Early Life and Career
Noverre was born in Paris on 29 April 1727 to Marie Anne de la Grange and Jean Louys, a Swiss soldier. The couple expected their son to pursue a military career but the boy chose dance, studying with M. Marcel and then with the famous Louis Dupré. Noverre's first professional experience probably occurred at the Opéra-Comique in Paris on 8 June 1743 in Le Coq du village. In his middle and late teenage years, Noverre performed at Fontainebleau, and in Berline before Frederick II and his brother Prince Henry of Prussia. Appearances in Dresden and Strasbourg followed before his return to the Opéra-Comique. In 1747, Noverre became ballet master in Strasbourg and created his first great success, the exotic Les Fêtes Chinoises. In 1748 in Strasbourg he married the actress Marie-Louise Sauveur. In 1750, he became principal dancer in Lyon and created his first ballet-pantomime, Le Jugement de Paris. He moved to Strasbourg for one year in 1754, and returned to the Opéra-Comique where Les Fêtes was staged with great success on 1 July 1754.
In 1755, he went to London with his wife, his sister and brother, and his company. There, he worked with David Garrick of the Drury Lane Theatre, learning new concepts of theatre and the then developing natural style of performance. When the London production of Les Fêtes was completely destroyed by rioters on the eve of the Seven Years War, Noverre and his family were forced to go into hiding. He continued to supervise dance spectacles at Drury Lane but without billing. He left London in 1757 wanting to work at the Paris Opéra but realized he would face serious opposition to the expressive style he had developed in London, and chose Lyon instead where he was free to develop new and very different works from the prevailing court ballets. He composed Les Caprices de Galathée, for example, and garbed his dancers in tiger skins and shoes made of tree bark. His naturalist attitude towards costume placed him in the front rank of the French Enlightenment.
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