Lindsay Kemp

Lindsay Kemp was a British dancer and mime artist who also worked as an actor, teacher, and choreographer. Born in 1938, he grew up in South Shields and trained in dance under Hilde Holger and in mime under Marcel Marceau. He started his own dance company during the early 1960s and drew attention at the 1968 Edinburgh Festival with Flowers, adapted from Jean Genet's Our Lady of the Flowers; his 1974 production of that show, in which he played Divine, toured globally for years. Kemp appeared in films including The Wicker Man (1973), Sebastiane (1976), Jubilee (1977), The Line, the Cross & the Curve (1994), and Velvet Goldmine (1998). He staged and appeared in David Bowie's Ziggy Stardust concerts at the Rainbow Theatre in London in 1972, taught Bowie and Kate Bush, and created works for Ballet Rambert, including Cruel Garden (1977) and Parades Gone By (1975). He died in 2018.