George was born on February 18, 1935 in Hong Kong. His father, Alexander, was a circus acrobat who taught him the right way to make hand stands; His mom was his first dance instructor. When Japan occupied Hong Kong in 1941, the household fled to Shanghai, after which his father went to western China to discover a job.
In Shanghai, a metropolis with the lifetime of emigrants, George took dance classes from Russian lecturers; On the age of seven, he started to carry out Polcas and Russian dances in nightclubs to assist his mom cross. Generally he was paid in rice.
In 1945, George’s father died in a truck crash as he tried to return to Shanghai. 4 years later, George and his mom, fearing Shanghai’s communist ingestion, evacuated within the Philippines, the place they spend two years in a refugee camp.
Earlier than leaving the Philippines, George’s mom warned him what can be required if he wished a future in dance. In an interview with the College of Nevada, Las Vegas, in 2024 he recalled that he mentioned it: “Look right here, George, you might be Asian, a part of you, and we go to America and could have all of the white individuals in order that you may be higher 10 instances higher.”
Their immigration to america was sponsored by a household good friend who additionally launched George on the American Ballet Faculty.
When he later stopped dancing, his profession was largely forgotten by the general public. In 2022, Da Lynn, the director, checked out previous pictures within the New York Public Library of Performing Arts, when he seen the publicity of Mr. Lee from the Hazelnut.
