American as Wampum

The U.S., which lacks Europe's state-supported ballet schools and its longstanding ballet tradition, is supposed to be a dim spot for the production of topflight classical ballerinas. Last week, watching Oklahoma-born Maria Tallchief dance with the vigorous young New York City Ballet Company, balletomanes could smile at that one. Combining gusto with flawless technique, Maria's performance in Firebird already ranks as one of the finest in present-day ballet; her other specialties, e.g., the Balanchine-Bizet Symphony in C, her Pas de Deux from Sylvia, and Divertimento, are danced with the style and confidence of a great prima ballerina. And, at 25, she has a lot of ballet ahead of her.

Onstage, Maria looks as regal and exotic as a Russian princess; offstage, she is as American as wampum and apple pie. The daughter of a full-blooded Osage Indian and a Kansas farm girl, Maria was sent off to dancing school by her mother, at five. It was the same era that produced Shirley

Temple, but tap-dancing never interested Maria. At six, she was up on her toes, dancing to The Stars & Stripes Forever. Soon after, swathed in her mother's remodeled peach satin and ostrich feather negligee, she made a solo debut as the Glow Worm. Unlike a lot of other dancing moppets who never get beyond the Glow Worm stage, Maria and her younger sister Marjorie (now a principal dancer in the Marques de Cuevas Grand Ballet) stuck to their toe shoes.

The family moved from Oklahoma to Los Angeles when Maria was nine, so that the girls could continue their studies. Maria became a favorite pupil of Bronislava Nijinska, sister of Vaslav Nijinsky. In 1942 she moved East, joined the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo. There she was spotted by Choreographer George Balanchine, who began casting her in his ballets, later married her. When he and Lincoln Kinstein organized the City Center company in 1948, he brought Maria along as prima ballerina. Since then, with Russian-trained Balanchine to supply the polish, she has been shining more brightly each season.

Maria is America's ranking classical ballerina, but she lives the role American-style, without fits of backstage temperament or expensive habits. "We're a group of young, everyday Americans who all get on,"she says of the troupe. Separated from Balanchine since last fall, she now shares a three-room apartment with Dancer Vida Brown, another troupe member, does her share of the housework and shoping. For relaxation she likes a good game of poker. Otherwise, says Maria, "I just like to dance."

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