Mikhail Baryshnikov
Mikhail Baryshnikov
Mikhail Nikolayevich Baryshnikov, nicknamed "Misha", is a Latvian-born Russian-American dancer, choreographer, and actor born in the Soviet Union, often cited alongside Vaslav Nijinsky and Rudolf Nureyev as one of the greatest ballet dancers in history. After a promising start in the Kirov Ballet in Leningrad, he defected to Canada in 1974 for more opportunities in western dance. After freelancing with many companies, he joined the New York City Ballet as a principal dancer to learn George Balanchine's style of movement...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionDancer
Date of Birth27 January 1948
CityRiga, Latvia
CountryUnited States of America
Every ballet, whether or not successful artistically or with the public, has given me something important.
I remember vividly seeing 'Tarzan' and Fred Astaire, the Chaplin films, Fred Astaire musicals, MGM, because of my mother. She was just interested in everything and she took me to opera and ballet, and then ballet got me hooked.
I don't try to dance better than anybody but myself.
The problem is not making up the steps but deciding which ones to keep.
Be. Good. To yourself, to other people, to everything you do. It's a norm of life by which people should try to live. Don't waste time. Be interesting and interested.
I do not try to dance better than anyone else. I only try to to dance better than myself.
I'm an impatient person in many respects. I like to put myself in uncomfortable situations. It forces me to deliver.
No matter what I try to do or explore, my Kirov training, my expertise, and my background call me to return to dancing after all, because that's my real vocation, and I have to serve it.
The body cannot lie. You cannot be somebody else onstage, no matter how good of an actor or dancer or singer you are. When you open your arms, move your finger, the audience knows who you are, you know.
You open a section of 'The New York Times,' and there's a review or a story on a choreographer or a dancer, and there's an informative, clear image of a dancer. This is, in my view, not an interesting photograph.
I cannot draw to save my life, and I'm not a big art scholar, but I worked with many designers throughout my career - in theater, in dance, costume designers, set designers, and I have a lot of artist friends and I do photography, and I think it's kind of in my life.
Film, theater and television always kind of scared me. I don't ever seriously think of myself as an actor at all, and I don't plan any film career or television career.
Everything I do, it's a bit painterly. I like being surrounded by objects, mostly on paper. I like the images. I like the painting. I like good photography. It's something that makes me an emotional connection, and I feel comfortable around it.
In any art form, in Hollywood or in music, there is a handful of people who really, you know, move the envelope.