The Annabel Timms School of Ballet is changing hands, but the workings and faculty of the hometown dance studio will remain the same.

 

A former student and current dance instructor, Heather Starkey Mudrick, is taking over operations. The only thing changing for the time being, she said, is the name.

 

“We plan to call it Studio 9 Dance Academy,” said Mudrick of the studio located at West Main and Center streets in the upper floor of a building owned by Mark and Judy Bonamico.

 

Finalization of the new ownership should be in place by September for the start of fall dance sessions. As always, the studio will feature ballet, pointe, jazz, tap, contemporary and hip-hop. Instructors Annabel Timms, Cindy Timms Pulice, Albert Altovilla, Emily Gray and Mudrick will all continue to be on board.

 

Timms decided that after 40 years of running the studio, it was time to pass on the reigns. Mudrick said she is thrilled to take them.

 

“I’ve taught there for the last couple of years,” she said. “I have three daughters who go there and I grew up taking dance there from Annabel and Cindy and always enjoyed that. This has always been a passion of mine.”

 

By profession, Mudrick is a physical therapist, employed by United Hospital Center.

 

“It all goes hand-in-hand,” she said, “using the body and learning how to use it properly.”

 

Mudrick said she gets joy from teaching young students how to dance. For more than 50 years, Timms has too.

 

After relocating to the area in 1963 when her husband (and former Bridgeport Mayor) Joe Timms took a job with Consolidated Gas, she began teaching at a downtown Clarksburg studio owned by Bonnie McGowan.

 

“We separated not because we wanted to, but out of necessity,” Timms explained. “They were going to tear down the building.”

 

Timms thereafter taught ballet at Nutter Fort Community Center and eventually at the Benedum Civic Center in Bridgeport.

 

“The Civic Center wasn’t open on Saturday mornings, but they opened for me so I could teach classes downstairs,” she said.

 

Then another opportunity came about and Timms moved into the West Main Street building. In the early days there, she said, the building was owned by Ed Salmon and housed the AB4 Nursery School.

 

“It was located where the Bonamicos now have their beauty shop (Expressions),” Timms said. “Miss Marian ran the nursery school during the day and rented me an area to teach dance during the evening.”

 

Eventually, Timms took over a portion of the upper floor of the building, which the Bonamicos ultimately purchased and renovated.

 

For the past four decades, hundreds of dance students have received instruction at the studio. Many have become members of Bridgeport Middle School and Bridgeport High School dancelines. Some have even advanced to the dance team at West Virginia University. 

 

In addition to her own daughters – Cindy, Becky and Sarah, all who have danced professionally - others have used their dance talent in notable ways. Her granddaughter Chiara Pulice went on to become a member of the WVU Danceline and is now pursuing other opportunities in performing arts. 

 

Kirsten Wyatt is currently featured on Broadway, as Chris Williams has been in the past. Emily Battles also works in the entertainment industry in New York City and Albert Altovilla worked in professional theater before coming back to the studio to teach.

 

Altovilla was still a dance student in 1997, the first year that Timms presented “The Nutcracker” on the stage of BHS. He played the title role in the studio’s own version of Tchaikovsky’s Christmas classic, complete with Herr Drosselmeyer, Clara, Fritz, the SugarPlum Fairy and her entourage of dancing family members and friends.

 

That was the same year that Mudrick was a senior at BHS and made her debut in “The Nutcracker,” as a Spanish dancer and in the Waltz of the Flowers.

 

It has all come full circle and now Mudrick - with guidance from Timms and Pulice - will take over operations as her own three girls continue to dance at the studio. It’s rewarding and she’s glad to be part of the tradition.

 

Tuesday and Wednesday, the studio will host a dance clinic for those trying out for dancelines at Bridgeport Middle School and BHS. On Aug. 7 and 8, second through sixth graders will participate in a hip-hop workshop with Altovilla.

 

An open house for new and returning students will be held 9 a.m. to 12 p.m. Aug. 12 and 1-3 p.m. Aug. 13. 

 

“Then classes should be in full swing the week of Sept. 11,” Mudrick said.

 

The studio presently encompasses space in about half of the building’s second floor. In the future, the new studio owner hopes to expand and incorporate a few new classes.

 

“For now, we’re taking baby steps, but we hope someday to add a fitness class for adults and maybe a Mommy and Me class during the day, as well as maybe tumbling,” Mudrick said. “We may also eventually host birthday parties and pop dance classes.”

 

Editor's Note: Shown above are dancers at Annabel Timms School of Ballet; students Autumn Feist and Sarah Momen with Timms after the 2016 performance of "The Nutcracker" and Heather Starkey Mudrick with her three daughters and one young son. She is also the stepmom of three daughters who dance in Florida.