The Rockettes

The Rockettes

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The Rockettes

The Rockettes with US Navy sailors

A Rockette in Radio City Music Hall

The Rockettes are a well-known precision dance company performing out of the Radio City Music Hall in Manhattan, New York City. During the Christmas season, the Rockettes have performed five shows a day, seven days a week, for 75 years. Perhaps their best-known routine is an eye-high leg kick in perfect unison in a chorus line, which they include at the end of every performance.

The Radio City Christmas Spectacular is performed annually at Radio City Music Hall and in numerous other American and Canadian cities by a touring company of Rockettes. It is one of the most-watched live shows in the United States, with over 2 million viewers per year. The Rockettes perform annually at the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade (since 1957) and the America's Thanksgiving Parade in Detroit. The NBC Rockefeller Center Tree-Lighting Ceremony also traditionally includes a performance by the dance troupe.

History

The group was founded in St. Louis, Missouri by Russell Markert in 1925, and originally performed as the "Missouri Rockets". Markert had been inspired by the John Tiller Girls in the Ziegfeld Follies of 1922, and was convinced that "If I ever got a chance to get a group of American girls who would be taller and have longer legs and could do really complicated tap routines and eye-high kicks... they'd knock your socks off!" The group was brought to New York City by Samuel Roxy Rothafel to perform at his Roxy Theatre and renamed the "Roxyettes." When Rothafell left the Roxy Theatre to open Radio City Music Hall, the dance troupe followed and later became known as the Rockettes. The group performed as part of opening night at Radio City Music Hall in 1932. In 1936, the troupe won the grand prize at the "Paris Exposition de Dance."

The Rockettes have long been represented by the American Guild of Variety Artists, and won a month-long strike in 1967.^[1]

The Rockettes did not allow African-Americans into the dance line until 1987.^[2] The justification for the policy against hiring African-Americans was that they would distract from the consistent look of the dance group^[3]

During the halftime show of Super Bowl XXII in 1988, the Rockettes were seen by a television audience of 150 million viewers. George W. Bush's 2001 Presidential Inauguration Ceremony featured the leggy performers prancing down the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.