‘The best gift I’ve ever given myself’: Why adults are returning to L.A. ballet studios

On a Tuesday in September, Mary Ruble walked up to the barre of the Westside School of Ballet in Santa Monica for a 7:45 a.m. ballet class, joining about 30 women of all different ages. They stretched and chatted until the teacher gave them their first warm-up combination — a series of stretches and pliés — and a live pianist began playing classical music from a corner of the room.

Ruble, in a black velvet and mesh leotard, was laser focused as she reléved onto the balls of her feet before gently rolling back down to first position. All the while, she kept a pen clipped to the front of her leotard and a tiny notepad on which she took notes on her instructor’s occasional corrections tucked into her black tights: activate the upper back muscles, round the elbows, lengthen the sacrum. The teacher reminded her to engage her core and relax her shoulders. Magically her spine elongated and she stood up a bit straighter than before.

It took enormous concentration, especially since Ruble had only ventured into this rigorous style of dance two years ago, at the age 40. But, to her, the challenge was thrilling.

“It’s the best gift I’ve ever given myself,” she said.

Ruble’s newfound affinity for ballet is part of a wider trend of adults who, after donning tights and tutus in their youth, are now returning to ballet studios in adulthood. Interest in adult ballet has increased by 75% over the last three to five years, according to Patti Ashby, U.S. National Director of Royal Academy of Dance, the primary ballet organization in the country that trains teachers and tracks national engagement with ballet. And the number of adult ballet summer intensive programs have nearly doubled since the pandemic, according to the weekly online ballet-centric magazine Pointe.

The trend is also alive and well on TikTok, where the popular hashtag “adult ballet” retrieves countless videos of women documenting their progress in the dance form. Professional ballerinas such as Mary Helen Bowers, with half a million followers on Instagram (@balletbeautiful), stream ballet-inspired workouts that focus on feeling beautiful while building strength. Interest in adult ballet has even intersected with the enduring fashion trend known online as #balletcore, which takes inspiration from the bows, tights, flats and chiffon that make up the classic ballet uniform. People are so interested to see these accessories in the wild that members of USC’s Kaufman School of Dance now draw thousands of observers online.

Though Los Angeles has always struggled to create a solid dance culture without a ballet company to call its own, a surge of new companies over the last decade are shifting the scene. The Los Angeles Ballet, helmed by Melissa Barak, as well as Benjamin Millepied’s Los Angeles Dance Project and the contemporary dance company BodyTraffic are infusing the ballet scene with youthful creativity and innovation. Especially after the COVID-19 pandemic, local studios such as the Marat Daukayev School of Ballet in Koreatown, the Align Ballet Method (with locations in West L.A., Silver Lake and Newport Beach), the Ballet Spot in Brentwood, Debbie Allen Dance Academy in Harvard Heights and California Dance Theater in Westlake have received an influx of adult students who are hungry for a form of in-person exercise after the pandemic’s colorless isolation.

“We have fully rebounded from the pandemic’s drop in attendance,” said California Dance Theater office manager Darby Olrich, who estimates the business’ daily classes are attended by 15 to 45 adults.

“The adult classes are a mix of professionals, college students home on break and an 80-year-old woman who just loves to do it,” Olrich said.

Similarly, in-person ballet classes are nearly at capacity at the Ballet Spot, according to its owner and founder, Eliza Tollett.

Adult ballet classes are especially popular at Westside School of Ballet, a business whose 47-year existence has made it one of the most well-known and established ballet studios in the region.

“During COVID, children and adults found themselves in some tough places emotionally and mentally and the studio was a haven for them,” Richard Tahvildaran-Jesswein, the managing director of the studio, said. “Now, in the wake of COVID, we’re experiencing this magic resurgence.”

Many of its teachers — who all offer students something different, from working on alignment to learning how to fail better — are so sought after that students will go so far as to call in to learn who’s teaching which class in advance, according to Tahvildaran-Jesswein. Because so many of the teachers have a cult following, the phone rings off the hook, he added.

Increased interest has pushed Westside Ballet to add 12 more adult dance classes to its schedule, including ballet, pointe instruction, jazz, ballroom, floor barre and theater jazz. Every day, the studio offers at least six adult classes, starting as early as 7:45 a.m. and as late as 8 p.m.

“We plan on being the Steps of the West Coast,” Tahvildaran-Jesswein said, referring to Steps on Broadway, the iconic dance studio on Manhattan’s Upper West Side. “We want to offer classes from morning to midnight because ballet is for everyone.”

Much like children’s ballet classes, dedicated adult dancers also hold recitals. Last year, the adult ballet showcase, choreographed and produced by many of Westside’s teachers, took place in the Moss Theater at New Roads School in Santa Monica. They sold 700 tickets.

Though many of the women who’ve returned to the ballet studio may have had an awkward or intimidating brush with the dancing style in their youth, their rediscovery of the craft on their own terms has helped them feel elegant, strong and beautiful. All that despite the fact that, thanks to films such as “Black Swan” or “The Red Shoes,” ballet has long lived in the societal imagination as an art form rife with competitiveness and impossible body standards.

“In the beginning, I was terrified,” Ruble said. “Once, after arriving five minutes late to class, I stayed in my car in the studio parking lot, too afraid to venture inside.”

But after attending classes, Ruble discovered ballet filled her with joy, freedom and exhilarating delight.

“I was so intimidated by ballet culture, but it’s nothing of the sort! The teachers and other dancers are kind, fun and accepting; the old stereotypes just aren’t there.”

Arabella Sommerville, 40, who attends the same class as Ruble, said that ballet is an entirely different experience for her as an adult. The Marina del Rey-based marketing firm owner recalls being mortified at the age of 8, when her mother sent her to class in baggy leggings and a bathing suit.

She said she stuck out next to all her other classmates who “were wearing the same leotard, in the same color, with perfectly pulled back hair, pink tights and so on.”

When she returned to ballet at age 26, she did so with a newfound sense of self.

“What I’ve experienced taking adult ballet is that no one is watching,” said Sommerville, who dressed in a black leotard, black nylon warm-up shorts, white tights and white Birkenstocks the day we spoke. “I used to be so afraid of what people would think, but I realize life is like an adult ballet class. No one cares. No one is watching. Everyone is just thinking about their own stuff, so you might as well go for it. The old narratives about ballet are breaking down.”

Along with offering a sense of freedom, adult ballet classes also provide attendees an opportunity to put down their phones, be present and build community.

“Humans need synchronization,” Sommerville said. “It’s healing. Sure, everyone has their own issues, but we come together in this way through dance. There’s a famous AA phrase: ‘There’s no fighting in the lifeboat.’ The same thing goes for ballet class.”

Sommerville experienced the support of her classmates firsthand when, soon after she began taking ballet class at Westside in 2021, she was diagnosed with breast cancer. While she was recovering from treatment, Ruble made her a tutu with miniature get-well notes attached to it.

“The women wrapped around me like a blanket of positive energy,” she said.

Sommerville adds that she doesn’t only feel a deep connection to her classmates in crisis, but every time she shows up for class.

“The feminine energy of the same women showing up every morning, along with the live classical music, and our synchronized movement lifts my heart,” she said. “It’s like this higher power vibrating in that room, knowing all these women have your back.”

Westside student Connie Bell, 70, who has been studying ballet for over 60 years, said that dancing at the studio allows her to feel seen in a way she rarely does. Her teachers, she says, “make me feel beautiful. And when you’re 70, no one makes you feel beautiful.”

At Westside Ballet’s adult showcase in August, I witnessed the sense of dignity these adult ballerinas carried with them. Sitting in the packed 350-seat auditorium, 61 women and 2 men performed different dance genres, from ballet to contemporary to jazz, ranging in age from 20 to 75 years old. Finally, as adults, they were getting the chance to wear the beautiful costume, don the pointe shoes and take center stage. They spun and turned, held challenging balances and leapt victoriously through the air. At no time did they act their age.

Ruble perfected her movements in sync with the music and the other dancers, her head tilted at just the right angle, her arabesque hitting the correct line, her discipline and note-taking clearly paying off.

As someone who has practiced ballet into her 40s, I knew just how hard they had to work for that moment, to feel beautiful and strong. There’s a thrill in reaching a certain lightness and transcendence — however fleeting it might be.