Grover Dale

Grover Dale is an American actor, dancer, choreographer, theater director, and publisher. Early life Dale was born Grover Robert Aitken on July 22, 1935, in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, to Emma Bertha (Ammon) and Ronal Rittenhouse Aitken, a restaurateur. He studied dance with Lillian Jasper in McKeesport from 1945 to 1950. Partnering up with another dancer (Mary Lou Steele) in an aggressive rendition of "Slaughter On Tenth Avenue", he secured multiple performance opportunities in local nightclubs before getting his first professional job with the Pittsburgh Civic Light Opera in 1953. Career Dale's Broadway stage debut was in the 1956 musical Li'l Abner as a dancer. He appeared in the original cast of West Side Story as Snowboy, a member of the Jets gang. Other stage credits include the role of Andrew in Greenwillow, in which he also understudied Anthony Perkins as Gideon Briggs; Noël Coward's Sail Away, where he had the juvenile lead role of architect Barnaby Slade; and in Half a Sixpence, where he played Pearce, one of a quartet of 19th century London shop apprentices around whom the show is structured. He made his film debut in The Unsinkable Molly Brown (as Jam). He also appeared in Half a Sixpence (Pearce), The Young Girls of Rochefort (Bill), and The Landlord (Oscar).