Press Release

Jerome Robbins's Personal Archives Bequeathed to The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts

New York City, April 12, 1999 -- Jerome Robbins, the legendary choreographer, director, and producer, who died on July 29, 1998 at age 79, has left his personal archives to The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, where they will become part of the Dance Collection. An announcement of the gift of the Jerome Robbins Collection was made by Library President Paul LeClerc at Broadway Celebrates Jerome Robbins, a memorial tribute held on April 12, 1999 at Broadway's Majestic Theatre.

"Jerry Robbins was one of the great American artists of the past half century. He was also one of the best friends of The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. We are deeply honored to receive his collections," said Dr. LeClerc. "This remarkable archive of primary resource materials includes a number of Mr. Robbins's books, photographs, videos, and artwork; all of his manuscripts, scrapbooks, notes, scripts, and business correspondence relating to his publicly produced plays and ballets; and his personal journals, diaries, private letters, and notes pertaining to unproduced ballets and stage productions. This is, without doubt, a stunningly important gift to the Library and to the performing arts community that we serve."

The Jerome Robbins Collection, which joins those given to the Library by Ted Shawn, Lincoln Kirstein, Agnes de Mille, and other great American artists, will be catalogued and preserved by the Library's Dance Collection over the next two years. Then, most of the collection will be made available for study in the renovated New York Public Library for the Performing Arts housed in the Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center at Lincoln Center. Mr. Robbins's personal journals, private letters, and notes pertaining to unproduced ballets and stage productions will be retained by the Library on a completely restricted and confidential basis for 13 to 15 years in accordance with the terms of Robbins's bequest.

A Long History of Support
Jerome Robbins had a long history of supporting The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. In 1964, the Library established a film and video archive of dance with an endowment set up by Robbins using a percentage of his royalties from Fiddler on the Roof, which he choreographed and directed on Broadway. With his help and financial support, the Jerome Robbins Archive of the Recorded Moving Image has become one of the largest specialized film collections in the United States. "Mr. Robbins had a vision of a shared, comprehensive resource for the needs of dancers and choreographers, to include every style and form of dance," said Madeleine Nichols, curator of the Library's Dance Collection. "Today, film and video viewing accounts for fifty percent of the use of the Dance Collection."

"Throughout the past three decades, countless discoveries at The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts have affected the development of important performances or reshaped traditional historical views," said William Walker, Andrew W. Mellon Director of The New York Public Library's Research Libraries. "The Jerome Robbins Collection will provide invaluable insight into some of the 20th century's most important works of theatre and ballet for generations to come."

About the Collection
The Collection includes over 100 boxes of materials and over thirty file drawers filled with contracts, correspondence, casting sheets, royalty statements, schedules, tour information, and more. His ballet files range in subject from Afternoon of a Faun to the Zurich Ballet. The more than 50 files on Fiddler on the Roof alone include such subjects as auditions, royalties, CPA reports, the motion picture, the German language recording, stock and amateur productions, and productions in Argentina, Australia, Czechoslovakia, England, Finland, France, Japan, Mexico, South Africa, and the former Soviet Union, among others.

Stage and costume designs, awards, posters, and artwork provide poignant reminders of a career filled with extraordinary highlights. These items include a 1957 costume design for Maria from West Side Story inscribed to Robbins by designer Irene Sharaff; Robbins's own costume sketches for Goldberg Variations, Dumbarton Oaks, and The Dybbuk; the set design by Oliver Smith for Fancy Free, Robbins's first work for a ballet company; Robbins's Emmy Award from 1955 for Best Single Program of the Year, honoring his production of Peter Pan; and a letter from Jacqueline Kennedy dated April 13, 1962, noting, "the President and I felt [your program] was one of the most pleasant and distinguished evenings we will ever have in the White House."

The Collection provides a rare glimpse at the inner workings of Robbins's creative process. One of his sketch books, for example, includes a page of sketches (ca. 1969/70) which Robbins drew to work out his thoughts about his ballet Goldberg Variations while his leg was in cast. On the back of the page he wrote: "These aren't choreography -- or floor patterns -- just doodles to help me feel out or parse out my own impulses to the music because I can't get up and do them myself. The final dance will contain some of the essences of what they mean to me -- but I doubt if they'd make any sense to anyone else."

Correspondence to and from Robbins often provides humorous insight into his professional relationships. After a trip to England in 1967 with lyricist Sheldon Harnick to brush up the London production of Fiddler on the Roof, composer Jerry Bock wrote to Robbins: "The show, over all, is in damn good shape....and they all seem happy to have some American Jews qvetching." In 1982, Irving Berlin sent Robbins an oil portrait with a note stating: "I started painting but quickly discovered that as a painter I was still a pretty good songwriter....Occasionally, I wind up with a face that resembles one of my friends....This gives me a chance, Jerry, to tell you that I often walk down what songwriters call 'memory lane' and among the happiest memories are 'Call Me Madam' and 'Miss Liberty.'" Mr. Robbins choreographed those two Irving Berlin musicals.

From One Dance Genius to Another
As innovative and influential as he was, Robbins was not above writing a fan letter of his own. In August 1974, he wrote to Fred Astaire: "This is a big fan letter and it is really just part of a continuity of enormous admiration I've had for you and your work spanning the years from ‘Flying Down to Rio' to today....The pure artistry, the sense of delight and exhilaration, plus the true thrilling quality of your work has lifted me up on a beautiful high for days. But even more was the confirmation of something I've always felt and that is how deeply influential and inspiring to my own career and work you have been. Well -- this is to thank you...for the things you have given us, -- the beautiful gift of joy, the belief that living is lovely, and that man is good."

The Jerome Robbins Collection includes his personal journals in 24 Japanese notebook volumes, with entries dating from October 25, 1971 to February 3, 1982. These are among the items that will be embargoed from public view for 13 to 15 years as directed in Mr. Robbins's will. "These are indeed treasured materials, as precious as Nijinsky's diary," said Madeleine Nichols, curator of the Dance Collection. "We are pleased that they will be part of the legacy of dance here for future generations."

The Jerome Robbins Collection was complemented by a generous gift of related materials to The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts by Mr. Robbins's friend Dr. Daniel Stern.

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The Lincoln Center facility of The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts is being transformed through a 2-year, $30 million renovation. During the renovation the Circulating Collections are available at The Mid-Manhattan Library, Fifth Avenue and 40th Street; the Research Collections are available at the Library Annex, 521 West 43rd Street, between 10th and 11th Avenues; and public programs are held at The Great Hall, Cooper Union, 7th Street at Third Avenue.

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