Patrick Bissell - Early Years

Early Years

Bissell was born on December 1, 1957 in Corpus Christi, Texas. He was one of the five children of Donald and Patricia Bissell; his siblings included his twin brother William, two sisters Susan and Barbara, and brother Donald. His father was a computer-systems designer with Hiram Walker Inc. Bissell was a gifted athlete who enjoyed performing feats of daring: at the age of 8 he jumped off a 30-foot (9.1 m)-high diving board, even though he did not know how to swim. He dabbled in many sports— baseball, basketball, football, track, etc. He was introduced to ballet by his sister Susan who paid him to be her ballet partner; thus he was first paid to dance. He was instantly hooked on ballet and decided to make it his life pursuit. He began training in ballet and jazz dance and was soon accepted into a company in Toledo, Ohio. Like many boys who take up ballet, he tried to keep his lessons a secret, but word got out and he was ridiculed and bullied every single day for the rest of his school days. "I was a skinny kid. They could have crushed me in a instant," he stated.

While Bissell showed early promise as a dancer, he also showed signs of being a troubled young man and began taking drugs at the age of 14. He was expelled from his first school for dealing drugs on the premises. He was noticed by the famous American ballet dancer Edward Villella, who encouraged his parents to send him to a performing arts boarding school. In 1972 he joined the National Academy of Dance in Champaign, Illinois from which he was dismissed for behavior problems. Bissell then spent a year at the North Carolina School of the Arts which he left when he was informed that he should pay more attention to his academic studies. He hitch-hiked all the way to New York to pursue a lifelong career in dance— as that's where the company's top schools are. He then won a scholarship to study at the School of American Ballet, where he was encouraged by Lincoln Kirstein, its founder, and Stanley Williams, one of his teachers. Wherever Bissell went, he attracted attention, both from his fiery dancing and his habit of wearing a cowboy hat and boots around New York City—his way of distinguishing he was a true-blue native Texan. He also made his way around the city on a motorcycle.

He danced the lead rôles in three of the four ballets performed by the school in its annual workshop and graduated in 1977. He became a good friend of Mikhail Baryshnikov, who praised his dancing.