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Misty Copeland did an interesting interview with NPR’s Fresh Air with Terry Gross. Her new memoir came out this month and it’s called The Wind at My Back: Resilience, Grace, and Other Gifts from My Mentor, Raven Wilkinson. Misty writes about her experiences on her way up as a Black woman in the ballet world and about her mentor, Raven Wilkinson, the first Black ballerina to receive a contract with a major ballet company. In the interview, Misty talks a little bit about childbirth (she had a baby boy, Jackson, earlier this year), but mostly about the overwhelmingly white world of ballet. It’s fascinating and also frustrating. Some highlights:
On her 2012 injury and feeling she was letting down the Black community: When the first surgeon warned her that she might never dance again, Copeland was devastated. “It was just like my whole world came crashing down,” she says. “I felt mostly like I was letting down the Black community.” As a Black woman, Copeland had heard for years that her skin color, her body and her hair didn’t conform to what ballerinas were supposed to look like. After finally opening a door in the ballet world to other dancers who looked like her, she didn’t want that door to slam shut because of an injury.
On the coded language around her body: “Once I became a professional, that’s when people started to really see me as a Black woman in a company where there weren’t any. And that’s when the language started to change around me fitting in. Still, to this day, I will read things that [say] I don’t belong because my breasts are too large, my muscles are too big, I’m too short. But these are all excuses because there are so many dancers who are not of color, who have similar body types to me that are shorter, that have larger breasts and bigger muscles. So throughout the course of my professional career, it’s really been about me understanding the language that’s being used and having conversations about that because that’s been what’s turned so many Black women away from ballet is because they’re told those things.:
On the norm of white skin in ballet: “The norm is that everyone wears pink tights and that’s representative of white skin. So it was something I was aware of when I was 19 and came into ABT that I would have to wear pink tights … and then have to go on stage and attempt to make my skin look like the other dancers. It chips away at you. The more that I look around and not see people who look like me, not see other women who look like me, and I’m painting my skin over and over, it was something I started to talk about. If it’s just to make us look otherworldly, then why can’t I have brown powder to powder my skin to take that shine away? Why am I changing the color? And I did it as a principal dancer the last time I performed the role of Swan Lake, I did that and in other roles where I was told to paint my skin white. So I did push back. But we have a long way to go, still.”
On being under scrutiny as the first Black principal ballerina with ABT: “When I was making these debuts in big, leading roles, for most dancers, you’ll make your debut on a Wednesday matinee. And some people will come and there probably won’t be a critic there at all to critique your show or talk about it. And I had the exact opposite experience. Every time I was making a debut in a role, The New York Times was there. There were blogs and people writing, ‘Will Misty succeed? And if she doesn’t, what does that mean for her career? What does that mean for the African American dance community?’”
Misty also says some interesting stuff about being told to do modern dance instead of ballet because people thought barefoot dancing was more fitting for Black dancers. I have a lot of thoughts on this whole interview because I used to do ballet as a tween/young teenager. The coded body stuff definitely came up — I’m short and wasn’t quite as skinny as the other girls in the class. The company director was a short, “curvy,” white woman (randomly, also with an unusual portmanteau first name like mine) and would say things like “Peridot is like me, we’re short and curvy, we don’t have the usual dancer body.” It made me feel weird and singled-out, especially because I knew I wasn’t “curvy” and was a pretty average-sized 12-year-old in the real world. I don’t remember if she explicitly pushed me toward jazz and hip-hop, but I definitely felt I’d fit in better there due to my “size.” Long story short, I quit and joined cheerleading.
Also, I saw Misty in Swan Lake seven years ago. I was super excited to see her because I wished there’d been a Black ballerina for me to look up ~13 years earlier. She was amazing, but I remember saying to my friend afterward that I was surprised her skin tone blended in with the other dancers’ under the stage lights. I did not realize they were painting her white! I’ve heard all the stuff about the color of the shoes and the tights, but it’s so messed up they were actually painting her skin. And silly too — everyone knows Misty’s Black and she’s the lead so she shouldn’t look like the other dancers. Anyway, Misty has overcome a lot and broken barriers for other Black ballerinas and continues to do so by speaking about it. The bit about the press is infuriating and perfectly encapsulates why she felt the way she did about her injury.
That is disheartening and awful. Maybe get over the idea that looking at a homogenous group of dancers is a good thing? I thought ballet had come farther than that – I knew the history but I really thought the genre had evolved more than it has.
Like the British royal family, ballet is anachronistic. If it wants to be something other than a museum piece, evolution has to be allowed to happen.
This might be weird, I hope it’s not–but I couldn’t help but notice how normal and nice looking her feet are in those sandals. I had always heard that ballerinas had really messed up toes, I wasn’t sure a simple pedi would do much. So that’s nice, I always hated to think about their poor feet!
I agree. Misty’s feet are surprisingly pretty. Most ballet dancer’s feet show the ravages of the stress put on them year after year. My daughters’ teacher wore each callous and bunion like a badge of honor. My daughter was so impressed, lol. I have a niece who’s a professional ballerina, still young, but her feet are starting to show her experience.
As to the skin painting- how messed up is that? If they want uniformity the other dancers should’ve painted their skin to match the lead. But it is obviously about promoting whiteness.
Her feet were the first thing I checked out in the pics too!
I had a friend who was dating a ballerina from a major-city company. I made a joke about “ it must be cheep to date her as I bet she never wants to go to dinner.” He asked me what I meant, and I said that eating disorders were super common amongst ballerinas. A month later he let me know that she indeed had an eating disorder. Ballet is chock full of toxic stuff.
I’m so glad that it wasn’t just me ☺️
Misty was promoted several years too late, but what I appreciate about her most of all is what a great ambassador that she’s been for ballet. Not just for black women and WOC in dance, but for ballet itself. She took on the leadership role that was hoited upon her–not all women would have the resilience to do this. her performances consistently sold out the Met stage–a notoriously difficult venue to sell out. She’s probably the only active ballerina with anything close to national recognition.
I’m an NYCB afficionado rather than ABT (I don’t much care for the nineteenth century Petipa classis other than the Tschaikovsky ballets–silly stories and mediocre music–I prefer Balanchine, Robbins, and new choreography)–but Misty’s prominence has been important for other black women in ballet. Still waiting on NYCB to promote some black women dancers, but they have a few who are starting to get lots of recognition.
To learn about 1, I suggest anyone interested watch NYCB principal dancer Megan Fairchild’s Youtube series, Conversations with Megan, where she interviewed fellow dancers, repertoire directors, and former dancers in NYCB. Definitely check out India Bradley’s interview–she’s a dark-skinned black ballerina who’s starting to dance more and more solos. She has been interviews by the New York Times as well, and she has a lot to say about being a black dancer now, and the role that Misty has played in opening doors. NYCB now lets its dancers wear skin tone tights and shoes, and even some pointe shoe manufacturers (Freed, Capezio) make shoes in various skin tones as well.
Thanks for this. There’s also an incredible woman — Michaela DePrince — who survived war in Sierra Leone as a child, was adopted by an American family, and now dances — beautifully — w Boston Ballet, a company that I think celebrates diversity more than most. Inspiring…
Yes, Michaela DePrince has an incredible story, because she dealt with being shamed as a child for having vitiligo. She danced in the Netherlands, and is back in the US now at Boston Ballet. Boston has black woman principal dancer now, as does San Francisco.
Lauren Anderson is another important ballerina–she was a principal at Houston Ballet, and Debra Austin left NYCB to be a principal dancer at Zurich and Pennsylvania ballet.
Misty (awesome ambassador that she is) has a children’s book about black ballerinas: Black Ballerinas: My journey to our legacy.” Great Christmas gift for anyone with a young ballet student on their list, of any background. All dancers should know about black ballerinas!
She’s not wrong. I worked for the third largest ballet company in the US for a decade and there is a Darwinist racism that seeps through the way ballerina’s are selected. You cannot imagine the number of times I’ve heard from those folks that black people don’t have the right feet to be a ballerina. You might think I’m joking but I am not joking. Changing those views of those people is going to be extremely difficult, because they are all white and they all believe the same BS.
They painted her. Deplorable.
Yes, they painted her, but they painted everyone for Swan Lake. Now a good check for a professional company would be if they allow their non-white dancers to wear skin tone shoes and tights–that’s important for all WOC, not just black women. That’s a company that’s at least being cognizant of diversity, equity, and inclusion work. A company that doesn’t do this in 2022 is not a company that this balletomane will watch at all.
I remember Audra McDonald talking about her experience with ballet. She was told to get “flesh-colored” tights, so she bought brown ones. Her instructor was not pleased. She pointed to her own (or one of the white girl’s) pale pink tights and said “FLESH COLORED!!”
I agree with TOM that ballet is an anachronistic art form. Though I am in awe at the skill of ballet dancers and enjoy watching short clips of their performances, I don’t enjoy “the ballet” in general. Maybe it’s because I took lessons as a kid myself and kind of hated it. It was so restrictive, to me. I’m also just not a good dancer, lol.
I am sure there is a lot of experimentation happening in ballet, but it seems like in that arena, you have to learn to fit in the box before you can think or perform outside it. You have to master the basics, to blend in, to the point that they made Misty literally blend in by painting her. How awful for her. Ugh.
She did an online talk for the students at the arts institute my husband runs. She was lovely and amazing and I loved that she could talk about representation with all of the artists present (the camp is not just for dancers). The kids loved her and how open she was. Things need to change.
I love her and I’m not exaggerating – I’d kill to have those legs and her body.
She’s amazing and I hope to see her in person one day.
I don’t remember ever being painted as a white ballerina 🩰. Had such a thrill this last spring when a random work day made it so I got to give her mom in law a pedi. I was so stoked when my boss told me who she was, bc omg Misty 🔥 Copeland!!!!! America’s most talented and beautiful ballerina 🩰 ever right. So NGL I was kinda starstruck, but the lady, she was super nice and like super proud of Misty and I loved that, so it was a really cool day. Right before it my boss was like, this lady is so nice, she comes in when she’s in town, she’s the mom in law who loves Misty! I danced ballet for 12 + years a few of my friends grew up to be in the Boston & SF Ballets & start schools and the fan girl in me is still stoked!! I don’t agree with these racist only white is right in ballet practices. I’d likely have felt like crying if it were me and I’m struck by how hard it would be to perform under these conditions and in these circumstances. It all seems like racist assfacery IMO.