It’s been a long time since a ballet personality has been in the media as much as American Ballet Theater’s Misty Copeland has recently. Many of our students would not know who Mikhail Baryshnikov is (perhaps the last big dance figure in the media), but perhaps they are seeing Misty in the media.
Aside from being in advertising for Blackberry, Dr. Pepper, and most notably Under Armour, she has garnered much media coverage as one of the first leading African-American ballet dancers in the U.S.
She has been seen on the Oxygen network, and profiled on CBS Sunday Morning and many other TV news shows, and has even written a book. I was surprised when I recently heard her as a celebrity guest on NPR’s “Wait Wait…Don’t Tell Me.”
She can be a good role model for young dancers, but her photos and ads are a bit provocative or risqué; perhaps one of the reasons she is making it bigger in the media and advertising world than in the world of classical ballet.