Pointe shoes and tennis sneakers — a world premier ballet performance at the Kravis Center in West Palm Beach, featuring two celebrated ballerinas, is dedicating its show to tennis legend Serena Williams.
The upcoming spring production, part of a billing featuring a variety of ballet performances, coalesces the world of classical dance with the physical power of one of the greatest athletes of all time.
Williams gave the dancers her blessings.
"I am lost for words," Willams said in a statement. "I have always loved dance, ballet in particular. It was a big part of my life growing up. I can’t wait to see how it turns out."
Match is a duet performed by Skylar Brandt — principal dancer with New York's American Ballet Theatre and considered among the top dancers in the world — and Breeanna Palmer, a school trainee at New York's Joffrey Ballet School. One of the ballerinas will perform in tennis shoes, the other in the classic, flat pointe shoes.
The performance came to life thanks to ballet star and choreographer Tiler Peck, the principal dancer for the New York City Ballet.
She told WLRN the similarities between tennis and ballet are enough to make audiences ponder whether the physical demands of ballet exude elements of both an art form and sport. In her mind, that's a resounding 'yes.'
"Ballet gets tied into more of just like a classical form, but really we are athletes like tennis athletes," Peck told WLRN.
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Peck said she grew up playing tennis and that many of the physical, stylistic movements are similar to ballet.
"A lot of times when [tennis players] are trying to do a forehand or a backhand, they are doing a jeté," said Peck, referring to a dance move where the dancer leaps from one foot to the other.
"When they serve, it's kind of like doing what we call a cambré back," she added. That's when dancers arch or bend their back forward or backwards.
Even NFL players of various shapes and sizes are known to have incorporated ballet into their training regimen. Amongst other things, the practice can help with flexibility, balance and srength training for knees and ankles.
Local students to share the stage with pros
The new show at the Kravis is part of a collaboration between Paris Ballet and Ballet Support Foundation, a nonprofit founded by former ballerina Lola Abigail Koch, who supports top ballet talents and international dance projects.
"[Serena Williams] is an inspiration not only for tennis and sport fans, [but also} for ballet producers, dancers, choreographers, students," Koch said. Match is part of an early effort to turn the performances into a traveling show, she added.
Dancer Skylar Brandt is also scheduled for a solo performance of The Dying Swan, a renowned, short ballet first introduced in Russia in 1905.
Trainees from the Paris Ballet — ages 3 to 18— will take onto the same stage as the professional dancers, performing well-known selections such as the Don Quixote and excerpts of The Sleeping Beauty.
Guest performances include alumni and dancers from Paris Ballet such as Raelin Flanagan, a senior, as well as Palm Beach County natives Sebastian Bondar, a Boston Ballet II student, and professional dancer Mario Mery of Ballet West.
Jean-Hugues Feray, Paris Ballet’s artistic director and founder, said the new dance shows — especially Match — are "enticing to a lot of people" new to dance.
Feray, a former international principal dancer who founded Paris Ballet a little over a decade ago, said it's his first time witnessing a ballet show dedicated to tennis. And that it's an opportunity to broaden the audience.
"I think it's going to make them [fans] realize how ballet can reach to other, people and forms. I think it's a fantastic way of bringing maybe fans from tennis and from ballet together," he said.
IF YOU GO
Paris Ballet at the Kravis Center
WHEN: June 2 at 7 p.m
WHERE: Raymond F. Kravis Center for the Performing Arts
For more information, visit kravis.org
