Ballet Quotes - Page 16

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I taught and studied dance in college, and for over a decade, I thought that would be my career: tap dancer, ballet dancer, modern dancer. I still find myself doing some tumbling or interpretive dancing in the grocery store every now and then.

I have never felt oppressed by women or that feminism is a problem. I do think boys find it hard to like things seen as feminine. I want my son not to feel self-conscious he likes ballet and my daughter to carry on playing Han Solo; that's all.

Dance has been a driving force in my life for 25 years. From music videos and hip hop, to jazz and musical theater, to ballet and classic modern dance, I have had extensive exposure to a variety of techniques that inspire my own electric style.

Sir Kenneth MacMillan's version of 'Romeo and Juliet' is my favorite full-length ballet, Sergei Prokofiev's breathtaking score a favorite composition of music. As a student of martial arts, I loved drawing my sword in defense of my Capulet kin.

Once you become a professional, to get through a ballet like 'Swan Lake' - four acts as the lead, changing character - the perseverance is incredible. It takes a lot to make it through and keep the same energy throughout the entire performance.

I was a dancer from a young age. My parents were dancers; we were taken to a lot of ballet as children. It occurred to me that what I liked more than dancing the steps was acting the story of whatever particular performance I was taking part in.

Ballet has really helped me in every acting role. You have to be very disciplined, you have to be able to control your nerves and perform under pressure, and all those things you have to use in acting when you're on film or going for an audition.

Ballet is something for which you need so much control and composure. And there's an element to acting that is the complete opposite. You have to be able to completely let go and reveal everything about yourself. It's about being very vulnerable.

The body is your instrument in dance, but your art is outside that creature, the body. I don't leap and jump anymore. I look at young dancers, and I am envious, more aware of what glories the body contains. But sensitivity is not made dull by age.

I don't force myself to exercise; I find going to gyms really boring. I find it easier to go for a fast walk or a jog in Central Park. I wear sensible shoes because my ballet dancing left me with a bunion on one foot after all the pointe exercises.

Peaky' has attracted a lot of attention from different disciplines in the arts. It was originally going to be a ballet, which is Ballet Rambert, and there is also a lot of music artists who offer their music to the show to be used on the soundtrack.

The last time I had to make a career decision, I was 17. I could have gone to Ballet Theatre or National Ballet of Canada. There were options. But as I became exposed to the Robbins repertoire, I realized that there was a living genius in the house.

That something that I fought so hard for throughout the beginning of my career is I didn't want to pancake my skin a lighter color to fit into the... ballet. I wanted to be myself. I didn't want to have to wear makeup that made my nose look thinner.

Ballet, there's a right way to do things, and it's black and white, and it's all striving for perfection. Acting is not that way. It's very gray, and the messier you can be, the better. The mistakes that you make are the gold and the beautiful stuff.

Writing used to be my hobby, but now that it's my job, I have no hobby - except watching TV and laying around the pool reading 'U.S. Weekly.' I have tried many hobbies, such as knitting, Pilates, ballet, yoga, and guitar, but none of them have taken.

I remember once saying in a television interview that the only things I hadn't been in were the opera and the ballet. Two days later, I got a call from Lord Harewood, of the English National Opera, saying "Would you like to be in 'Ariadne auf Naxos?'"

A young girl reached out to me to be her mentor one day, which I didn't really know anything about. What I did remember was what it was to be alone as an African-American dancer in the ballet world and wanting to connect with someone who looks like me.

Some people think that movements, such as the movements in ballet, are a higher cultural expression, whereas some are just dirt. I think it is elitist to think that a trained movement is more acceptable than untrained and possibly unrehearsed movements.

Since babyhood, I've always evolved from one thing to another. My mother gave me ballet lessons at 6 as part of her enthusiasm for the arts and for life. We went to museums, to the theater. While her own talent was untapped, she worked for church causes.

I think ballet has influenced my personality a lot in the sense that I am very disciplined in all of my endeavours. I am always on time; I take things very seriously. I've built up my inner strength and self-esteem over time as I've improved as a dancer.

I've been with Semperoper Ballet in Dresden, Germany, for five years - I wanted to escape the competitive dance world and go somewhere where I felt appreciated for my talents. Stateside, it was always kind of a struggle. And the competition? Not into it.

I can always invent movement, and sometimes it can be fitted into the right place, but that is not choreography. It is the music that dictates the whole shape of the work. I do not believe in the permanence of anything in ballet save the purely classical.

I think it's particularly stupid that filmmakers have traditionally said, 'Yeah, I like baseball, but the movie's not going to be about the intricacies of the game.' I mean, you wouldn't cast an overweight guy with stubble if you were doing a ballet film.

My mother always said to carry yourself with dignity and pride, and I just think Audrey Hepburn totally epitomizes that, you know? From such a young age, she was dancing ballet. There was a lot going on in her life... that was during the time of the Nazis.

At the ballet classes I took when I first came to New York, I would see great dancers like Cynthia Gregory and Lupe Serrano. I would look at them and study what they could do, and what I couldn't do. And then I'd think maybe they should try what I could do.

When I was filming in Budapest for ITV's 'Titanic,' I realised I'd never been to the ballet before so decided to see a production of 'Giselle.' I went on my own. As it was my first ballet, it was a very bizarre and interesting experience but very enjoyable.

While I was in Astana, a ballet master from St. Petersburg's Mariinsky Theatre staged a performance of 'Giselle' in the opera hall. It was one of only a few performances to grace Astana's concert spaces in many weeks, and tickets were impossible to come by.

I was a ballerina for a good 12 years. When I was 15 I had to stop. It wasn't a choice, it was an injury that prevented me from going forward in ballet unfortunately. Well, fortunately because I wouldn't be doing what I am doing now if that had not happened.

Dancing for the length of time that I did, it centered me in such a way to be really in tune with my body, and I just feel like I'm physically able to do things because of my ballet background. Without ballet, I don't think I'd look graceful at all on screen.

My first drag role was the character Widow Simone in the ballet 'La Fille Mal Gardee.' She's a crazy social climbing woman trying to marry off her daughter to the wealthy town idiot. And in the middle of the show, she gets to perform a clog dance. I loved it.

When I'm making a new ballet, I usually read through the score a little bit, and then I have to go back and translate or transcribe all the counts for dancers because the way that you hear it is completely different from the way the musicians read and play it.

I spent a whole year in New York without going back to France. And I always came back because my mother was living in New York since I was 13. So I went to summer camps, hang out at the Roxy, go to class for ballet, so I always had part of my life in New York.

I used to do ballet all the time, and I do this ballet workout: it is an amazing thing called Barrecore. It is like pulsing. It turns your legs into, like, jelly, and you feel like a Bambi; you lose so much control over your body because you're pulsing so much.

I got the part [in Into the Forest], I started taking ballet again to try to regain my strength back. I actually love that it was changed to Crystal Pite's modern dance. And I wouldn't even really call it modern dance because it feels like it's in its own genre.

I want to be a lawyer, a dancer, an actress, a mother, a wife, a children's author, a distance runner, a poet, a pianist, a pet store owner, an astronaut, an environmental and humanitarian activist, a psychiatrist, a ballet teacher, and the first woman president.

When I was about 12, I was studying Chinese and ballet with my brother, and one morning Jonathan said to me, 'I don't think I'm going to go to ballet class anymore,' and I looked at him and said, 'You know, I don't think I'm going to go to Chinese class anymore.'

My mother was the influence on me - my father was absent. He was a diamond dealer; he was doing wonderful things in the background, and women were left at home. So my mother really was in charge of everything: the ballet, dance lessons, piano lessons, and latkes.

I've always been interested in both writing and music. When I first started getting published, I also worked as rehearsal pianist for the Boston Ballet, touring with them all over the U.S.A. and Europe - I wasn't making enough money from writing to support myself.

I'd love to look like my mum when I am her age. She taught ballet for years, and my attitude to exercise and fitness has definitely been influenced by her. She's 84 now, and I've watched how well she has aged, and a lot of that is to do with her fantastic posture.

Nicholas Hytner, who directed Center Stage, is a huge ballet fan. He was completely open, as was Bruce Beresford, to get our perspective. "No, we wouldn't do this. Yes, we would do that. That's not realistic." So, I feel like Center Stage did well in that respect.

I went to art school when I was little. I took ballet lessons. I played a little kick ball. I was sort of into everything because I had too much energy and I didn't know where to put it. When I was a preteen, I got into singing, and became really obsessed with it.

So much is made about the beginnings of ballet careers, the rosebud, and then once the petals and leaves start falling off, is it beautiful anymore? Some people think it is; some people don't. The expectation is to focus on the very beautiful parts, not the ending.

I went to Indiana University for college for a couple of years, where I double majored in dance and journalism, and after my sophomore year there, I went to the San Francisco Ballet school for the summer, but then they offered me a scholarship to stay for the year.

Ballet found me, I guess you could say. I was discovered by a teacher in middle school. I always danced my whole life. I never had any training, never was exposed to seeing dance, but I always had something inside of me. I would love to choreograph and dance around.

When I was doing gymnastics, I was playing. It was fun. The ballet was not fun at all. Yes, I agree you must have discipline, but you don't need to be a witch. You can't teach a child like that. Three times a week, I went back to train as a gymnast. Then I was happy.

Another friend began to say, "Well, Quentin has a problem of adjusting himself to society and he..." This sentence was never finished. The ballet teacher expostulated, "I don't agree. Quentin does exactly as he pleases. The rest of us have to adapt ourselves to him."

Ballet Beautiful is about finding balance and making fitness a part of your life in a happy, healthy, rewarding way where you get to feel pretty and look beautiful. It's not about beating yourself up in the gym and locking yourself in a dark room with blasting music.

I would like to tell all dancers to forget themselves and the desire for self display. They must become completely absorbed in the dance. Even in a classical variation there should never be any thought of a dancer doing a variation--he should become identified with it.

It was something I was more interested in myself. When I went to see my sister dance at ballet, I was really into costumes and the arts, and my family was also supportive of whatever me and my sister wanted to do. I would say I pushed myself the most to be into design.

I did tap dancing and stuff like that at drama school. I did ballet as well. My dance teacher and I didn't necessarily get along all that well sometimes. She's brilliant... but it's just because I don't like wearing tights that I put up a bit of a fight there, I think.

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