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| Brian Blades Jean Sargeant
Friday October 10, 2003
The Guardian
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When
the dancer and actor Brian Blades, who
has died aged 84, won the all-England
stage dancing championship as a
14-year-old, he beat into second place a
Miss Peggy Hookham, better known later as
Dame Margot Fonteyn. He had taken dancing
and drama lessons from an early age at
the studio school of dance and dramatic
art in Liverpool, initially because
dancing was considered good exercise for
a delicate child.
Born into a middle-class family in
Prescot, Lancashire, Brian was educated
at Prescot grammar school. In his first
professional appearance, aged 13, he
danced in The Miracle, starring Diana
Manners (Lady Diana Duff Cooper). He also
took child parts at the Liverpool
Playhouse, at a time when Michael
Redgrave and Rachel Kempson were in the
company. In London, he appeared in a
revival of The Geisha (Garrick, 1934) and
in André Charlot's 1936 Sleeping Beauty
at the Vaudeville. He also danced at
Glyndebourne and Covent Garden. When the
second world war broke out, Brian joined
the Northumberland Fusiliers and served
in the north African desert. His love of
acting once led him to evade an officers'
training course in favour of an army
revue. "You're a soldier first and
an actor second," his commanding
officer rebuked him. After the war, he
returned to the theatre, where his
versatility meant he was never short of
work, whether in West End revues such as
Oranges And Lemons (Globe, 1948) or
acting in musicals, including Noël
Coward's Ace of Clubs (Cambridge, 1950).
In 1957, he joined the cast of The Boy
Friend, playing Percival Browne for the
latter part of the run at Wyndham's. He
also danced in films choreographed by
Agnes de Mille, Michael Kidd and Jack
Cole, among which were Where's Charlie
(1952) and Gentlemen Marry Brunettes
(1955). His versatility also meant he
became a choreographer and writer, when
he worked in the 1960s at the Players
Theatre, which specialised in Victorian
music hall. Then, aged nearly 50, Brian
decided on a complete career change, and
moved to a more secure job at the Bank of
England, where he worked in the economic
intelligence department until his
retirement in 1984. But he did not let
his theatrical skills go rusty. He wrote
a musical, Music Hall 1870, for the 1970
Thomas Becket festival in Canterbury. At
the age of 76, he performed in 50 Years
Of The British Musical, during the 1995
VE-Day commemorations at Hyde Park.
Brian's other commitments included strong
support for the Labour party. He liked to
recall that in prewar days, the Tory MP
Thelma Cazalet had engaged him to teach
her how to tap-dance; but when she
suggested a duet tap dance in front of
the then prime minister Neville
Chamberlain, Brian politely declined. He
is survived by his brother and sister,
and two nephews. · |
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| Brian
Blades, actor and dancer, born July 15
1919; died August 4 2003 |
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