DENVER – Since being named the first African American woman principal dancer for a major ballet company, Misty Copeland has done a lot of interviews all over the world.
But she burst into laughter when she found out who would be interviewing her on her latest stop in Denver: a five-year-old ballerina named Ruby.
Copeland’s life has been a whirlwind since last summer, when she was named a principal dancer with the American Ballet Theatre. The woman who was often called an “unlikely ballerina” had found the ultimate success.
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At a sold-out luncheon for the Women’s Foundation of Colorado on Wednesday afternoon, Copeland spoke to more than 3,000 audience members about discrimination she faced because of her skin color and her muscular body as a ballerina. Raised in poverty, living in a motel with her mother and five siblings, Copeland wants her life to be proof that anything is possible for anyone.
“It doesn’t matter what color you are. It doesn’t matter how tall you are. It doesn’t matter where you come from,” she said. “Anything is possible.”
Seeing herself reflected in Copeland, Ruby asked the only type of question a five-year-old knows how to ask: a blunt one.
“How does it feel being a brown ballerina?” Ruby asked Copeland.
“It is amazing,” she told Ruby. “It’s amazing to sit across from another brown ballerina, because there aren’t many of us and there needs to be more.”
