Georgina Parkinson.

When the eighteenth-century poet Alexander Pope wrote, "let such teach others who themselves excel," he could have had Georgina Parkinson in mind. A ballerina with the Royal Ballet during one of its peak eras, she now coaches the creme de la creme of American Ballet Theatre. Her transition from dancer to teacher did not come gradually. "I was plunged into it right off the deep end," she says.

Sitting in the comfortable kitchen of the Manhattan loft studio apartment that she shares with photographer husband Roy Round, grown son Tobias, and Basil, a shaggy Shih Tsu, Parkinson chats animatedly about her two careers--first as a ballerina for the Royal Ballet, second as one of ABT's most trusted coaches for the past sixteen years or so. On the walls are pictures of her, poised on toe, or informally reclining, her strong bare feet detailed in close up; one shows her larking around in The Concert, another, exuding elegance, modeling a hat. (Asking her to pose for him was Round's way of working up the courage to approach her for a date.) "My career blossomed at a time when all the great choreographers of our day were very active," recalls Parkinson. "Ashton, Balanchine, MacMillan, Robbins. I danced their works but I probably had my biggest success in the role of La Garconne (The Blue Girl) in Nijinska's Les Biches when it was revived in 1964. And that was entirely because of Bronislava, who gave me endless weeks of coaching. She was extremely inspiring; and I read her very well, though the lines of communication were so few. She didn't speak any language I knew. I only comprehended she adored me--unconditionally loved me. I could make terrible mistakes, let her down; Fred [Ashton] would come in to see rehearsals and I would fall about. The ballet was technically hard for me, very stylized, and I didn't have a burningly great technique. It was Bronislava's support and patience that achieved results, and I'll never forget her for that. I'd love to bring Les Biches back to life. I'm the only person in the world now, I suppose, who has the information direct . . . Style, chic, glamour, the ambiguous quality the role had. She gave me the key." Parkinson has followed Nijinska's example in her own teaching.

Back in the early fifties Brighton-born Parkinson auditioned for the Royal Ballet School along with three hundred other little girls, and she has never forgotten the experience. "Suddenly my name was called, and from standing at the back I was brought forward before Ninette de Valois and told to do an arabesque. It was the most frightening moment of my life."

Yet after that, says Parkinson, "I always felt from the time I came from the school into the company [in 1957] as one of the back, back line of swans that they liked me and were watching me very closely."

Her career with the Royal encompassed a wide variety of major works, from Swan Lake and Ashton's Monotones and Enigma Variations to MacMillan's Romeo and Juliet, where she originated the role of Rosaline; she went on to dance a particularly dramatic Juliet and to create several roles in later MacMillan ballets, including the Empress Elisabeth in Mayerling and the Tsarina in Anastasia. "I'd had a fabulous career," she declares, "but when I stopped, I stopped."

Parkinson, s first taste of teaching came when her friend Nora Kaye, wife of director Herbert Ross, invited her to substitute for MacMillan after he became unavailable to teach Mikhail Baryshnikov and Leslie Browne a Romeo and Juliet pas de deux for Ross's movie The Turning Point. Recalls Parkinson, "I spent my vacation doing it. T was still very much the dancer, and had never done anything like that before. [Eventually she taught Baryshnikov the entire role.] Then a few years later Nora called me to say she thought I should take the job of ballet mistress with ABT. They were planning a revival of Sleeping Beauty. I was completely tucked up in the womb at the RB--that's the way most dancers are for the most part--and I'd really never thought of going anywhere else permanently. I asked for a year, s leave of absence. Subsequently, Misha called to say he was taking over ABT and would I be part of his staff? So I thought that sounds okay, and in 1978 we all got our green cards and came to the U.S."

Parkinson's official teaching initiation was a trial by fire. "When I arrived in Washington, D.C., I saw my name was on the call sheet to teach the company--I mean, Baryshnikov, Gelsey Kirkland, Cynthia Gregory, Fernando Bujones--they were all in this huge class. Nobody will ever know what that was like. Daunting--completely terrifying! I wore a track suit and pointe shoes, and I demonstrated all the exercises. I felt completely unready, though I'd prepared my class for hours beforehand. And they were very sweet! Later some of the dancers used to give me little hints like |Speak louder' or |Always stand in the same spot when you set the exercises.' ABT is a completely great company, and I love them to death."

As time went on Parkinson concentrated primarily on helping soloists and principals in special roles. "An important part of being able to coach," she says, "is to take dancers who are just about to make the big step, to guide them through their paces, check out just how much of their own imagination they're going to use, how much help they're going to need. Technically the company standard is pretty high. There are still some moments, though, when there are problems, like weaknesses that have to be strengthened. You do that by building stamina and by the end, you get the |product' ready. And it's absolutely wonderful to put it out there and see it come to fruition.

"So much depends on the personality of the person you're coaching. The same rules don't apply to everybody. Some are more technically assured, some of them know who they are, some of them don't. Some are self-conscious, some are insecure--most are insecure. However, I don't ever want to make the mistake of expecting anybody to approach anything the way I did. You allow them to contribute as much as possible rather than inflict the way you thought about it. I will suggest, and if they haven't come up with anything better they might accept what I say for now and rethink it later."

For the ABT season April 25 through June 4 at the Metropolitan Opera House in New York City, Parkinson takes on the additional task of helping guest star Nina Ananiashvili familiarize herself with ABT's version of the classics and teaching her the role of Manon, which she will dance for the first time.

Parkinson still practices her art onstage in special cameo appearances such as Lady Capulet in Romeo and Juliet (a part she has made particularly her own), the Queen in Swan Lake, and the Madame in Manon. "I don't look for stage roles," she adds, "even though I'm very happy if they come along. I don't want to appear as if I'm taking work away from the dancers. If there are roles I can do that I think company members can perform as well or better than myself, then obviously I won't put myself up. But if it's something interesting and challenging, I do say yes.

Of the period roles she usually essays these days she says, "one has to understand things like physicality and movement quality and how women stood in those days when dress really affected the posture. For example, I had little idea of the role of the Madame in Manon until I saw the costume. Then I knew what she was all about. The ways of moving may be completely foreign to you, and you have to make part of your own physicality feel the character."

As the pace quickens toward opening night of any season, pressure builds for coach and choreographer to get the dancers alone for sufficient time. "Seven weeks rehearsal sounds like a lot," she says, "but quality time within that period is still rare--especially as the principals are in every other ballet. One has to get their concentration and their energy, yet they're amazing in their ability to do it. You don't always get the trust to begin with. You have to earn it, work at it. Coaching is very exhausting, like being a dance psychiatrist. You have to know a dancer's bad days, when to push them, when not. And maintain a sense of humor! The bottom line is: Let, s be able to laugh at ourselves. Otherwise, it can be so intense it becomes negative. I can't bear it when it gets too sticky."

This year Parkinson is preparing some of the up-and-coming dancers like Ashley Tuttle, Yen Chen, and Sandra Brown for new roles and is working with ballerinas Cynthia Harvey, Julie Kent, and others in perfecting their interpretations of several lengthy ballets, including Swan Lake, Manon, and Giselle.

About dancers coming to a big part for the first time, Parkinson says, "They usually know the steps by the time I get them. They've been a wili or Myrtha. But before you start you make sure they know things like what follows what. Often there's elasticity in a version of [the ballet], so you get all that set.

"It doesn't matter how much emoting you do if you can't cut the technique. l think the hardest thing about Giselle is Act I. It's just very difficult to make it read across the footlights. Is Albrecht going to be a cad? Is he really going to be in love with Giselle? And what is her relationship with him, with her mother, with Hilarion? With some couples I've coached, Albrecht wants to do it one way, Giselle another. All I can do is advise and help out and suggest. But hopefully, it'll be their decision. Then you see their choice, not mine. And ultimately, I like watching their performance, for what they do really is show their implicit trust, and so together I think we make something."

Hilary Ostlere is a Dance Magazine contributing editor and a dance critic and entertainment columnist for New York City's Westsider.