Anna Lee, Tony Randall, and now . . .
June Taylor, the Emmy-winning choreographer whose routines on “The Jackie Gleason Show” brought the chorus line into the television age, died on Sunday at a hospital in Miami, said her sister, Marilyn Gleason. She was 86 and lived in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. Each week “The Jackie Gleason Show” opened with a number by the 16 high-kicking, wide-smiling young women of the June Taylor Dancers. Their routines, created by Ms. Taylor, were intricate, expensive and wholesome-looking updates of the classic Broadway chorus lines. Ms. Taylor won an Emmy Award for her choreography on “The Jackie Gleason Show” in 1955.
Born in Chicago, Ms. Taylor was a seasoned nightclub dancer when her career was derailed by tuberculosis at age 20. She turned to choreography, hitting the road with her own company. She met Gleason, then a little-known comedian, at a Baltimore nightclub in 1946. Ms. Taylor began working on television in 1948 on Ed Sullivan’s “Toast of the Town” and later worked on “Cavalcade of Stars,” which Gleason joined in 1950. “The Jackie Gleason Show” began in 1952 and ran until 1959; it returned to television in 1962 and ran until 1970.
Ms. Taylor often spoke of television’s demands on dance. “One of the first things I learned in television was the necessity of varying the style of the dancing each week,” she said in an interview in 1953. “People want something new. My girls, I believe, are the best hoofers in the business. They know tap, ballet, classical ballet, toe work, modern and acrobatic dancing.” Mrs. Gleason, who was a dancer in her sister’s group, remarked that speed was a necessity. “We were on television,” she said yesterday, “and we had to move fast. The only comparison was the Rockettes, but we danced four times faster than they did.”