(bright music) (gentle music) - I was very fulfilled with my career.

I did everything that I wanted to do and more.

Every time I went on stage, I never hold back.

I mean, every single show, it was like, "That's the last show that I'm ever gonna be able to do."

The adrenaline is like a drug.

I didn't feel the floor, I didn't feel my arms, my legs.

I just felt like I was floating.

I'm saying to the audience, "Follow me," you know?

"Come with me, dance with me, be with me during this time that I'm gonna be on stage."

(audience applauding) One, two, three, four, five, six.

I would do anything for anyone to experience that.

One, two, three, four, five, six, (speaks foreign language), three, four, five, six.

(gentle music) - [Shelly] 61 seasons ago, Barbara Weisberger and George Balanchine formed a relationship and a collaboration to be able to start up what was then the Pennsylvania Ballet, which is now the Philadelphia Ballet.

Angel, who stands on the shoulders of all of those that came before him is now the artistic director, and he's been here for 10 years.

- One, two, three, (speaks foreign language).

- Being a world-renowned dancer means that he's danced just about in every major theater across the world and has worked with every major dancer there is and company.

It's really, really a treasure to have Angel able to bring that to each one of the dancers because it's helping them excel.

- And around, up, up, up, fifth.

Make sure you stretch your arms all the way and balance it.

I want the dancers to feel that I'm there 100%.

I want them to know that it's all about them.

That everything that I do every day is just for them.

And two and three and back, and one.

To me, it was never a profession, it was who I was.

(gentle music) (lighthearted music) I was born in Spain, in Madrid.

(lighthearted music continues) I have two sisters, and then later on when I was eight years old, my parents adopted my youngest sister.

After school, my mother didn't want us to be in front of the television.

So the typical thing was to take the girls to ballet class and then the boys to either karate or soccer.

And I went to karate for like a week and a half, and one of the other kids in the class got his nose broken.

He started to bleed and scream, and I was only six years old, so I got really scared and I said to my mom, "I don't wanna go back."

So my mom used to take me with my sisters to ballet school and she would say, "I have to run some errands.

Can you just sit here watching your sisters dance?

And then I'll be right back."

She thought I was gonna be up on the ceiling, you know, just jumping around and being a menace.

One day, and I got up on the room and I started to do turns and jumps, and that's how I really started.

For the very first moment that I started to dance, my parents and the teachers, they used to see that I was free.

(inspiring music) The school that I was in Madrid, had a small company.

I was in that company for four years, but I was not really fulfilled artistically.

It was more of a modern company, it wasn't a classical company.

And stronger.

I decided to stop dancing.

I stopped dancing for like four or five months, and I was actually gonna become a carpenter.

And then a friend of mine said, "Why don't you go to a competition and see what your level is?"

And he was right.

I mean, I went to the competition and I won gold medal.

In the jury was Natalia Makarova, which was a very famous prima ballerina from American Ballet Theater.

And she said to me, "Do you know what you're gonna do now?"

And I said, "Well, no, I was gonna become a carpenter, so I don't really know."

And she said, "Well, let me talk to the director of American Ballet Theater.

I'll let you know."

She did.

The director of American Ballet Theater was Kevin McKenzie, and he said, "Catch a flight.

Come here to New York and take class with the company."

So I did.

He actually offered me a soloist contract.

About nine, 10 months later, I was promoted to principal dancer.

I was there for almost 20 years.

There were some really amazing moments that when I think about it, I'm like, "Wow, this happened."

- Hello, this is our friend, Angel Corella.

- Yeah, yeah, Angel is a dancer.

- He dances with American Ballet Theater.

- Going to "Sesame Street" and dance with the alphabet, dancing for almost every president at the White House, dancing for the Queen of England, doing a commercial for Rolex, doing a commercial with Gwyneth Paltrow for Freixenet.

So much happening that it didn't give me time to digest what was going on.

I used to have fans that used to come to see me dance.

After, they would come backstage and I will sign their autograph, talk to them for a while.

And then I'll start going home and they'll walk with me and talking, I was like, "I don't think I know you."

And the fact is, it was that they felt like they knew me because they had been part of what I was doing on stage.

Towards the end of my career, that's when I actually start to really feel like, "Oh, okay, there's a big responsibility with who I am and what I do."

And when I said, "Okay, now it's time for me to hang my shoes and give the opportunity to the younger generation," I wanted people to remember me with that energy and that happiness that I had on stage, and not just feeling like, "Oh, maybe he should have left a little bit sooner."

After I retired from ABT, we started our company in Spain in 2007, 2008.

We created the Barcelona Ballet.

The company was running for five years, but in Spain, we don't have the tax deduction loss that there's here in America.

So if the government changes, then the support changes, and that's what happened.

And the new government said, "We don't really need a ballet company," and that's how we closed the company.

And unfortunately, that was a very difficult time for me, trying to come back and share with my country this amazing project.

To be rejected like that, it was really hard.

- Angel was leaving Spain and coming back to the United States, and he heard about this search committee with the Pennsylvania Ballet.

And he decided to ask for an interview.

We knew who an Angel Corella was, one of the greatest dancers of his generation.

Everything in life is timing and you have to be lucky.

Sometimes, you get really lucky.

- Good, one.

Present the heel, two.

- We really wanted someone who could take the ballet to the next level.

And Angel, having been a great dancer and one of the top his generation, if not the.

I saw someone with, you know, tremendous talent as well as grit and determination.

His sister had danced for the Pennsylvania Ballet, called at that time.

- She danced with Philadelphia Ballet for two years and then she moved to New York to be with me, and she became a soloist dancer with American Ballet Theater.

I used to come to visit my sister almost every weekend to here, to Philadelphia, and see her dance and see the company.

So I was very familiar with the company.

There was a connection there.

There was something that I felt familiar with.

- He talked really fast, and was really eager.

And the more we learned about him, the more excited we got to make him our choice.

- I probably didn't give them even time to process everything that I was saying.

- He said, "I want the Pennsylvania Ballet to be the best ballet company in the world."

We had found our artistic director.

(distant engine rumbling) - Thank you, thanks.

(door clacks shut) (gentle music) I wanted to create a very unique and very dynamic company for all the dancers to do all kinds of styles and all kinds of different repertoires.

(gentle music continues) Keep the Balanchine tradition.

(gentle music continues) And also do new repertoire, do some of the choreographers that they're very well-known, and then discover new choreographers.

Discover what the future of choreography and the future of dance will be.

When you go to see the Philadelphia Ballet, it should represent everyone in the community.

I think that we're seeing now more African Americans, we're seeing more Hispanics, people from Asia.

- [Shelly] There are dancers from 13 or 14 different countries.

And I think because Angel has such a reputation, a lot of dancers around the world really do wanna come here and work with him.

- If Angel had an open position today, we'd probably have hundreds or a thousand resumes because I've seen him transform dancers from this level to that level in a couple of years.

- [Angel] Fifth, up, hips forward, and then straight up, good.

- I've had a connection to Angel via ballet, pretty much my whole life.

He was actually my first image of ballet.

I was probably seven or eight years old and I was having my breakfast cereal and watching "Sesame Street," and I saw him do the dance with the alphabet.

Angel's power on stage and energy really excited me and made me wanna go take the summer intensive at American Ballet Theater, which is when I actually got to meet him in person for the first time.

- He used to come to me after the show and give me his program and I would sign his autograph.

He'd actually post a picture on Instagram when he was a little boy.

- [Sterling] That was a very memorable moment for me to meet my idol at the time.

His work ethic, his focus has really rubbed off on me, and how I wanna conduct myself on a daily basis and perform on stage for our audiences.

- [Angel] Of course, there are certain things like nice line, nice feet, that they can turn, they can jump.

Good, that's right.

But even with that, I think the main quality is passion.

One, two, three, four, five, six, one.

Good.

- Angel is a lot of things, but I think almost above all else, he's passionate, and holds us all to a very high standard.

But I think it all comes from a place of him knowing what we can do and him believing in us.

(light music) - When he sees that you're ready, he will give you the opportunity.

And that is everything for a dancer.

That keeps you alive, that keeps you wanting more, and that keeps you grateful.

- You can tell that when he's giving you and the studio his all, coming from the depths of his heart and passion for ballet, and passion for making his company the best it can be.

- And he loves to be in the studio.

He is actually there one-on-one with the dancers, working tirelessly to get everything to perfection.

And more than that, he also has everything memorized in his mind from every ballet he's ever danced, as well as the music.

- I have a photographic memory, so when I was a dancer, I used to learn every single part.

I mean, I learned all the chord, the ballet, the girls, the guys, the extras, every single person.

So now it's all up here.

- He does the character of man, and all of a sudden, he switches in two seconds and does the woman.

(Ashton and Sydney laughing) I think just as good.

- Yeah, yeah.

- Yeah, just as good.

- Just as good, yeah.

- He was so masculine and entitled.

- I look beautiful like you.

Down and then you're gonna go (vocalizing).

- I think to be able to do that and to be able to also captivate us every time, it's just amazing.

- [Angel] Very rarely, I have to look online or look on the video or on the notes about a ballet that I've already performed.

- He sings a lot, which is one of my favorite things about working with him.

If we're in the theater, for example, this is one thing he does all the time.

We'll mark through the piece and he'll sing it, like, over the microphone, the whole thing with all of the accoutrement (vocalizing).

(Angel vocalizing) (everyone laughing) (Angel vocalizing) - He'll just sing the whole thing.

And it's just, like, it's brings you so much joy because usually, it's something so mundane for dancers when we're doing a blocking or spacing rehearsal, or we're in the studio kind of walking through something, it just makes it much more positive and happy, and kind of makes you giggle.

- He sings well beyond his range, sometimes.

- Yes.

- And every note is a chun.

- Yeah.

(both vocalizing) (Angel vocalizing) (light music) - The man knows every note of music in every ballet.

When he sings his stuff, he doesn't miss anything.

- Poor thing, she has to suffer my singing all the time.

When I say to Martha, "Can you go from (vocalizing)," and she's like, "Okay, I got it."

She understands right away.

(light music building up) - He can move faster if he just sings.

No, he doesn't drive me crazy.

- He works sort of the way he moves.

Like, he moves his head quickly, he thinks quickly, he's quick.

And so, it's a great challenge to keep up with the rate at which he's dispensing the information and expecting folks to understand it and put it into effect.

- Three, and front and two, and one and two and three, and double back and double side, and double front and double side, (speaks in foreign language), and two and three and (speaks in foreign language).

(majestic orchestral music) - [Shelly] We have a live orchestra, which is incredibly important.

- It enhances the experience in every possible way.

When it's orchestral music, that connection between dancers and conductor and orchestra, and by extension, the audience, is part of what makes this medium great.

- She walks out into that pit and the audience goes crazy.

(audience applauding) (bright enthusiastic music) And she knows ballet so well and works so well with Angel because he has this music acuity that I think that they have such a nice collaboration.

- It's this tremendous love for the art form and I think that comes across and is communicated very clearly to everyone who works with him and who listens to him speak.

- He just never fails to have a smile on his face.

You know, no matter what is going on, what difficult situations are happening, he really has an ability to bring that positivity to the room, and it's infectious.

- Oh, my God.

- You look great.

Yeah, you look great.

(gentle music) I first met Angel when I was still a dancer with the American Ballet Theater.

And he had come over from Spain and he was this amazing dancer.

I totally remember the day that he came in, and I was just shocked at how good he was.

She goes out, let her come to you.

(gentle music continues) And you don't really even need to do much.

- Not only he's a fabulous rehearsal director, but he's a wonderful person.

He was a soloist with ABT and I remember the first show that I danced with American Ballet Theater.

- He was doing, you know, his usual thousand pirouettes and everything.

He came off stage and his leather shoe sewed at the bottom, completely blown out.

- Middle of the first variation, the shoe just broke in half.

- I just said, "Well, this is the only thing we can do."

You didn't have an extra pair of shoes backstage, we didn't.

And so I just slapped some tape around it and sent him back out.

- He should have been like, you know, "You're a soloist.

I don't want you to get promoted.

I want you to fail.

You know, you go out on stage with your shoe all open and see what you can do."

I still have those shoes at home with the tape.

My mom put them on the wall.

- When Angel was appointed the artistic director of the then Pennsylvania Ballet, I reached out to him and I said, "I'd love to work with you."

You're here.

- He was a principal dancer with New York City Ballet.

And although he's been a huge star, he really respects what we're doing.

- [Charles] We try to get the best out of our dancers in the best possible way, and he's just unwavering in that.

I'm just honored and very, very pleased to be part of it.

- I think that that is what fulfills me and what makes me going every day.

(light playful music) At this moment, I would say that almost every dancer in the company could do principle parts, but then we have only a certain amount of shows and certain amount of roles.

So it's like, "Okay, I could put this dancer, but I could, oh, this dancer would be amazing.

Oh, this dancer too."

And it becomes a problem to have so many good dancers, but it's a nice problem to have.

- I am only a principal dancer because of all the opportunities I have gotten here.

I did "Carmen" last year.

He choreographed for me mostly and that feels always so special.

- I think it's his first full length ballet that was totally built from his vision.

- Yes, the greatest dancer of his generation, but also a great choreographer and mainly a great teacher.

And very seldom is a great dancer, a great teacher.

It just doesn't usually go that way.

- Angel's so talented.

I love how Angel can just rearrange a ballet to just make it so exciting.

- Angel is very unique in the sense that he loves to be involved in every part of building a ballet.

And "Carmen" was absolutely amazing.

He was involved in the lighting, he was involved in the staging.

I know he looked in Spain for a lot of ideas because he was bringing his heritage to "Carmen," and so that also you could see throughout the ballet, that it was very traditional and very in line with what he might see in Spain.

(audience cheering and applauding) (gentle music) - So you've been working on the white one tutus?

- Yes.

- Oh, great.

- Working with Angel is very different than working with majority of directors that I've worked with.

He really has an eye for costuming, and he loves to get his hands into costuming and be a part of what it is that we are doing.

- That would be great.

I don't want it completely flat.

- Okay.

- But it should have that feeling of falling down, but not that much.

- I love it, a little bit of drape.

- Something in between, yeah.

- A little bit of wave.

- Yeah.

- Yeah, but just more structure so that it still does look like a tutu.

With Angel, we really are going back and forth.

He stays very close to wardrobe, and we make sure that the end product is really a product of both of us.

- Great, fabulous.

- Yeah.

- Thank you.

- Yeah, you're welcome.

- Thanks, yeah, thanks.

- And one of the fun things that we love to watch is he'll get on the internet and look for costumes himself, and then bring them to wardrobe and say, "How could we use this for this ballet?"

- No one in the audience would know that small pieces come from everywhere.

I love that he likes to shop.

I also love to shop.

- He's also trying to save us money, but this is something Angel does.

When he takes something on, he gives 150% and he makes things happen.

(paper rustling) (light music) All the work he did during the digital process during COVID was pretty amazing.

We had to completely turn things upside down and figure out how to do digital performances, and that was really an experience.

(light strained music) (gentle music) The board absolutely adores Angel, and they're so proud of the work that he has brought to the company and how he has forged forward over the past 10 years.

- I was amazed at the board from the very beginning, have give me their full support 'cause that's what made it possible to take the company where we are today.

- Angel arrived.

He walked into this interview exuding all of this energy, and passion, and dreams.

He laid it out right there.

And for me, I always brag that when he walked in and after this interview, this was over.

- She was sitting there with a big smile and she was listening to everything that I was saying, and she was actually almost dancing to what I was saying.

- Of course, I was smiling.

Yes, you bet, Angel.

And ever hopeful that you were gonna be our new artistic director.

- She's one of the most lovable and most well-known person in the arts in Philadelphia.

- [Louise] Just to know these dancers, they do something that is so hard and they make it look effortless.

(gentle music) - [David] Our current studios are named after Louise Reed.

She's been a force of nature within our ballet world for a long time.

- David Hoffman has been like a family member to me.

Very generous and very real relationship that I have with David.

He hosts events all the time, but especially the Red Rose Farm event during the spring season.

It's a great festival that we do now every year.

It's a big party for the dancers and for all the audiences that come to see us.

(gentle music) - Shelly Power was hired seven years ago.

She had spent several years at Prix de Lausannne, a major international dance competition.

- Shelly is very powerful.

And at the same time, just very approachable, which I appreciate.

I've learned so much from her.

And Shelly knows how to get the job done.

- I don't know who has more energy, Angel or Shelly.

We are so fortunate to have these two people working together.

(gentle music continues) - Hello.

- Hey, Angel.

- Hi.

- How's rehearsal going?

- Going really well.

- It's always a give and take, and that's something we naturally fell into, which is, in my world, pretty unusual.

- When she says to me, you know, "This is possible, this is not possible."

I understand right away that when she said it's not possible, it's true that it's not possible.

- There's always a natural tension between budgeting and picking repertoire, but Angel is always willing to figure out another way to make things happen.

- I always say that she's my right hand and my left hand both.

(gentle music) - Where the Pennsylvania Ballet was to where, you know, the Philadelphia Ballet is today, was a dream.

His enthusiasm and where he saw that the the Philadelphia Ballet could end up was so inspiring.

He values his dancers and he respects his dancers.

And yes, I'm sure he pushes them hard.

I know he has very high expectations, which has been part of his success.

- [David] The audience, I think, are much more engaged than they were 10 years ago.

The number of standing ovations in a given performance, I think are up significantly.

(audience applauding) I think the audience is more diverse.

- [Angel] The world is changing, and I think that inclusion is really, really important for any company in society.

And that's where we are aiming for our future.

- [Shelly] Debra Austin, we are very proud to claim that she was our first principal, Black ballerina, and throughout the United States, outside of Dance Theater of Harlem.

So really we were breaking boundaries at that time in the '80s.

- When I joined the board, I wanted to do something and be purposeful and to be productive.

So I thought, you know, perhaps during the summer months, we can invite young dancers to have an opportunity to study ballet from world-class instructors.

Hello, everyone.

Welcome to Ballet Bootcamp.

How's it been so far?

The Evelyn Ebo Ballet Bootcamp purpose is to invite students from all over the Philadelphia School District, ages eight to 18 at all levels, to be able to come in and experience, and have accessibility to the School of Philadelphia Ballet and classical training.

And I think that just exposing, having the access is the very thing that we need to let young dancers know there's a place for you.

Angel has actually sat in on some of the ballet bootcamps.

He is interested and supportive of all that we're doing right now.

- [Angel] It's extremely important that when you see talent and you see a kid that has a future in the ballet world, that they get that opportunity and they get that support to be able to achieve it.

It's gonna be good for us and it's gonna be good for the arts in general to develop this talent.

(everyone cheering and applauding) - [Shelly] And certainly, when we have our new building and our expansion, we will have our dance innovation lab.

We're gonna be able to bring more and more students in.

- [David] And we will have totally adequate rehearsal space for both the company.

- [Instructor] That's right, good, Ashley.

- [David] And a growing school.

- What's really important in the school is our trainee program.

So the trainee programs are building to go into the second company.

And then the second company, of course, is a bridge into the full company.

We also wanted to engage the community in a space where they could come, they could watch a light performance or a rehearsal in the Dance Innovation lab, or watch creativity happening right in front of us.

Lighting design, choreography, or a pop-up class, where they could just go in and take a free class.

The ballet has been through hills and valleys like every company has, but to be able to say we've been here going into our 61st season, it's quite a pinnacle for the organization overall.

And to have an artistic director with us for 10 years, and we look forward to his next 10 years.

- He has that power to make you stop and be like, "Wow, can I just admire how much he has done in his life?"

And that's such a treat for us - Yeah.

- Because it's hard to find directors that have had all this experience.

- Sometimes, we get the pleasure to sit in the audience on the other side of the curtain and watch some of the performances that we're not in.

And I'm just sometimes moved to tears because I'm just so proud and inspired of what I'm a part of.

And that's because of Angel.

- Philly is very lucky to have him and we're very lucky to have him.

- He is very special.

- I will do everything for the dancers because they're the soul and heart of the company.

So I'm very glad that they feel that way.

People say, "Don't you miss dancing?"

And I say, "No, because I dance every night with the dancers."

It's hard for me to stay still, to stay sitting.

I'm in the back of the house just dancing with them because it's such an amazing feeling that these dancers, they trust you and they believe in you.

There's not anything holding me back that I wanted to do.

Now it's all about them.

- He's done everything for this company and he has dreams.

Oh my, we're not there yet.

We have dreams.

(music swells to crescendo) (audience cheering and applauding) (gentle inspiring music) (audience cheering and applauding) (bright music)