Morleigh Steinberg (born 18 October 1965) is an American choreographer and dancer with the production company Arcane Collective. She is married to The Edge, the guitarist with the band U2.
Raised in Los Angeles and schooled in modern dance, Steinberg became a member of the dancer-illusionist company MOMIX in 1983. They became known for their visual humour and contorted positions. In 1986, she co-founded ISO, a dance company that embodied an approach they called "serious fun" and sometimes collaborated with a singing group, and gave performances around the country and abroad. In both companies, she was both a choreographer and dancer. She staged her experimental dance solo production and did choreographic work for films and music videos. Starting in the mid-1990s, she branched out into lighting design and film directing on dance-related themes. She has often collaborated with Japanese choreographer and dancer Oguri, with whom she co-founded Arcane Collective, a production company.
Steinberg first became involved with U2 when she appeared in the 1987 music video for "With or Without You". She was hired as a choreographer, and subsequently as a belly dancer for the song "Mysterious Ways" during the band's Zoo TV Tour in 1992 and 1993. Her relationship with The Edge began at the end of the Zoo TV Tour. The couple married in 2002 and have two children together. They maintain residences in Ireland, France, and the United States.
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Early life and education
Steinberg was born and raised in Los Angeles to an affluent family. Her father, Robert, is a lawyer in Los Angeles. Her mother is an interior designer, who came from a film industry heritage and grew up on the Universal Studios lot. She has two sisters, older sister Roxanne and younger sister Eliza. Her family is Jewish.
Steinberg was tutored in modern dance and her instructors included Bella Lewitzky. Steinberg attended Beverly Hills High School" where she was part of its Advanced Dance Group which gave modern dance performances. At age 16, she spent time at the Interlochen Arts Academy in Michigan and when 17, left with her sister for a year of dancing in Paris. She also attended Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts, for two weeks. She later said that her training in dance had "stressed relationships to objects and to poems."
Career
In 1983, Steinberg began dancing in the studio of Moses Pendleton, who founded the modern dance company Pilobolus. She was attracted to Pilobolus growing up, saying, "I was taller than most girls my age, and I thought that was a company I could be with because the women were always lifting the men." There she joined up with Daniel Ezralow, Jamey Hampton, and Ashley Roland, and the four created the Connecticut-based, dancer-illusionist company MOMIX. From 1983 to 1986, Steinberg toured nationally with MOMIX, and the group became known for its visual humour, contorted positions, and Trompe-l'œil effects.
The dancers felt financially insecure, however, because Pendleton owned the MOMIX name, and also felt artistically stagnant. The four split from MOMIX in 1986 and founded the ISO ("I'm So Optimistic") dance company. With ISO, they set their acro dance moves against the new-wave a cappella singing of The Bobs in combined performances. The dancers labelled their new approach as "serious fun".
Steinberg's first association with U2 was in February 1987. The group's lead singer, Bono, was a fan of ISO and she was cast for the music video of their hit "With or Without You". In it, director Matt Mahurin portrayed Steinberg in an abstract style, swirling in various positions in shots interposed with the band performing. During a Los Angeles stop on the band's subsequent Joshua Tree Tour, Steinberg met The Edge (actual name Dave Evans) in person for the first time during a party at her house. He came and had a conversation with her and her sister.
Steinberg did choreographic work for two feature films, Earth Girls Are Easy (1988) and Wild Orchid (1990). She did the choreography for Paula Abdul's 1991–1992 Under My Spell Tour. She additionally did concert or music video choreographic work for David Bowie, Rod Stewart, Sting, and Lenny Kravitz. She also ran her own dance school.
By 1990, ISO was performing not just in the US but also abroad. The troupe was regularly reviewed by The New York Times. A 1988 review said that, "Unfortunately, many of [the troupe's] effects looked too self-consciously clever." A 1990 review concluded that, "It is easy to be optimistic about ISO; its shows are goofy fun. But the apparently casual silliness derives from great theatrical shrewdness." A 1991 review said that, "The evening got off to a good, punchy start, then dwindled irretrievably into sophomoric hijinks." A 1993 review stated that, "Iso is after laughs and it gets them. But its targets are threadbare just when dance could use some sharp satirists." In one 1990 performance, Steinberg used elastic bands to playfully reshape her arms and legs as noodles, then flew from wires like an angel.
Personal life
The Edge married his first wife Aislinn in 1983. They had three children, but separated in March 1991. Steinberg and The Edge developed a friendship during the Zoo TV Tour, and toward the tour's end in 1993, the friendship developed into a relationship, and Steinberg broke up with her boyfriend of the time. Following the tour's completion, Steinberg and The Edge discovered they missed each other, so she moved to Dublin in 1994, and the relationship became firm. Having grown up around Hollywood, the prospect of being associated with a famous rock star did not faze her. On his part, the relationship with Steinberg improved his frame of mind after a long period of unhappiness.
The couple's daughter, Sian Beatrice, was born in Los Angeles in 1997 and their son, Levi, was born in 1999 in the same city. Steinberg had kept her home and many of her possessions in Los Angeles after moving to Dublin; only after she began raising her children in Ireland did she start feeling that country was her home.
Steinberg continued some professional activity with U2, directing one of the music videos made for the 1997 single "Staring at the Sun". The video featured close-ups of each of the band members set off by an array of lighting effects. Following the September 11 attacks, she was one of the backing singers on the song "Walk On" for the America: A Tribute to Heroes telethon.
The couple married on 17 June 2002 in a small civil service at the Dublin registry office, and a few days later in a ceremony atop a mountain in the South of France. The Edge said, "The Dublin ceremony was just a necessary formality." The only people present were his two best men: Bono and antiques dealer Chantal O'Sullivan. Four days later, their French wedding was held with 200 or more guests at the hilltop village of Èze overlooking the Côte d'Azur followed by a seaside reception. The ceremony was led by Steinberg's father Robert and combined elements of both Christian and Jewish traditions.
The couple bought and renovated a €4 million house in Killiney outside Dublin during 2002–2003, where they lived for their children's primary education. Their daughter Sian had leukaemia at age 7, which required three years of treatment, in Dublin and in California. After discussion with the family, U2 went forward with its 2005–2006 Vertigo Tour, but changed scheduling and reduced dates to enable The Edge to go home more often. Bono later called Steinberg a heroine for having to take up the parental burden and said that without her, the tour would never have taken place. After Sian was declared free of leukaemia, Steinberg and The Edge learned that she was dyslexic and relocated to New York where she could attend a special learning centre.