He was born Anver Bey Abdullah Jaffa Khan in Seattle, Washington to a Pashtun father from Afghanistan and a mother from Italy.

Joffrey's other works include Gamelan (1962) and Astarte (1967), which was set to rock music with special lighting and motion-picture effects.

The pas de deux features a man who leaves his seat in the audience to climb on stage for an erotic dance with the "tattooed love goddess".

This was the first tour of the Robert Joffrey Studio Dancers, and they soon performed in India, the Middle East, the Soviet Union, and at the White House.

[6] In 1958 he choreographed the world premiere of Robert Kurka's The Good Soldier Schweik for the New York City Opera at Lincoln Center.