Dancing through the war
My name is Angela Redgrave and I was born in Church End Finchley, London on the 21 September 1917.
I was born in a boy’s college that my father was running at the time, he was actually a minister in the Church of England. About five years later we moved out to Watford where I did most of my growing up.
I had an ambition to perform from a very early age and wanted to perform, either sing, dance or act. In those days there weren’t the opportunities we have these days such as a prolific amount of dance schools, colleges and musical theatre schools.
So it really was quite late in my life; I was about 10 when a girl joined my school called Molly Wood who was obviously training in ballet. I was absolutely fascinated by this, I watched every move she made, whether during a concert at the school or when she was showing the teachers. I was so pleased when after doing a little dance show for some of the parents, one of them said, “Do you go to the same school as Molly Wood, because you are doing the same steps”.
I was delighted.
Eventually my father realised that he had to do something about this and so I was enrolled into the Watford Academy of Dancing. I must have had a very good teacher who was very technical in every way. I stayed there for quite a few years taking most of my examinations.
London
When I was 16 I transferred to what was then regarded as the leading London performing arts school. It was run by Miss Euphen Maclaren who was a member of the Pavlova Company.
I was there for quite a time, we learned all types of dance, mainly classical ballet but also what we called musical dance in those days, and tap and all that type of dancing that I really loved.
I did take my examinations with the ISTD and achieved my Licentiate in four or five subjects. During that time we also did quite a few auditions in London and I got into various London shows, mainly pantomime and of course the one really big production of the year; the wonderful Hiawatha at the Royal Albert Hall. A musical that is now too expensive to stage. We had Sir Malcolm Sargent playing the music, what more could I have asked for? I do believe that on one of the occasions this was staged, Miss Phyllis Bedells was the principal dancer.
The war
But then came World War II and everything changed. I worked and danced through some pretty hair raising experiences as I was living in London, and had to regularly dodge air raids, running as fast as I could into the nearest underground station.
I was nearly 22 when the war started, having finished all my training in ballet, tap, modern and musical theatre, and I was starting to look for a job. I hoped it would be in ballet, but unfortunately at that period there were not many opportunities so I auditioned for musical theatre type shows.
I got a job in a summer show and thought to myself that I might as well try that to start with, and the plan was to travel down to Teignmouth where the show was due to run for the entire summer season. We had just arrived there and were all meeting in a pub to be given further instruction, and then the company manager came in and said, “Wait everyone, Churchill is going to make an announcement”.
We sat about waiting, having a drink, and finally at 11 o’clock the announcement came: “We are now at war with Germany”.
Well of course that changed and finished everything, and all the plans for a summer season in Teignmouth, and we all had to travel back up to London. No work, no theatres, no training.
ENSA
Then ENSA: Entertainments National Service Association started up. I don’t know how I heard about it but some of us went along to the Theatre Royal Drury Lane stage door, where we had to be interviewed to see what talent you had and could offer to their shows.
So we registered, and there was a very pleasant elderly actress, whose name I cannot remember, told us that there was a lady auditioning girls for groups who would be entertaining the troops in various camps in England, so we all went along in a bunch to see her. She wanted tall girls who could execute really high kicks. I had very supple legs and hips in those days and could kick well above my head. I was chosen to be part of this group, and I eventually found out that I was to be a Tiller Girl.
I enjoyed my time very much. We actually worked in big theatres as we were a very long line of girls, everything was excellent, good stages, good dressing rooms, lovely meals after the show. I remember sitting next to the Crown Prince of Denmark on one occasion.
The dancing was of a very good standard, and I was the ‘end of the line’ girl: my job was to keep the line perfectly straight and to turn it round on windmills. It was lovely, we finished with the Can Can. I do remember one of the girls who, shall we say, was a lot older than the rest of the girls, and really struggled with the endless kicks. Just before the final split she invented a code to put a halt to everything, and so after about six really high kicks she’d say “right” and we’d all immediately drop down into the jump splits.
A soubrette
After about 10 months we were recalled to Drury Lane and were interviewed again to start a smaller show.
These were very small units of about seven to eight people, and were made up of comedians, male and female singers, a speciality act such as a juggler. and a soubrette. I was cast as the soubrette (female singer/dancer/actress).
This was a very different form of dancing and entertainment.
The stage was at the back of an army hut, made up from a few planks on top of blocks of wood. Impossible for ballet. They were small army units way out in the country, or it could be a munitions factory or even a field hospital. No dressing room facilities at all. You just had a curtained off section at the side of the stage.
Boys were one side, girls the other. Boys could get out to use the toilet facilities, but the girls were stuck the other side with no toilet facilities. We would be brought a pail of water at the end of the show so that we could wash off all our heavy stage make up. We never told the boys, but it actually became extremely useful to us girls for other reasons than washing, before it was taken to the boys for their ablutions. One of the girls mentioned that we should look at the boys’ complexions the next morning at breakfast and we all had a giggle saying that they had skin as smooth as silk from the ‘magic’ water.
The following day we joined the transport at Drury Lane, an open backed lorry. We were driven way out into the country, and finally after a lot of twisting and turning we finally came to a standstill. A young officer came through the back drapes and said “Here we are boys and girls, this is your stage”, so we found that the lorry turned into our communal dressing room, the drapes at the back of the lorry opened and we found we were on a stage.
Dancing among the bombs
I do remember one fateful night when our unit joined the coach at Drury Lane and we were driven down to Docklands in the East End of London. The most bombed area in London. We were to entertain a group of service men and officers in the Royal Navy. In the middle of the performance the air raid warning went off, but no one moved! So we had no choice but to finish the show with bombs and shells raining down outside within a whisker of the stage. At the end of the show we found ourselves stepping on broken glass. We all jumped into the ENSA coach and made for Holborn underground as soon as we could.
Strangely enough on VE day some years later, we found ourselves back in the same place as that ENSA performance. The officer came in and said, “You are going to find the boys very boisterous”. We started the show and they most certainly were. After a few moments of watching the performance they began to join us on the stage, singing, linking arms and doing impressions of the Tiller Girls.
Someone else commandeered the piano, the chairs were all pushed back and we finished with a riotous dance with the entire Naval company. It truly was a night to remember.
This is just a small part of how I danced my way through the war.
Somerset
After the war I relocated to Somerset where I decided to restart my teacher training so that I could open my own dance school, using the syllabus of the Royal Academy of Dancing, as it was known in those days, and that I dearly loved and respected.
So I went to a very well-known school in Bristol; The Maddox School. This was the RAD school in the area. I studied and really worked hard, although I didn’t take any examinations, but I did study all the work including the Vocational levels.
I then opened my own very successful school in Somerset , that of course was all RAD. During that time I heard that the well-known Bristol School of Dancing was up for sale. The owner was retiring. So I made an offer and actually obtained it.
It was far from easy, as the premises, two huge Victorian houses that had been knocked into one property had already been sold, so there were no actual premises. This meant hiring various church halls, working around things like church meetings, the Brownies, the quilting club etc.
Then an opportunity came to buy premises in Clifton, literally a stone’s throw from the original premises. It was in Lansdown Road and the premises were up for sale because the teacher, who was a Ballroom teacher had very bad arthritis and wanted to retire. So I managed to secure that and this changed things completely.
Phyllis Bedells connection
It was after quite a few years that I discovered that this was actually the same building in which Phyllis Bedells (a Bristol born girl) had started her own school. At that time she and her husband lived in the large house in Vyvyan Terrace, in the garden of which stands the studio, or Swedish Gymnasium.
Phyllis Bedells started her school in 1924 that I understand was very, very successful, and known as The West of England Academy of Dance.
After a time she returned to London to perform, handing her school over to a friend of hers who lived in Portishead, a town just outside Bristol. That continued for many successful years.
I was fortunate enough to purchase the premises and transferred my school as well as pupils from the Bristol School to its new home where it continues to this day. The studio still has the barres that Phyllis Bedells herself had fitted, as well as a music stand.
The whole building is extremely special and the atmosphere exudes to the memory of Phyllis Bedells.