It was a hint of a story, found in the contents of a red suitcase in an attic that inspired Little Juliet Prowse to overcome her fear and impostor syndrome to write her first book — about the extraordinary life of her aunt, known in the family as Big Juliet.
Completing the writing task required determination, resilience and sheer hard work — some of the qualities that made the dancer Juliet go from the then Transvaal to being one of the top entertainers in London, Hollywood and Las Vegas more than 70 years ago. She was briefly engaged to Frank Sinatra and had flings with Elvis Presley and, rumour has it, Warren Beatty (among many suitors). She was said to have had the best legs in the dancing business.
Writing, self-publishing and promoting her book, Born to Dance: The Extraordinary Life Story of My Aunt, was a “monstrous” task, Prowse tells the FM from her Cape Town home. She works as a marketing and communications consultant.
“At my book launch [in April] I said if you had told me 10 years ago that I would have written and published a book I would have told you that you’ve been smoking the strong stuff.
“I had the fear of writing actually.”
But like her aunt, Prowse was determined.
Her book tells how the dancer started ballet at four. At age 12, she persuaded her parents she was worldly enough to take an hour-and-a-half bus trip from Vereeniging to Joburg every week for ballet lessons. This showed her “absolute” determination to look after herself while becoming a dancer, the author says.
Prowse writes about her aunt’s unsettled early years: born in India in 1936, moving to South Africa with her mother and brother after her father died when she was three. Her mother remarried and the family settled in Vereeniging.
When she performed her first solo ballet role as Queen of the Wilis in Giselle at 14, The Star newspaper’s theatre critic wrote: “Juliet was absolutely magnificent.”
At 17, after having dropped out of school, the aspirant star was dancing in London, at 20 she was in Paris on her way to Italy and Spain and, by the time she was 23, she had arrived in Hollywood. All this while she was unwaveringly supported by her parents, especially her mother.
The dancer carved her own international career, taking on personal and professional challenges, and growing her influence as a mentor to future generations
The dancer carved her own international career, taking on personal and professional challenges, and growing her lasting influence as a mentor to future generations of dancers. Her fellow artists were in awe of how hard she worked. She was also known for having beautiful, exceptionally long legs. For many she symbolised grace, power and elegance.
The author’s “journey of discovery” started when she spotted a little red suitcase in her parents’ attic, filled with articles and photographs about the dancer.
Initially, Prowse wanted to know about her aunt’s experience of being a teenager in London, but this grew to her wanting to tell the story of how she became a “triple threat” (can dance, sing and act) on the stage, screen and television for four decades. She became one of the highest-paid dancers in the US in the 1970s.
Prowse says her aunt kept in close touch with her family in South Africa, visiting them when she could and inviting them to the US to attend her shows. She was down-to-earth, generous and caring, and had a wonderful sense of fun and humour. A consummate professional, she built dance companies that produced dancers of great repute.
The book is fast-paced, crammed with facts and delicious gossip. It empathetically covers the dancer’s complicated romantic relationships.
Her relationship with Sinatra started on the set of the movie Can-Can in 1959. It was her “first true, heart-wrenching love affair”. He was more than 20 years older.
In January 1962, after not having seen her for six months, Sinatra met her on the LA airport tarmac when she returned from performing in New York. Prowse writes: “As Juliet disembarked, he was standing with roses, and after a kiss, he flipped open a little velvet box with a 10-carat marquise cut diamond ring. ‘Will you marry me?’ he said.
“Juliet was filled with shock and emotion. For most of her relationship with Frank, all she had wanted was the certainty of his love. Now he was declaring it to her. Feeling overwhelmed but also overjoyed, she said: ‘Yes’.”
It was not to be. In the weeks that followed, Sinatra made it clear that he did not want a working wife, or any more children. “The more Frank demanded, the more Juliet felt bullied.”
Juliet wasn’t willing to give up her career and they announced the end of their engagement after fewer than six weeks.
And the ring? “One evening Juliet drove up to Frank’s house and, as he wasn’t there, she left a little box on Frank’s grand piano with a note.”
In 1972 the dancer married actor John McCook, later of The Bold and the Beautiful fame. The wedding was delayed for five weeks when she gave birth to their only child, a son named Seth, on the originally scheduled date.
A banner on the front page of the Los Angeles Times shouted “Baby Balks Juliet’s Wedding”.
The marriage ended in divorce in 1979.
She died of cancer in 1996, days before her 60th birthday.
Prowse inherited some of her aunt’s athleticism to become a middle-distance runner (but says she was not nearly as graceful). After attending school in Vanderbijlpark she won an athletics scholarship to the University of Nebraska and was able to see her aunt on holidays. She graduated from the university with a BSc in biological sciences.
She made the Springbok team as a runner in 1995. Her 17-year running career included competing for Stellenbosch University.
The process of writing the book had stops and starts. “I started documenting and then Covid happened, so I couldn’t fly to the US as planned in 2020.
“And there were ups and downs of losing confidence, trying to write something then feeling like an impostor ... writing this, as you know, as someone who was not there, who’s not a dancer.”
Eventually she was able to visit the US in 2022. Her aunt’s last boyfriend handed her an apple box packed full of letters he had kept for 26 years. These were from her aunt to her mother, letters from her secretary and a few from her managers.
“This was invaluable because suddenly I moved [from questioning] ‘Who am I to write this?’ because I had her words. I had the people who were there and their comments.”
The more than 1,000 letters and articles, and interviews with more than 20 people in the entertainment industry the dancer had worked with, ensured the authenticity of her story.
Prowse finds the engagement with older people who remember her aunt delightful. Some are Elvis fans who saw the dancer in GI Blues, while others remember the excitement of the engagement with Sinatra. With a frenzy of fans descending on the dancer’s parents’ home in Vanderbijlpark to meet their “South African star”, the author has met various people now in their 70s who were there on the day.
Marketing the book in the US has been slower, but is gaining traction.
“A steep lesson I had to learn was how Amazon (global) can immediately and without much explanation, remove your product from its platform.”
After being fearful before, Prowse says she now “quite likes” writing and may write another if she finds “a book wants to come out”.
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