ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Wednesday, April 24, 1996 TAG: 9604240061
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-5 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: WINCHESTER
SOURCE: Associated Press
OSCAR WINNER Robert Duvall showed Shenandoah University students that he's more than an agile actor.
Cathryn Bell thought she would be watching a tango demonstration when she came to her dance class at Shenandoah University. Instead, she spent the afternoon doing the tango in the arms of Academy Award-winning actor Robert Duvall.
``He's such a great partner, he guides you to what he wants you to do. He's so smooth, so fluid,'' Bell said Monday while watching her fellow students tango with Duvall and Buenos Aires dance instructor Nestor Ray.
While Duvall instructed Bell on the finer points of the tango, Ray worked with Shenandoah student Jodi Allen.
``They lead you, you never feel like you are lost. It was just like walking,'' Allen said of dancing with Ray and Duvall.
Ray has been staying at Duvall's farm in nearby Middleburg. Duvall, who won the Best Actor Oscar in 1983 for ``Tender Mercies,'' met Ray during his recent trip to Buenos Aires to film a television movie on the capture of Nazi war criminal Adolph Eichmann.
As the dancers, students and staff and faculty members watched, Duvall and Ray glided across the dance floor, mixing the basic tango pattern with a walking step and several intricate maneuvers.
``I'll be the guy, he'll be the girl,'' Duvall said before they started, drawing hearty laughs from the crowd.
When they finished the laughter had turned to applause.
``I was leading him, but every once in a while he said `walk,''' Duvall said.
``Is there a secret to the tango? I don't know,'' the actor said as he took a break. ``It's never-ending, it's complex yet simple, and can go on forever.''
Duvall said he has been interested in social dances ever since his mother made him attend cotillions. The tango has been his passion for 10 years.
His interest in drama and dance may soon be combined.
Duvall said he has a film in the works in which the tango is a central element.
LENGTH: Medium: 51 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: AP. Robert Duvall (right) and Nestor Ray demonstrate theby CNBtango before pairing with Shenandoah University students Monday.