureyev defected from the Kirov Ballet while dancing in Paris. Fonteyn, though reluctant to partner with him because of their 19-year age difference, danced with him in his début with the Royal Ballet in Giselle on 21 February 1962. The duo immediately became an international sensation, each dancer pushing the other to their best performances. They were most noted for their classical performances in works such as Le Corsaire Pas de Deux, Les Sylphides, La Bayadère, Swan Lake, and Raymonda, in which Nureyev sometimes adapted choreographies specifically to showcase their talents. The pair premièred Ashton's Marguerite and Armand, which had been choreographed specifically for them, and were noted for their performance in the title roles of Sir Kenneth MacMillan's Romeo and Juliet. The following year, Fonteyn's husband was shot during an assassination attempt and became a quadriplegic, requiring constant care for the remainder of his life. In 1972, Fonteyn went into semi-retirement, although she continued to dance periodically until the end of the decade. In 1979, she was fêted by the Royal Ballet and officially pronounced the prima ballerina assoluta of the company. She retired to Panama, where she spent her time writing books, raising cattle, and caring for her husband. She died from ovarian cancer exactly 29 years after her premiere with Nureyev in Giselle.

Photo of Lindsay Kemp

2. Lindsay Kemp (1938 - 2018)

With an HPI of 51.36, Lindsay Kemp is the 2nd most famous British Dancer.  His biography has been translated into 20 different languages.

Lindsay Keith Kemp (3 May 1938 – 24 August 2018) was a British dancer, actor, teacher, mime artist, and choreographer.He was probably best known for his 1974 flagship production of Flowers, a mime and music show based on Jean Genet's novel Our Lady of the Flowers, in which he played the lead role of 'Divine'. Owing to its homosexual themes and perceived decadence, reviews were sometimes hostile, but it was widely considered a theatrical and sensory sensation, and it toured globally for many years. He was also a mentor to David Bowie and Kate Bush.

Photo of Alicia Markova

3. Alicia Markova (1910 - 2004)

With an HPI of 49.19, Alicia Markova is the 3rd most famous British Dancer.  Her biography has been translated into 22 different languages.

Dame Alicia Markova DBE (1 December 1910 – 2 December 2004) was a British ballerina and a choreographer, director and teacher of classical ballet. Most noted for her career with Sergei Diaghilev's Ballets Russes and touring internationally, she was widely considered to be one of the greatest classical ballet dancers of the twentieth century. She was the first British dancer to become the principal dancer of a ballet company and, with Dame Margot Fonteyn, is one of only two English dancers to be recognised as a prima ballerina assoluta. Markova was a founder dancer of the Rambert Dance Company, The Royal Ballet and American Ballet Theatre, and was co-founder and director of the English National Ballet.

Photo of Kenneth MacMillan

4. Kenneth MacMillan (1929 - 1992)

With an HPI of 48.21, Kenneth MacMillan is the 4th most famous British Dancer.  His biography has been translated into 17 different languages.

Sir Kenneth MacMillan (11 December 1929 – 29 October 1992) was a British ballet dancer and choreographer who was artistic director of the Royal Ballet in London between 1970 and 1977, and its principal choreographer from 1977 until his death. Earlier he had served as director of ballet for the Deutsche Oper in Berlin. He was also associate director of the American Ballet Theatre from 1984 to 1989, and artistic associate of the Houston Ballet from 1989 to 1992. From a family with no background of dance or music, MacMillan was determined from an early age to become a dancer. The director of Sadler's Wells Ballet, Ninette de Valois, accepted him as a student and then a member of her company. In the late 1940s, MacMillan built a successful career as a dancer, but, plagued by stage fright, he abandoned it while still in his twenties. After this he worked entirely as a choreographer; he created ten full-length ballets and more than fifty one-act pieces. In addition to his work for ballet companies he was active in television, musicals, non-musical drama, and opera. Although he is mainly associated with the Royal Ballet, MacMillan frequently considered himself an outsider there and felt driven to work with other companies throughout his career as choreographer. His creations for the Stuttgart Ballet and the Deutsche Opera ballet include some of his most frequently revived works.

Photo of Antony Tudor

5. Antony Tudor (1908 - 1987)

With an HPI of 40.76, Antony Tudor is the 5th most famous British Dancer.  His biography has been translated into 15 different languages.

Antony Tudor (born William Cook; 4 April 1908 – 19 April 1987) was an English ballet choreographer, teacher and dancer. He founded the London Ballet, and later the Philadelphia Ballet Guild in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S., in the mid-1950s.

Photo of Darcey Bussell

6. Darcey Bussell (1969 - )

With an HPI of 28.32, Darcey Bussell is the 6th most famous British Dancer.  Her biography has been translated into 16 different languages.

Dame Darcey Andrea Bussell, (born Marnie Mercedes Darcey Pemberton Crittle; (27 April 1969) is a retired English ballerina and a former judge on the BBC television dance contest Strictly Come Dancing. Trained at the Arts Educational School and the Royal Ballet School, Bussell began her professional career at Sadlers Wells Royal Ballet. In 1989, at the age of 20, she moved to The Royal Ballet, where she became the youngest-ever principal dancer.Bussell remained with The Royal Ballet for her entire career, more than two decades. She however performed as a guest artist with many companies including the New York City Ballet, La Scala Theatre Ballet, the Kirov Ballet, Hamburg Ballet and the Australian Ballet. She retired from ballet in 2007.

Pantheon has 6 people classified as dancers born between 1908 and 1969. Of these 6, 1 (16.67%) of them are still alive today. The most famous living dancers include Darcey Bussell. The most famous deceased dancers include Margot Fonteyn, Lindsay Kemp, and Alicia Markova. As of April 2022, 2 new dancers have been added to Pantheon including Antony Tudor and Darcey Bussell.

Living Dancers

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Deceased Dancers

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Newly Added Dancers (2022)

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Which Dancers were alive at the same time? This visualization shows the lifespans of the 5 most globally memorable Dancers since 1700.