Gene Kim started his NYU Tisch undergraduate thesis film Fighting Spirits before Black Swan came out, but it also plays with the classic image of dueling ballerinas in black and white. But when these ladies battle on stage, they fight with something heavier than toe shoes.
Not to be outdone by the United States in the proud sport of abusing amateur athletes, a Chinese ballet instructor apparently pulled a Mike Rice on her students. A mysterious video recently uploaded to China’s video sharing site Youku features a dance instructor screaming at her students and slapping them into…
If you've ever watched Breaking Bad and thought "Hmm... this could use some more pliés!" — get ready. Kill Bill producer Lawrence Bender and Breaking Bad co-executive producer Moira Walley-Beckett are developing a show for Starz (with a z!) about the troubled lives of professional ballerinas. If you thought it was…
Today in places rich people are going, Natalie Portman and her hot ballerino husband Benjamin Millepied are packing up and moving to Paris. Why, Natalie? America has been so good to you! Remember Phantom Menace? We forgave you for that. We forgave you.
In keeping with the proud tradition of grisly backstage ballet drama that movies have so thoroughly accustomed us to, Sergei Filin, the artistic director of the famed Bolshoi ballet, is still suffering from a vicious attack that took place on Thursday night when someone threw acid in his face. In. His. Face. Though…
Ballet companies, to those of us not in the know, always seem like the most intriguing places. Like, it seems like a safe bet that they're all haunted by sad 19th century Russian ballerinas who died after being driven to madness by their multiple lovers and now spend their ghost-y days tormenting the living dancers.…
A strip club just outside of Albany called Nite Moves made the case Wednesday in New York's Court of Appeals that its cover charge ($11) and lap dance fees ($20 for three minutes) shouldn't be subject to the state's eight percent sales tax because naked dancing is an art form, not unlike ballet. After a 2005 audit of…
If you aren't on drugs, the idea of wearing a bell-bottom bodysuit and holding a kitten while you dance/do a malfunctioning robot impression probably doesn't sound like that much fun. Or maybe it does, but, if you're going to perform in a cat ballet, you probably should tell people that you're stoned, just as a way…
Ballet-oriented TV show Bunheads premiered on ABC Family Monday night, and already, after just one episode, Shonda Rhimes — the creative force behind ABC shows Grey's Anatomy, Private Practice and Scandal — has a problem with the series.
A soloist at an Italian ballet company has found herself jobless after telling a British newspaper that her company pressures its dancers to be thin. The dancer says that the La Scala's practices have led to an epidemic of eating disorders and fertility problems within the company, and the company claims that's…
When Californian Joy Womack arrived at Moscow's elite Bolshoi Ballet Academy at 15, she spoke limited Russian and was one a number of foreigners allowed to train at the school. Now, she stands poised to become the first American to graduate from the academy this spring.
LAS VEGAS, NV - DECEMBER 17: Model and television personality Holly Madison (C) appears as a guest performer in Nevada Ballet Theatre's production of 'The Nutcracker' with Jaime Gallagher (R) at the Theatre des Arts at the Paris Las Vegas December 17, 2011 in Las Vegas, Nevada. (Photo by Ethan Miller/Getty Images)
Today in things I wish I'd known existed one year ago: a suburban Chicago organization that trains therapy dogs puts on an all-canine production of The Nutcracker so successful that tickets to the event last year sold out in four hours. They're taking this year off, but they'll be back in all their adorable dancing…
When I was a kid, there were two best-selling books by photographer Jill Krementz that I read over and over, attempting to soak up the images, the words, the spirit of the narrative. One was A Very Young Gymnast. The other was A Very Young Dancer. In today's New York Times, we find out what happend to the little girl…
Yes, it's a little misleading and cruel to make your pet dance around on his hind legs for food. But when you put the little tutu onto a prairie dog and watch him dance, everything else in the world just fades away...
Misty Copeland is the first black female American Ballet Theater Soloist in 20 years, and she's helping redefine what it means to look like a dancer.
Sadly, the quotes from Feminist Ryan Gosling were never uttered by the perpetually-shirtless one himself, but in an interview with The Independent, he explains what makes him the type of man we imagine might yap about Judith Butler. When asked about growing up with his mother and his sister after his parents divorced,…
Last night's brand-new episode of Dance Moms reiterated the fact that the stars here are, in fact, the moms. (If they weren't, the show would be called, I don't know, Dance Kids?) So is it any surprise that when the girls won the National Talent Competition, the mothers made it all about themselves?
First, Natalie Portman's dance double Sarah Lane complained about not getting enough credit for her work on Black Swan. Then Benjamin Millepied stepped up to defend Portman's dancing prowess. Then Fox Searchlight did. Now Darren Aronofsky has. All these defenses raise a question: why do we care how much Portman danced?
"Come spring, a ballet-inspired trend may well extend to every level of the [fashion] market," says a NYT blog. It was inevitable, right?
