As a ballet dancer born in 1979, Gillian Murphy, of Wimbledon, England, has been dancing professionally since 1996. Murphy, who currently is a principal dancer with Royal New Zealand Ballet and American Ballet Theatre, took her first class in ballet when she was three years old. It was during this time that her father was working overseas and her classes in ballet were held in Belgium.
When Murphy was still young, her family moved to South Carolina. Murphy then continued to take ballet classes in South Carolina when she was five years old. Most of her ballet dance training was then done in the United States. At the age of 11, she was dancing the Black Swan pas de deux. By the time she was 15 years old, she was a finalist at the Jackson International Ballet Competition.
Murphy gained additional ballet dance training at the Columbia City Ballet and then continued her dance training at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts. Working under world-renowned ballerina, Melissa Hayden, Murphy danced numerous principal roles in ballets at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts. Some of these include George Balanchine’s “Concerto Barocco,” “Tarantella,” “Theme and Variations,” “Western Symphony” and also “The Nutcracker” productions.
When Murphy was done with training, it was in August of 1996 that she joined the American Ballet Theatre as a member of the corps de ballet. She was 17 years old at the time and within three years, she was promoted to soloist. In 2002, she was again promoted to principal dancer.
As a dancer with the American Ballet Theatre, Murphy played numerous roles. She was Cinderella in “Cinderella,” Kitri in “Don Quixote,” Titania in “The Dream,” Myrtha in “Giselle,” Polyhymnia in “Apollo,” the Queen of Hearts in “Jeu deCartes,” the Lilac Fairy and Princess Aurora in “The Sleeping Beauty,” Juliet in “Romeo and Juliet,” Sylvia in “Sylvia,” as well as many other roles. Her resume of production performances also include dancing in “La Bayadere,” “Coppelia,” “Le Corsaire,” “Fall River Legend,” “Fancy Free,” “Lady of the Camellias,” and several other ballets.
Murphy also danced in lead performance roles in “Ballet Imperial,” “Baroque Game,” “Allegro Brilliante,” “Ballo della Regina,” “Black Tuesday” by Paul Taylor, “Birthday Offering,” “Clear,” “Desir,” “Diversion of Angels,” “From Here On Out,” “In the Upper Room,” Les Patineurs,” Push Comes to Shove,” “Pretty Good year,” and several others. She also danced in feature roles in “Without Words,” “Overgrown Path,” “Company B,” and “The Elements.”
Murphy also created a variety of roles. The leading roles in “Glow – Stop,” “Kaleidoscope,” which premiered in 2005, “Within You Without You: A Tribute to George Harrison,” and “Rabbit and Rogue” which premiered in 2008 at the Metropolitan Opera House, were all created by her.
In addition to this impressive series of roles over the course of over 20 year of professional dance, Murphy also made numerous guest appearances. She has danced as a guest at The Royal New Zealand Ballet, the Kiev Ballet, the Royal Swedish Ballet, the Staatsballet Berlin, and the Mariinsky Ballet, formerly known as Kirov Ballet. She has traveled throughout the United States as a guest artist as well as in Canada, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Italy, and Germany.
In addition to dancing on stage, Murphy has also made television and big screen appearances. She played a small role in “Center Stage,” a film released in 2000 that ws directed by Nicholas Hytner and the original choreography of Susan Stroman. The movie featured other American Ballet Theatre dancers, Sascha Radetsky, Julie Kent, and Ethan Stiefel. In a telecast production in 2005 by the American Ballet Theatre, she danced Odette-Odile in “Swan Lake” and again in an American Ballet Theatre telecast of “Le Corsaire.”
Additionally, Murphy made appearances on DVDs by participating in the “Melissa Hayden Project” which was a video series created by the Balanchine Foundation to film various dancers who were working with George Balanchine. She also was in the “Center Stage: Turn It Up” sequel that was released in 2008. In 2010, Murphy appeared alongside Ethan Stiefel in “Gossip Girl.” Along with colleague, Julie Kent, she was a ballet consultant for the “Black Swan” movie starring Ntalie Portman, Winona Ryder, Mila Kunis and Vincent Cassel. Murphy also appeared in the Royal New Zealand Ballet film, “Giselle.”
Murphy is not only an accomplished ballet dancer, but she also has been recognized around the world as a recipient of multiple awards. In 1995, she was awarded the Prix de Lausanne Espoir after she performed in the final round at Moscow’s Bolshoi Theatre. In 1996, she was a Presidential Scholar nominee. In 1998, she was awarded a Dance Fellowship by the Princess Grace Foundation-USA. In 2009, Murphy was a recipient of the Princess Grace Statue Award, which is the Princess Grace Foundation’s highest honor. Then in May, 2014, her alma mater, the University of North Carolina School of the Arts, awarded Murphy with an honorary doctorate.
Gillian Murphy has been recognized for her intensity in the art of ballet. She also has a technical flair that has been said to excite audiences around the world. The New York Times have even quoted Murphy as being one of the “most exciting ballerinas of her young generation.” She has also been featured on the cover of Irish America magazine.
In 2015, Murphy married longtime boyfriend and colleague, Ethan Stiefel, a former principal dancer for American Ballet Theatre. Stiefel had proposed to Murphy in 2011 after she performed in the American Ballet Theatre’s Spring Season Opening Gala with American Ballet Theatre onstage. The proposal occurred on the opening night of the season at the Metropolitan Opera House. Murphy and her dance partner, David Hallberg, had just taken curtain calls after dancing “Tchaikovsky Pas de Deux.” Together, dancer Murphy and Stiefel, a former dancer and now choreographer and instructor, are considered the ballet royalty of couples.
On May 28, 2016, Gillian Murphy officially marked her 20 year anniversary as a professional ballet dancer. She did so by performing with American Ballet Theatre in the lead role of Lise in a ballet that translates to “The Girl Who Needs Watching.”
