Verdon, Gwyneth Evelyn

▪ 2001

“Gwen” 

      American dancer and actress (b. Jan. 13, 1925, Culver City, Calif.—d. Oct. 18, 2000, Woodstock, Vt.), was the quintessential stage musical star, considered by many to have been the best Broadway dancer ever. She was highly regarded not only for her dancing but also for the depth she brought to the characters she portrayed, and she was especially noted for her collaboration with choreographer Bob Fosse in his innovative works. Verdon's mother had been a dancer, and Verdon began studying dance when she was a young child, partially as a means of strengthening her illness-weakened legs. By age six she was performing as “the fastest little tapper in the world.” She began dancing in a repertory company at age 15 and in a nightclub the following year, but she married at 17 and gave up dancing until the marriage ended five years later. Verdon made her musical-comedy debut in Bonanza Bound (1947), which closed before reaching Broadway. Her Broadway debut came in 1950 in Alive and Kicking, and she began appearing in specialty dance numbers in films, including On the Riviera (1951), as well as coaching film stars in movement. She returned to Broadway in 1953 to be a featured dancer in Can-Can, stopped the show with a dazzling performance of her biggest number, and won her first Tony Award. In 1955 Verdon began her association with Fosse when she was given her first starring role, the Devil's temptress assistant Lola, in Damn Yankees, for which she won another Tony. She also played that role in the show's 1958 film adaptation. Her next stage musicals were New Girl in Town (1957), for which she was co-winner of a Tony, and Redhead (1959), which garnered her a fourth Tony; both shows featured Fosse choreography, and he also directed the latter. Verdon and Fosse were married in 1960, and not until 1966—in Sweet Charity—did she return to the stage. Verdon and Fosse separated in 1971 but never divorced, and they remained friends and collaborators until his death in 1987. They worked together on her next Broadway hit, Chicago (1975)—in which Verdon's character was one she had long wanted to portray, Roxie Hart—and on Fosse's musical Dancin' (1978), film All That Jazz (1979), and revival of Sweet Charity (1987). After ending her dancing career, Verdon concentrated on acting; she appeared on television in numerous series and in the made-for-TV film Legs (1983) and in such motion pictures as The Cotton Club (1984), the two Cocoon movies (1985 and 1988), and Alice (1990). In 1999 she served as artistic adviser for the retrospective Fosse.

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