The Pennsylvania Academy of Ballet celebrates 50 years of producing stars

Melinda Pendleton calls her 80-students-strong Pennsylvania Academy of Ballet “a boutique school.”

Pendleton’s parents, Margarita de Saá and John White, were both dancers with the Ballet Nacional de Cuba. De Saá was a principal dancer, as was her identical twin sister, Ramona.

In 1964, following Fidel Castro’s Cuban Revolution, Pendleton’s parents moved to her father’s native California and tried to start a company. (Ramona would stay in Cuba, play a significant role developing the Cuban method of ballet education, and eventually become the director of the Cuban National Ballet School. The sisters’ reunion 40 years later in Cuba was the subject of a PBS Independent Lens documentary called Mirror Dance.)

“[My parents] were in communications with Balanchine, and they were doing some of his early works there,” Pendleton said. “They were trying to see if he would start a company or ... put his name on a company on the West Coast.”

De Saá was performing with the company they were trying to establish and also in some movies. She was one of the swans in the movie Funny Girl and also in In Like Flint.

Their company never got a foothold in Los Angeles and Barbara Weisberger, the founder of Philadelphia Ballet, offered them a job.

After working there for five years — “teaching, setting ballets on the company, doing various things” — they opened their own studio in 1974. They approached Weisberger with the idea of a satellite school.

Weisberger didn’t think it was right for the company, so de Saá and White moved on and opened their studio in Narberth. First they rented the second story above the Narberth movie theater. A few years later, a building a block and a half away became available.

“They bought it and renovated it, and we have been in this building ever since,” Pendleton said.

Fifty years on, the school has about 80 kids divided into six classes. That means about eight to 12 students per class, which translates into personal attention.

“This studio has led so many people on these different pathways, in the arts, in their lives,” Pendleton said. “I really want to make this a celebration of that,” referring to the academy’s 50th anniversary show at Drexel’s Mandell Theater.

The artistic director of Paul Taylor Dance Company, Michael Novak, studied there. As did Jessica Lang, an important dance maker who is choreographer in residence at Pacific Northwest Ballet and artist in residence at Sarasota Ballet.

Other alumni include Philadanco dancer Grace Kimble; Philadelphia Ballet soloist Austin Eyler, who took his first steps at the school; and Shoba Narayan, who was Princess Jasmine in Aladdin on Broadway.

“The idea was reaching out to former students [who had a career in dance] and having them come back. So our first choreographer was Austin Hartel. Austin started with my parents above the movie theater, and went on to dance with Pilobolus and choreographed around the world. I reached out to him — he’s at Oklahoma University, teaching there — and I said, ‘Will you come back and set a piece on our advanced dancers?’ And he said, ‘I would love to.’”

She also contacted Novak.

“Would it even be possible to have one of our alum who’s dancing professionally do a Paul Taylor solo?” she asked. “I didn’t even know if they allowed that or that kind of thing. And he was like, ‘Yeah, I’m sure we can work something out.’ I’m just thrilled.”

Kimble will be dancing the Taylor solo.

“I said the same thing [to Lang]. I said, ‘Hey, I’ve got an alum who’s currently dancing with Philadelphia Ballet. He has a partner; he dances a lot with [Philadelphia Ballet principal dancer] Nayara Lopez. Could the two of them do a pas de deux?’ And she was like, ‘Absolutely.’”

Pendleton herself is ballet royalty, and other anniversaries have focused strictly on that.

“We did a 25th [anniversary] and we did a 40th, and a lot of it was about celebrating my parents — and we absolutely are doing that. But I feel like at this point, it’s so much bigger than that. My parents have touched so many people, and the studio as a result of that has touched so many people.”

A ballet school in Narbeth, around eight miles from Philadelphia’s center, continues to be a hard sell, Pendleton said.

“If someone really wants to pursue a career, it’s a bit of a hard sell, especially here in Lower Merion Township,” she said.

“We’re this funny little school that is in the middle of Narberth, that offers professional training in this small town.”

And produces stars.

Pathways: Pennsylvania Academy of Ballet’s 50th anniversary celebration. 3 p.m., Aug. 10, Mandell Theater at Drexel University, 3220 Chestnut St. $20. paacademyofballet.com/