Northern Ballet Theatre

British dance company founded in 1969 in Manchester, but now based in Leeds in Yorkshire. Originally named Northern Dance Theatre, it was started by the Canadian choreographer Laverne Meyer to tour smaller theatres with a repertoire of new choreography by Meyer and others. He resigned in 1975 and Robert de Warren took over. He made fundamental changes to the company, by hiring more dancers, adding more full-length ballets to the repertoire (including several of his own) and emphasizing its classical basis. At this point the name was changed. In 1987 the company underwent another dramatic rewrite when Christopher Gable took over as artistic director. He gradually moved the repertoire away from the classics and introduced original full-length productions, such as A Christmas Carol, The Brontës, Dracula, and Hunchback of Notre Dame, that brought dance and theatre ever closer together. Following Gable's death in 1998 the company faltered until David Nixon was appointed director in 2001.