Celia Franca CC OOnt (25 June 1921 – 19 February 2007) was a co-founder of The National Ballet of Canada (1951) and its artistic director for 24 years.

[7] In 1950, a group of Toronto balletomanes asked Franca, who had come to Canada to attend a festival,[3] to start a Canadian classical company; she did so in the very short time of 10 months.

While supporting herself as a file clerk at Eaton's department store, she recruited and trained dancers,[8] staged some Promenade Concerts, organized a summer school,[9] she gathered an artistic staff and prepared her uneven but enthusiastic new company for its opening on 12 November 1951.

Franca continued her association with the National Ballet, revising works for the company, including Offenbach in the Underworld (1983) and staging The Nutcracker.

After a year of poor health after breaking the vertebrae in her back, she died on 19 February 2007, aged 85, in an Ottawa Hospital.