In Memory of Leonora Stapleton
Last Thursday we opened our Butterfly, but this Monday, our most special butterfly flew to new worlds where she is dancing and watching over us all. We at DeNada are very sad to lament the passing of Leonora Stapleton, original cast member who created the lead role of Gertrudis, but we also celebrate the light, love and inspiration she gave to everything she did and with which she filled us all at every second.
I first met Leonora as a not-so-skilled student at the Northern School of Contemporary Dance, where she was teaching ballet. Leonora had that unique and special eye to make anyone feel great, but more importantly, she knew who needed lifting. She was there for those who passed unnoticed, and she had the power to fill you with hope, to make you believe, to make you do.
Many years later, I was a very nervous choreographer who asked her for a coffee in Leeds. I had an idea for a character that she would be great for, but my hands trembled as I opened the door to the cafe in Chapeltown, where she and her family lived. I felt tiny next to this remarkable woman who had been whisked away from Yorkshire in the 80’s for a dazzling career: training with Alvin Ailey, dancing with Dance Theatre of Harlem, Complexions Ballet and many more, and who had been in the original Broadway casts of both The Lion King and Tarzan, which she had then restaged around the world.
When I mentioned my crazy idea to her, Leonora’s eyes lit up in wonder and surprise, and I saw a flame burn in them- a flame of passion, of love of dance- that I’ve yet to see in any other dancer. Always a perfectionist, she asked for a private audition first, which we did, and when I saw, in that first instance, what she could do to my movement, what she did with my direction- I had no doubt that in that studio was an otherworldly being.
Leonora joined the cast of Mariposa in summer 2019. We both loved quoting Sunset Boulevard and there is no better way to describe her than with Norma Desmond’s incantation: “With one look [she] put words to shame” and with “just one look”, she’d set the stage aflame. At a mature age she had the energy of roaring rivers which she would project and make the youngest of us embarrassed for feeling tired. Always joking about her choreographic forgetfulness, the cast loved her for her laughter, wisdom and love for the art, and everybody wanted to be there for her and with her.
At lunch breaks, Leonora would feed us with stories of New York City and a time when contemporary dance, voguing and musical theatre were exploding into new heights, all of which she wasn’t only able to witness, but which she also played a beautiful part in. We didn’t need food: her stories, her motivation, her passion fuelled us to continue creating, exploring and dancing.
After Covid put a standstill on our plans for Mariposa, Leonora was visited again by illness. We spoke openly throughout and Leonora did everything she could to come back to us and join the cast when we returned to the studio this September. The day she joined us again is a memory I will keep with me forever. Sat next to me on a chair, when the first chords of piano music for the company ballet class started, her eyes lit in a way I’ve never seen, her smile filled the room and her heart started beating with a joy that is frankly indescribable. When she heard the first sounds of Luis Miguel Cabo’s score for the work, I could tell that she was flying and that for her, other than her beloved family, the biggest happiness was dance, dancers, music, stage and lights.
She told us all, in one of her last speeches, to love dance above everything, because love of the art is what will change this world. She told us to be inspired by her journey, to use it to tell our story, that she had been reborn and would be reborn again and that we should create, reimagine, reinvent this world that so needs our loving. Our industry is tough, and is living through one of its toughest moments. But she filled us with the warmth, the power, the conviction, that we have to dance on, and so we will, for Leonora.
Leonora took flight calmly, with a smile, with her loving, warm and beautiful family at her side. We will miss her terribly, but she dances on in the thousands of hearts she touched, in the roles she created with such love, in the flowering seeds of hope she gave me and many, many more.
I don’t think she’ll rest in peace, because Leonora, from what I lived with her, could not stand still, however hard you tried to get her to rest! But her endless energy is with us, always, and will make sure we dance, and live, to the fullest, like she did.
Until we can dance together again, soon- hasta pronto, Leonora. We at DeNada love you.
Carlos Pons Guerra
DeNada Dance Theatre’s performance of Mariposa on the 12th October, at Leeds’ Stanley and Audrey Burton Theatre, will be dedicated to the memory of Leonora Stapleton.
Photo by Joe Armitage