Misty Copeland Retires

Ten years ago, Misty Copeland became the first Black female principal dancer at American Ballet Theater at the age of 32 — a relatively late stage in a ballet career. But once she got the opportunity, she took off running, making her mark not just through her performances but as a symbol of progress in a field long criticized for its lack of diversity. Recently, Copeland announced that she will retire from Ballet Theater after a final performance this fall.

Copeland’s rise was historic and impactful. She wasn’t just admired — she was heard. She used her platform to speak boldly and clearly about the need for diversity in ballet. Her performances drew massive audiences, including many Black and brown families and children who hadn’t previously seen themselves reflected on elite ballet stages. Her presence and voice shifted not only who was watching ballet but who could dream of being in it.

Though she had been with Ballet Theater since 2001 and a soloist since 2007, Copeland wasn’t promoted to principal until much later, limiting her prime years on stage. Injuries and the pandemic added challenges, but she persisted. She balanced performances with public appearances — from inspirational speeches to humorous TV sketches — always bringing ballet to broader audiences. In a memorable “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” segment, she led the host and sidekick through ballet steps, humorously declaring at the end, “Today, ballet died.”

But ballet didn’t die — it evolved. Copeland’s influence helped propel other dancers of color into the spotlight, including Calvin Royal III, who became a principal in 2020. Her example showed that a ballet career was attainable at the highest level. She also inspired a generation of parents and teachers to support young dancers of color, and created the Be Bold curriculum through her foundation to expand ballet access to children.

Although progress has been slow, change is visible. Aesha Ash now leads artistic health and wellness at the School of American Ballet, and dancers like India Bradley are debuting in leading roles at major companies. While some institutions like New York City Ballet have yet to promote a Black female principal, dancers like Chyrstyn Mariah Fentroy at Boston Ballet signal a shift. These developments owe a debt to Copeland’s trailblazing presence and advocacy.

More than a dancer, Copeland became a pop culture icon — “the first big ballet pop star since Baryshnikov.” Her performances ranged from dramatic classics to Broadway, but in a 2019 solo in Twyla Tharp’s “Deuce Coupe,” she fused power, grace, and self-possession into something transcendent. That moment symbolized not just Misty the figurehead, but Misty Copeland the ballerina — a singular artist whose legacy will endure far beyond her final curtain call.

After 25 years with the company, Misty Copeland is retiring from American Ballet Theater. While the departure of ballet’s biggest crossover star is certainly a momentous occasion, it’s also not exactly a surprise. The 42-year-old has been away from the Lincoln Center stage for five years, spending that time raising a son with her attorney husband, Olu Evans, and working with her namesake organization, The Misty Copeland Foundation, which aims to bring greater diversity, equity and inclusion to the dance world — at a time when that mission is newly fraught.

Copeland will give a farewell performance with A.B.T. this fall, putting a cap on a career that was both groundbreaking and improbable. She grew up in near poverty in Southern California and was frequently homeless, her mother struggling to make ends meet for Misty and her five siblings. Eventually, she found solace and stability in dance, though she didn’t seriously pursue the art form till she was 13 — late for a budding ballerina. Despite that, and the historical struggles for people of color to break into the often hidebound world of classical dance, she eventually joined A.B.T. in 2001, and after a 15-year climb, she became the first Black woman ever to be named a principal dancer with the company.

Copeland explained that although she was personally at peace with the decision, she also knows that she is stepping away at a difficult cultural moment. The whole idea of D.E.I., the value of which she came to both embody and now works to promote, is under political attack, and arts institutions are being forced to reckon with partisan antagonism. So there was a lot for her to wrestle with as she looked back on the legacy she will leave behind and ahead to the rest of her life.

You’ve been ramping down dancing for a while. Why does now feel like the time to make an official retirement announcement?

In all honesty, I’ve wanted to fade away into the background, which is not really possible. The legacy of what I’ve created, the way that I’m carrying so many stories of Black dancers who have come before me — I can’t just disappear. There has to be an official closing to my time at American Ballet Theater, this company that has meant everything to me. It was in 2019 that I was processing that I think this is the end of this chapter, and though I wasn’t saying it out loud to the world, I’ve already moved on to that next place of what I want to be doing.

What was going on in 2019?

It was the very first time in my career that I felt fulfillment. I got to a point where it was like, I think I’ve done everything I can on the stage. I remember one of my last performances of “Swan Lake.” It was at Wolf Trap in Virginia, the beautiful outdoor amphitheater. I had gotten to a place of just letting go of what the critics think. Even once I became a principal dancer, I was getting so much criticism about whether or not I should be in the position as a Black woman. Am I technically up for the challenge? “The technicality” — those words are often used with people of color. But that final performance, I let go, and it was an incredible “Swan Lake.”

When you talk about your legacy, do you have a sense of how effective that legacy has been?

The way somebody put it to me once was that on the nights when you were dancing, the house was noticeably more diverse than on nights you weren’t. Will that still be the case moving forward? It’s never been about me. It should never have been about me. It should have been about a broader understanding that people from Black and brown communities are interested and want to be in these spaces. They just need to see themselves. They need to feel like it’s something that they’re being invited into. I’ve never felt like I’ve gotten to this place and given this opportunity because I am the best Black dancer to ever exist. I was the first at American Ballet Theater to be given an opportunity.

This is a slightly larger philosophical question: Choreographers might have in mind a certain way for their dancers to look that best brings their ideas to life. We know that race shouldn’t be a criteria for that, but there are criteria, whether it’s height or muscularity or whatever. So how do you think about the question of when it’s OK to be exclusive in pursuit of one’s aesthetic ideals?

I think often choreographers don’t even know what their movement might look like on different body types and different types of people. Do you even really know what the possibilities are of seeing your movement that could look even more incredible or bring a new idea out of you and make you go even further? Black people have been told for generations, “You all have flat feet, so you’re not going to be in pointe shoes; your butts are too big, your thighs.” We don’t all look this way, and that’s not all bad anyway. It’s about opening your mind to the possibilities of what can be created when you see something done on a body in a way that you’re not used to.

You’re talking about the benefits of diversity and representation at a time when, certainly in Washington, the whole notion of D.E.I. as something with innate benefits is being denied. Has your thinking about the work that you want to do changed as a result of the world that we’re now living in?

I don’t think that my thinking has changed. My whole career is proof that when you have diversity, people come together and want to understand each other and want to be a community together. So many young Black and brown people didn’t even know Lincoln Center was a place they could step foot in. When they see my poster on the front, they feel like it opens their minds up to a whole new world. And it’s not just about coming to see me. It sparks their interest to want to participate and to want to learn more about the art form. Art is the most incredible way to build bridges, no matter what political party you’re in.

Do you feel embattled or discouraged that institutions that explicitly support D.E.I. risk losing funding?

Or that federal funding for the arts in general seems under attack? We’re just keeping our heads down and staying the course. I don’t think it’s about creating this big hoopla in public. It’s about continuing to be intentional about the real work, and I think that’s being done through Lincoln Center. I don’t think we have to scream it from the rooftops.