Jazz Dance: A History of the Roots and Branches

17. The “Free Style” Jazz Dance of Matt Mattox

17 The“Free Style”Jazz Dance of Matt Mattox Bob Boross Jazz dance is a collective art form, led by pioneers who have advanced its evolution with their individual formulations. One such leader is the dancerteacher -choreographer Matt Mattox. A product of the finest concert and commercial dance training of the 1940s and ’50s, Mattox has advanced his own version of a jazz-imbued dance expression over the course of a stellar career lasting sixty-five years. He has significantly impacted Hollywood dance films, Broadway musicals, European concert dance companies, and the training of generations of concert and commercial dancers.1 Mattox’s work often utilizes movement qualities from jazz dance, and it has been performed mostly in the commercial theater. For these reasons, dance historians have placed him within the field of jazz dance. However his influences are eclectic, and his work includes more than the traditional jazz dance vernacular. In his early career Mattox was a gifted ballet dancer and was mentored by the illustrious film choreographer Eugene Loring.2 Mattox then served a seven-year apprenticeship with the legendary theatrical jazz dance choreographer Jack Cole as one of Cole’s preferred dancers in films and Broadway shows. Mattox is also skilled in tap and other dance forms that appear in musicals of the 1940s and ’50s—flamenco, East Indian, and ballroom. When permitted to define his own work, Mattox differentiates his dance vocabulary and artistic approach from vernacular and commercial jazz dance by calling his form of expression “free style.” In his article “In Jazz Dance,” published in the Anthology of American Jazz Dance in 1975, Mattox 119 states, “I have always disliked the word “jazz” in connection with the style of movement with which people seem to associate me. I prefer to think of this particular style of movement as being ‘free style’ movement.”3 Harold “Matt” Mattox was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma, in August 1921, and his family moved to Los Angeles in 1931. There he won tap dance contests and partnered for ballroom dance lessons. At age sixteen, Mattox took up ballet, eventually studying with Nico Charisse, who at that time was married to Hollywood starlet Cyd Charisse. It was she who encouraged Mattox to audition for Eugene Loring. Mattox passed his audition and the very next day began work as a dancer in the Fred Astaire film Yolanda and the Thief (1945).4 The initial phase of Mattox’s lengthy career was as a featured dancer in Hollywood film musicals, where he partnered Marilyn Monroe, Jane Russell, June Allyson, Mitzi Gaynor, Judy Garland, and Cyd Charisse. He appeared in Till the Clouds Roll By (1946), Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953), The Bandwagon (1953), and Pepé (1960). Mattox’s most visible dance role was as Caleb, Figure 17.1. Matt Mattox teaching in France, 1993. By permission of Bob Boross. 120 · Bob Boross the bearded brother in the monumentally successful Seven Brides for Seven Brothers (1954). Mattox was equally visible as a dancer on Broadway and in touring shows. It was in 1948 that he was hired by Jack Cole as lead dancer in the Broadwaybound musical opera Magdelena.5 He also danced for Cole in 1953’s ill-fated Carnival in Flanders,6 where Mattox led a trio of devilish, goateed Cole looka -likes in the show-stopping “Spanish Trio.” From 1950 to 1952, Mattox displayed his classical talents as a featured dancer in tours of Song of Norway and Louisiana Purchase, partnering ballerinas Alexandra Denisova and Vera Zorina in George Balanchine’s choreography. While amassing this remarkable résumé, Mattox was internalizing the building blocks of his later free style dance technique in his associations with Eugene Loring and Jack Cole. Although Mattox routinely credits Cole as his major influence, it is important to note that Loring’s teaching and experiments in forming a dance class as early as 1948 (also named freestyle, but spelled slightly differently) had a strong effect on Mattox’s future jazz dance formulation.7 The knowledge gained from both Loring and Cole benefited Mattox in 1955 when he left Hollywood for opportunities in New York. Mattox was featured in the musical Once upon a Mattress (1959), choreographed by Joe Layton, and for Cole he danced in Ziegfeld Follies (1956). Mattox’s career as a choreographer also took flight; he staged dances for the Broadway musicals Say Darling (1958) and What Makes Sammy Run (1964), Aida at...