Biography
Jean Babilée, born Jean Gutmann on 3 February 1923 and passing away on 30 January 2014, was a distinguished French dancer and choreographer active in the latter half of the 20th century. Regarded as one of modern ballet’s most outstanding performers, he was the first French dancer to achieve international recognition and earned the nickname "enfant terrible of dance."
Born in Paris to a doctor, Babilée trained at the Paris Opéra Ballet School from 1936 until 1940. His dance career was interrupted by World War II due to his Jewish heritage on his father's side. He fled Paris in 1940 as the Wehrmacht advanced but returned to the Paris Opera Ballet in early 1942. During the Vel' d'Hiv Roundup on 16 July 1942, he narrowly avoided deportation to Auschwitz. To escape forced labor conscription in Germany in early 1943, he left Paris and spent the remainder of the war with the French Resistance, fighting alongside the Maquis in Touraine.
After the war, Babilée resumed dancing, joining the Soirées de la Danse, later known as Les Ballets des Champs Elysées. Adopting his mother’s maiden name professionally, he achieved major successes with Les Ballets des Champs-Elysées and Les Ballets de Paris. From 1945 to 1950, he was the principal dancer at Ballets des Champs-Élysées, creating roles in ballets such as Jeu de cartes, Jean Cocteau’s Le Jeune Homme et la Mort, L'Amour et son amour, and Till Eulenspiegel. In many productions, he performed alongside his wife, principal ballerina Nathalie Philippart. Babilée quickly gained a reputation for exceptional physical ability, reputedly leaping higher than any dancer since Nijinsky. Notably, during the 1946 premiere of Le Jeune Homme et la Mort, he famously hung by his neck on a gallows for one minute, supported solely by one arm wrapped around a pillar.
In the 1950s, Babilée performed as a guest with Le Ballet de l'Opéra de Paris and the American Ballet Theatre before founding his own company, Les Ballets Jean Babilée. He directed the Ballet du Rhin in Strasbourg during 1972 and 1973. In the early 1980s, Maurice Béjart created the solo Life specifically for him. At 61, in 1984, he reprised Le Jeune Homme et la Mort with the Ballet de Marseille.
Beyond dance, Babilée appeared as a stage actor and in various films.
The 2000 documentary Le Mystère Babilée, directed by Patrick Bensard, chronicles his career through interviews, excerpts of his work, and testimonies from collaborators and observers such as Béjart, Christian Lacroix, Jean-Paul Goude, and Yvette Chauviré.
