American dancer, choreographer, and director. After a brief career
dancing in MGM musicals, Bell worked as an assistant to choreographers
such as
Gene Nelson and
LeRoy Prinz on major musicals of the Fifties and
Sixties. During
Judy Garland's famed comeback at the Palace, Bell served as
her stage manager, and subsequently associate produced
Esther Williams's
American and European tours. In the late 1950s, he began an association
with
Jerry Lewis, as stage manager, technical director, assistant director,
and production manager on a number of Lewis's films and tv programs. He
died following a stroke at 65, in 1991.