Norman Maen

Norman Maen (1932 – 22 April 2008, born "Norman Maternaghan") was a director and choreographer.

Maen was born in Ballymena, Northern Ireland and began his career working as a dancer in an Irish dance group. He qualified as a teacher after successfully completing his studies at Ballymena Academy and Stranmillis College, Belfast.

After qualifying in teaching, he moved to Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada where he worked with the Alan Lund Dancers on a weekly television series which starred Robert Goulet. Later, he went on to Broadway as a principal dancer for Jack Cole. Soon after, he returned to Ireland to become the station choreographer for RTE for three years. In 1963, he hired eight dancers to become The Norman Maen Dancers and invited television and theatre producers to an audition in London where he was offered four different offers. One of these led to his involvement with the television series This is Tom Jones for four series where he worked with celebrities such as Liza Minnelli and Juliet Prowse and won his Emmy award. He is most remembered for his Swine Lake sequence on The Muppet Show which featured Rudolf Nureyev dancing with a giant pig. During this series he worked with Minnelli and Prowse again as well as numerous others including Julie Andrews, Gene Kelly and Ethel Merman.

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