Colette

It will be extremely difficult to image the company without Paquette devoted to his company like no other, tremendous actor and what partnering skills! Mathieu Ganio is only 34 years old, thankfully, so he has 8 years ahead of him before mandatory retirement.

The official casts are published 15 days before the run starts. But yeah, as Mashinka mentioned Dansomanie usually publishes the info before the company does. Mathieu Ganio is the most otherwordly Prince Siegfried, Mathias Heymann is also great. Ould-Braham, Hecquet and Albisson are terrific Odette/Odiles.

Well, now that's a cast I LOVE, I saw their debuts in R&J and loved them, I was going to cry if Mcrae and Osipova were casted in this, Ball and Naghdi are perfection in this ballet.

It seems that for O'Hare the only dancers that can be filmed are Nuñez, Osipova, Muntagirov, Mcrae and Lamb. I don't know why Ed Watson wasn't scheduled to be filmed again, Nuñez's subpar Giselle got filmed twice so why don't film the greatest Crown Prince Rudolph a second time? Anyway, Ed got injured so Bonelli (and I'm not a fan) would have been a good second choice, much better than Mcrae, Morera is in my opinion the best Ashtonian and Macmillaner dancer on earth, also my favorite classical dancer in the whole company, WHY has she not been filmed as Mary is beyond me, Lamb was amazing as Mary but the world needs a recording of Morera's remarkable Mary. We should have recordings of her in Song of the Earth, Symphonic Variations, La Fille, Elite Syncopations, The Nutcracker and La Bayadère.....But she's so very underused☹.

Yes. Yessss!

Absolutely not true, at most farewells some retired Étoiles plus other guests stay on stage.

No stop! She was the first to go back to the wings, where she remained for the rest of the evening while everyone else was hugging Hoffalt. Dupont does not strike me as the most compassionate A.D of all time.

This truly heartbreaking turn of events (Hoffalt's premature retirement) means that the company's #1 Virtuoso aka Alu must be promoted, but one never knows with this company. The Étoile ranks are in such sad conditions, Hoffalt was the only other true Danseur Noble besides Ganio, now all we have is Ganio- who is a true Ballet God but doesn't seem to be a fave of Dupont, Heymann is amazing but he's not a danseur noble, Bullion is not a classicist, but rather an amazing dramatic figure and he's almost 40, Marchand can not dance a classic to save his life but he is very good in Balanchine and does very well what Dupont seems to value the most: Pose for magazines. I will not even say what I think about Louvet. This company has amazing classicists fading away in the lower ranks, another danseur noble needs to be promoted and my vote would go to Magnenet and Loup-Quer, it would be ideal to have Alu and Magnenet as new Étoiles and Loup-Quer as premier danseur but that is very unlikely, I HATE to say it but I believe Paul Marque or Pablo Legasa will be promoted, which would be awful but then again, the world's oldest ballet company does not care about classical ballet.

I was present when he was nominated, seems like it was yesterday. Hoffalt as Colas As Solor + Hoffalt's video from that series of videos Millepied did on all the Étoiles

Nope, she stood on the wings and did not present any flowers to him. His fellow Étoiles did show much love to him. These photos are sooo beautiful❤

Unfortunately, yes, the amazing Étoile Josua Hoffalt has decided to retire -aged only 34. It is extremely sad to loose a dancer like him, aged only 34! I wish him the very very best. Aurelie Dupont's behaviour was deplorable, she stood in the wings, never going center stage, never showing compassion or appreciation for Hoffalt (who always declared himself a fan of Dupont). Deplorable. And awful for the company to loose one of its few true classicists. Btw now Dupont has no excuses to not promote Alu. A VERY sad night for classical ballet. 😭😢

I could not possibly agree more with the two previous posts. We live in a very dark era of ballet and most people in the audience seems to be ok with it. Those of us who dare to speak against this travesty are met with hate or, as is in most cases, are completely ignored. To see Ballet's two most venerable institutions submitted to the ignorance and vulgarity of their respectives so-called "Artistic Directors" and of most of the AUDIENCE is revolting, to say the least.

Makhalina's performance was her "benefit performance" and official retirement from the Mariinsky, Igor Kolb also said on Instagram that "Yulia is done dancing at the Mariinsky". She does continues to dance in galas, as well as being a coach at the Mikhailovsky. So yes, there should be room for 2 or 3 promotions, Osmolkina, Novikova and Ivanova/Ostreikovskaya. Never gonna happen under Fateyev. The Mariinsky website needs some serious update, I would not trust in it at all, even Irina Golub is still listed, for christ's sake!

It was the 2005 Mariinsky Festival, when in the last "Artistic Evening" she was given (what an insult!) she danced the most remarkable La Valse with Merkuriev. (and Yanna Selina in the first Solo Couple and Obraztsova in the second! Amazing cast!)

It was one of her signature roles before Fateyev took over, she was more the Happy Girl at the ball than the stereotypical "Diva" and that made it all the more heartbraking. She was oficially recorded for Kultura TV in it. Two short clips: