Wayne Eagling

Wayne Eagling (born 27 November 1950) is a Canadian ballet dancer, now retired. After more than twenty years as a popular member of The Royal Ballet in London, he became well known as an international choreographer and company director.

Wayne John Eagling was born in Montréal, Québec, to Anglophone parents, Edward and Thelma Eagling. He spent much of his childhood and youth in California, where his family had moved. As a boy, he augmented his academic studies by attending classes at the Patricia Ramsey Studio of Dance Arts. There, he developed into a gifted student of classical ballet and, as he matured, was encouraged by his teachers to pursue a career as a professional dancer. In 1965, when he was 15, he was noticed by Michael Somes and Gerd Larsen of the Royal Ballet during the company's tour of the United States and was offered a place at the Royal Ballet School in London. He moved to England in the late 1960s, when "swinging London," the vibrant cultural phenomenon of fashion, popular music, and entertainment, was at its peak. Eagling resisted its allure, however, and remained a devoted student of classical ballet and related arts. A strapping young man, he was invited to join The Royal Ballet in 1969, when he was only 18.

Eagling proved to be a valuable addition to the company. A supple and powerful dancer, he was promoted to soloist in 1972 and to principal dancer in 1975. As the product of "an eclectic training with a mix of lots of different methods," he was exceptionally versatile. He performed the leading roles of princes, gallants, and swains in the nineteenth-century classics—partnering such luminaries as Margot Fonteyn, Jennifer Penney, and Merle Park—but he was best known for his work in the twentieth-century repertory. A favorite of renowned British choreographer Kenneth MacMillan, he created roles in a number of his works, including Elite Syncopations, a suite of ragtime dances, and Gloria, an elegiac work about the futility of war. He danced the role of Crown Prince Rudolf in the New York premiere of MacMillan's Mayerling in April 1983. He also danced in ballets by Frederick Ashton, George Balanchine, Jerome Robbins, and Rudolf Nureyev, among others. He was especially admired as Balanchine's Apollo, as Woyzeck in MacMillan's Different Drummer, and as the Chosen One in Glen Tetley's The Rite of Spring, the first male dancer to undertake that dramatic role. While still active as a principal dancer, Eagling began to take part in choreographic workshops sponsored by the Royal Ballet. His first work for the company was Frankenstein, the Modern Prometheus, made in 1984. Other works soon followed, mounted for his home company and for companies abroad.

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