Ballet Appreciation Quotes

I think Hong Kong's ballet audience is very sophisticated in the sense that they are able to find the beauty in good performances.

Ballet needs figures that people can recognize and relate to. People don't know ballet dancers as well as they know other artists.

I want the ballet world to be given the respect that it deserves and to be seen by more people - for so many to experience the beauty that I've received from the ballet world.

Russians are very discerning about ballet. They're very opinionated about what classical ballet is.

I want a big man physically as well as intellectually. l want a man with the thigh muscles to give me a good frolic in the sack, the kind who'll tear hell out of a thick steak, and yet who can go to the ballet with me and discuss Hegelian dialectic and know what the hell he's talking about.

In France, ballet is on TV ... It's on the eight-o'clock news. It's a cool thing to be a dancer.

In 1998, Vanity Fair asked me to write a big piece for them on the 50th anniversary of the New York City Ballet. My life, to a great extent, had been spent at and with the New York City Ballet, and I decided to try it. It was very scary, writing about something I loved so much and had such strong opinions about.

Ballet is certainly appreciated in New York, but it has been a part of the Russian culture, history and heritage for hundreds of years, so it's much more instilled in the Russian blood.

I never went to a ballet until I was 45 years old. I don't know why.

When you can't follow a ballet's action, you can always read the program notes.

Mr. Balanchine wanted me to be myself. He didn't want me to look like anyone else. I love teaching our company dancers the Balanchine ballets. I try to give them what was passed down to me and what I learned from him. They dance it so beautifully. It also keeps me close to Mr. Balanchine. He's with me every single day.

At age 14, coming to the U.S., all I knew was American Ballet Theatre, Baryshnikov, Nureyev, and some of the European companies. I barely knew anything about Balanchine.

I always feel that the mark of a good ballet is that when you see it more than once, you get more out of it.