Michael Flatley

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Image:Image795 2.jpg Michael Ryan Flatley born July 16, 1958 in Detroit) is an Irish-American step dancer whose parents were from County Mayo and County Carlow. As a very young child he moved to Chicago, the city he considers his home town. He began dancing lessons at the age of 11. His teacher told him he would not be able to compete professionally as he would have had to start dancing at an earlier age. He went on to become the first non-European to win the All-Ireland World Championship for traditional dance in 1975. He also trained as a boxer and won the Golden Gloves Championship in 1975. His first teachers were his mother and his grandmother Hannah Ryan, an Irish dancing champion. After leaving Brother Rice High School, he opened a dance school.

His first professional break came when he joined The Chieftains for tours in the 1980s. He created the initial choreography for Riverdance and, with fellow lead dancer Jean Butler, led the show to great success as the interval act in the Eurovision Song Contest on April 30, 1994, and starred in the full-length show that was developed from the original seven-minute interval act. After leaving the show Michael Flatley began his own show, Lord of the Dance, which went platinum in three countries: the USA, Australia and the United Kingdom. Colin Dunne remained with Riverdance, taking Flatley's role as lead male dancer. In 1998, Flatley put together a dance production called Feet of Flames, a version of which toured Europe and the US in 2000 and 2001.

Flatley received the National Endowment for the Arts' National Heritage Fellowship in 1988 and was named one of National Geographic Society's Living Treasures in 1991 for mastery of a traditional art form, the youngest person at that time ever to receive this accolade. In May of 1989, Flatley set a Guinness Book world record for tapping speed at 28 taps per second; when this record was broken, he set another record in February of 1998, by achieving 35 foot taps per second.[1] The current holder of the Guinness World Record for tapping speed is James Devine, at 38 taps per second.

In 2002 Michael and his fiancé announced their intentions to wed: 15th July 2002 ([2]) “On Friday night the 'birthday party' at the Hotel de Paris in Monaco turned out to be a surprise engagement party for Michael's long-term girlfriend Lisa Murphy.”

8th November 2004 George Hamilton from US ABC Life of Luxury visited Michael in his home in Ireland, Castlehyde in Fermoy. In this program Flatley announced he was suddenly single:

George Hamilton: “Yet something is missing. While we were in Ireland, Flatley announced the break-up with his fiancée. That's right, ladies - he's single. And looking!”

Michael Flatley: “Mostly I'd be looking for somebody who's intelligent; and who is loyal, likes to travel and have fun . . .”

Flatley's newest Irish dance show is Celtic Tiger, which opened in July 2005. The show explores the history of the Irish people and Irish immigration to the US.Added to his new show Lisa and Flatley were back on again and as recently as December last year, had still planned to marry.

10th December 2005 Flatley appeared on the UK ITV/BBC show Parkinson [3] doing press for the UK leg of his Celtic Tiger tour. Again his true passion behind the 47 year olds love for dance came through as Parkinson and Flatley spoke about the traditional constraints of Irish Step Dancing:

Extract from ITV Network Limited

Parkinson: “I mean what you did was make it sexy basically didn't you, because it was constrained, it was rigid, it was stitched wasn't it. Because dancing's sexy isn't it?”

Michael Flatley: "Well it should be and you know you go into any pub in Ireland everybody knows it's so full of laughter and fun and joy and sadness and passion and everything, I couldn't imagine Irish people dancing with no facial expression and their arms at their sides, so naturally when I had won the world title I went off and began working on I guess my vision of what it should be...”

7th April 2006 Michael Flatley has announced that his long time on-again-off-again relationship with fiancé Lisa is finally over for good. The UK Mirror newspaper [4] reports that “US born billionaire Flatley first met Lisa in a Dublin nightclub in 2000. They got engaged in 2002, but never set a date for their wedding. Then finally last December, Flatley said he still planned to marry Lisa, but wanted to keep the timing a secret.

Now, Flatley, who made his name in hit show Riverdance, is burying himself in his work. He has gone teetotal and is in top shape for his new £10million touring extravaganza Celtic Tiger.”

12th April 2006 Flatley according to contactmusic.com [5] spoke out about his recent discovery of a facial skin cancer Flatley kept his cancer scare a closely guarded secret, but now insists, "I'm completely fine now, thank God."

Flately is now planning to float Unicorn Entertainment, his Las Vegas-based holding company, on the stock market over the next 12 months whilst still on tour. And Irelands Sundays Business Post [6] have stated (16th April 2006) that Unicorn is believed to be worth between €200 million and €250million and controls a number of Flatley’s business interests.

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