The Philadelphia Ballet presents Carmen and Boléro

The passions of Carmen

Principal dancer Mayara Pineiro, who will be dancing as Carmen on opening night, has faced many challenges from growing up in Havana as a student at the Cuban National Ballet School to her daring defection to the United States as a teenager. (The film Secundaria documents her story.) This season marks another new beginning: Pineiro was on maternity leave when Boléro premiered, but she’ll be dancing it this week as a mom, to baby Thiago.

It’s been a journey, from dancing Le Corsaire in her first trimester to getting ready for the new season, but in spite of the morning sickness, she said, “It was such a wonderful experience. It felt great, the way we were growing together.” Getting back in shape was hard work, but Pineiro will be dancing three roles in October, counting Lizzie Borden in Agnes de Mille’s Fall River Legend opening on October 16. “I thought it was impossible at the beginning,” she confided, “but now I am happy that it happened [that way].”

Pineiro danced in the premiere performances of Carmen. It’s a fun role, she said, and revisiting it lets her play more with it. “She is so free-spirited. She doesn’t care what people think about her. She wants to be looked at, admired. She likes to play with men; she likes to play with women. She’s just the center of attention.”

Leaping onto stage

Pineiro loves the choreography, but it’s not easy, especially the lifts: “You are upside down, you are thrown in the air!” And there are a lot of fights, all of which require the passion of Carmen as well as the skill of a dancer. Pineiro said one of her favorite parts is the death scene because of “all the feelings that she had in that moment, that she knew that he would kill her, so it was this kind of internal fight, trying to run away, but at the same time confronting him. It is so dramatic and passionate.”

She loves her first variation as well, when Carmen flies onto the stage in a gasp-worthy leap. “Everything stops, and then she arrives. And she is wearing red.” And watch her dance for Escamillo. She’s in black with a red flower, and a fan—Pineiro studied Flamenco in Cuba, and she loves the fan-work, and the way Corella has infused the ballet with Spanish dance. “It’s powerful,” she said, “the steps are so strong, [with] A lot of personality, a lot of precision.”

Boléro brings its own special challenges: “I was a little intimidated when I started learning it. There were so many steps, and you have to be so focused. You cannot relax for a second, because once you miss a step, there’s no way back.” Still, Pineiro loves it for the power that dancing together brings. There are trios and pas de deux, she said, but even those are done in groups. “Boléro is about the whole company.” It’s a fitting way to open the season.