GILLIAN LYNNE ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR / CHOREOGRAPHER

Gillian Lynne was a leading soloist with Sadler's Wells Ballet, the star dancer at the Palladium, played opposite Errol Flynn in the movies and danced with all the greats on TV. She became instrumental in the development of jazz dance in Britain and her distinctive style 'a fusion of classical and jazz ' led to her groundbreaking work on Cats, which was recognised with a new category of Olivier Award, specially created for her to acknowledge Outstanding Achievement of the Year in a Musical. Gillian's fifty-plus Broadway and West End shows include Tonight at Eight, Once Upon a Time, The Match Girls, Tomfoolery, Jeeves Takes Charge, Cabaret, The Roar of the Greasepaint, Pickwick, How Now Dow Jones, Collages, The Ambassador, The Card, Phil the Fluter, Hans Christian Andersen, The Yeomen of the Guard, My Fair Lady, Songbook, Dick Whittington and The Phantom of the Opera. For the Royal Shakespeare Company The Boy Friend, A Midsummer Night's Dream, The Comedy of Errors, The Way of the World, As You Like It, Once in a Lifetime and The Secret Garden. Gillian's opera productions include The Trojans, The Midsummer Marriage, The Flying Dutchman, Parsifal and Bluebeard. Among Gillian's ballets are Lippizaner, The Bront‘s and Journey for the Bolshoi. On television, Gillian has directed The Various Ends of Mrs F's Friends, Easy Money, The Look of Love, Le Morte d'Arthur, which won the Samuel G Engel Award in America, and A Simple Man, which won the 1987 BAFTA. She staged many of The Muppet Shows for ATV and her 11 feature films include Half a Sixpence, Man of La Mancha and Yentl. She was awarded the Austrian Silver Order of Merit for her production of Cats in Vienna, a Moliere award for Cats in Paris, and in 2001 she was honoured by the Royal Academy of Dance with the Queen Elizabeth II Coronation Award. Her latest production is Chitty Chitty Bang Bang at the London Palladium. Gillian was awarded the CBE in 1997.
For further information: www.gillianlynne.com