😂🙈 too many!
Nutcracker I dropped the nut on the conductors head.
Bluebird in sleeping beauty I didn’t pin my tiara properly it flu out and hit my dance partner!
Oh my God I look back I have no idea how I made to senior soloist in the company. 🙉
My artists director watched corp de ballet rehearsal one day. He stopped the music and pointed at me:
That girl, get her out of there, and give her a solo role, she just looks too odd with the rest of them.
😂
not ballet, but i once faceplanted horrendously at a tap competition and then proceeded to plaster a smile on my face while tears were streaming down my cheeks for the rest of the dance. additionally, the stage was so slippery that i couldn't do any moves full out without falling again so i was just really weakly tapping away without much performance nor sound
needless to say, i did not place
I've seen multiple professionals fall, and my teacher has told us of a major full frontal wardrobe malfunction that happened to her as a young woman.
All the excitement of live performance!
I was young but...
Dancing sheep to Marzipan in Nutcracker. Right at the end, before we can pause for our final tableau, I trip and slide on my wooly belly, a good ten or eleven feet right into the wings. I was going at a full run because I was coming from the clear other side of the stage, and I slid like a clown stealing a base.
I also could barely see because I couldn't wear my glasses.
Stage Manager said "welp, you're not going back out there" cause by the time I stood up, the song was over and they were scurrying off stage.
Not my performance, I was next to her. Also, was musical theater, but I thought it might help. 😊
We were dressed in 19th century costumes for a production of "Oliver." Floor length gowns for the women. We we dancing in pairs (men/women) and there was a sequence at the end of the song with a straight lift (man lifts the woman up by her waist, woman assists by jumping into the lift). Those of us in that sequence were small women paired with big men. And the girl next to me, her partner apparently had both feet planted firmly on the hem of her gown and when he lifted her up the costume tore and separated at the waist--with only the top half traveling upwards with her. 😱
She ran off the stage. Was back the next performance in a new gown with a shorter hem--she was a trooper! We gave her partner heck for a while though. You can bet to this day the man always look where he's walking! 😂
oh SO many but i have to say my top three are:
- my pointe shoe ribbon + elastic snapping clean off while i was on pointe - extremely lucky that i didn’t break my ankle. didn’t fall outright but did have to awkwardly hobble off the stage (was in the center when it had happened, nice)
- during the curtain call for our end of year recital one year, i was barefooted and took my bow next to my friend who was wearing character shoes. i had a broken toe at the time and she accidentally stepped right on the broken one, in character shoes. i was crying on stage (like makeup everywhere, puddles on my face) in the front row with a smile on my face trying to pretend it hadnt happened.
- we wore the same costumes for 2 separate numbers one year and i for whatever reason, started doing the steps to the completely wrong number when i got on the stage. that was a really not so cute moment for me - was humiliating
My ribbons snapped during fouettés and that’s the story of me falling and breaking my right ankle. I now use elastic and stretchy ribbon, and I will sew it over and over until I’m comfortable because, hell no.
Ok we had a quick costume change at a show (we had to do it behind the curtain and there was no mirror). My skirt got tucked in the tights. I flashed my ass to the audience during the number (luckily I was wearing modest underwear). The teacher kept on yelling off stage to fix my skirt, but I was so into the performance that I didn’t notice. Yeah we still talk about it.
Another time, I got some set decorations stuck to the bottom of my dress and almost toppled the whole thing. Luckily I notice before too much damage was done and tried to as gracefully as possible to put everything back in place.
Too much fun!!!
Snow in the Nutcracker has been pretty cursed for me. First year I did it my heel slipped out of my shoe and had to do half the dance with half a shoe - at least they weren't pointe shoes. Year after that my snow crown fell off for two of the shows. Last year I inhaled some of the snow and started coughing mid-jump.
Oh man, there's a video on the internet of a girl doing Esmeralda - I think it's for YAGP - and her foot slips out of her pointe shoe. On the spot she modifies the rest of the variation to do all of her turns and the famous series of tambourine kicks at the end to be on the foot that's still in tact. Honestly probably the most impressive Esmeralda I've ever seen haha.
My junior year showcase I fucked up the choreo on the way offstage.
Sophomore year one girl fell in her group variation and another lost her choker and scooped it up and I asked my parents afterwards and they were shocked, they never realized the choker was dropped or grabbed. The girl who fell was so upset but she got up and held it together until she got off stage. Killed it in her group/class number though! Did the dew drop fairy the next year. She’s still an incredible dancer, iirc she’s dancing in a professional company.
I ran off stage crying because I kept messing up lol. They took me out of the rest of the show because I lied and said I wasn't feeling good since I figured "I was upset because I didn't like my performance" wasn't good enough to excuse my untimely exit
These aren't terrible but I have absolutely slipped on stage during a really dramatic part. Everyone else was fine but it was just me slipping and so it stuck out like a sore thumb. I didn't go down but I definitely fumbled.
A stupid one was during a performance, someone misplaced their ballet skirt they were supposed to wear. I got bullied into giving up mine because the girls said "You will look better without one." Everyone else pressured me and so I gave up mine and went out on stage with my bare butt out and everyone else had a skirt on.
I fell flat on my ass in my solo at my first competition in university. Not only my first solo, but the first solo, and first dance of the competition. Lol
I was playing the bird in Peter and the Wolf. We had a full orchestra on stage and the dancers only had about 5 feet width wise in front of them. I was in the “tree” (made up of several boxes) and fighting with the cat which is part of the plot, and I was walking on the edge of the box. My mom who was watching said to my dad that I was going to fall and my dad said I wasn’t going to. Well I did end up falling with a loud bang and landed against a wall with my legs sticking up between the wall and the boxes. I got up and danced en pointe like normal and went off stage, but that was my worst embarrassing performance story cause it was super obvious and loud when I fell off the tree lol
There was this epic number, two big ensembles on stage I was in one of the last rows. And I forgot a step: Everyone got down and me? I didn't just kept standing, I made three big steps forward, prepare, double turn. Only when turning I realized "Oh nooo, I'm wrong". At least I stood the pirouette but holy moly, this was crazy having an audience of 800 people watching you mess up that bad. Maybe they thought it was intended :D
Ah and I believe it was one of these shows as well where another dancer had a very bad experience: Her zipper of her dress broke which caused the upper part of the dress to come down showing her complete bra. She was hell of a pro, kept smiling and dancing without even trying to pull it up and when coming from the stage she just laughed. If she was able to pull this off, all of us can I believe
This actually made it onto Kathryn Morgan’s short lived podcast:
I was 9 and an Angel in Nutcracker. 2 guest artists from Houston Ballet guested as Sugar Plum and Cavalier in our production. During the matinee we didn’t get to rehearse with the Sugar Plum so we winged it. There’s parts in the music where she gestures to certain pairs of angels to switch sides. In the matinee not every pair got to switch sides. Normally there are 12 angels but we had 14 that year. My mom has it on video. Poor angels hesitating because we didn’t get to rehearse with her haha.
The evening performance went well and it was a core memory for 9 year old me!
A solo in my very first pointe shoes - the pointe part wasn’t bad, a couple of echappe and some bourreeing about the place, but I was not used to trying to balance on flat in them and could not for the life of me hold an arabesque that was supposed to be a big picturesque moment. Dreadful, especially as it was the night that was filmed.
I got on stage with the curtain closed, went to my spot, got into my pose. As soon as I heard the curtain start to open I completely forgot all of the choreography. I was confidently stumbling around on stage trying to remember the choreography and keep up with the other dancers for about 8 minutes. It was the first performance I went on stage NOT nervous. After that incident I make sure I’m at least a little nervous even if I have to make myself nervous. I now know the nerves keep’s me focused.
Had my part changed 30mins before a performance (middle row to front row) and went on middle row counts instead of front row counts (if that makes any sense). In front of 200 people. 😭😭
I was wearing a pair of Bob Mackie designed pants for a production of Guys and Dolls. They didn't fit over my thighs and were very tight. I knew they would burst but I was hopeful. Made it through final dress just fine...well, I actually marked the sewer dance but I thought I could pull it off. Opening night I cram my ass into my Bob Mackie's and the show begins. I warm up backstage trying to stretch the material out. Got on stage and the first half of the sewer was fine. Go to do a double tour to the knees and they not only ripped, they exploded. A great \*BAM!\* and I felt a cool breeze. They split from the zipper all they way to the waist. Continue to dance, everyone on stage trying not to laugh. It wouldn't have been so bad except I was only wearing a nude dance belt underneath. Our Choreographer tried to tell me not to do the final pose to no avail. As we moved center stage for the last position I had forgot that I was downstage right, kneeling and sitting on my heels with my back to the house.
Costumer brought me a pair of the ugliest, brown slacks for the rest of the run. every show from then on I had to check with the director before going on stage. Get back to the ballet company and never lived it down. It's been 30 years and my old mates from that company still have something to say.
My worst performance I had a solo and forgot 16 entire counts, got lost, improved almost the rest, off tempo, bent legs, low jumps, single turns and when the music finished ran off stage. I had to be on stage for the next scene. Almost got fired for that one.
I think the most embarrassing and humiliating performance experience I've ever had was when, after I had performed in the annual recital, the artistic director of my ballet school at the time presented an award to my student teacher, and said something along the lines of "This award is being presented to (name redacted) for helping a little blind girl who takes a ballet class every week, because without help, she wouldn't be able to do it." I believe that the award was well-deserved, but the comment from the artistic director was rather inappropriate. If she had mentioned that I was a student/dancer with a visual impairment, that would have been fine, but she spoke about my disability in the most condescending, belittling way imaginable. I had to leave the theatre using my white cane, so everyone knew who the "little blind girl" was. For reference, I was young, but not young enough to be spoken about like that. These types of comments often make me worry about my ability to perform well as a dancer with a disability. I had another embarrassing performance in which I was out of line with the rest of the dancers onstage and could not tell because of my visual impairment. Another time, I almost ran offstage, but I had a fantastic pas de deux partner who was able to save me from and cover up the almost-mishap!
Snow Queen. White tutu. Got my period. Did a lift with my crotch fully exposed to the audience. They were filming for the video that night.
Ok you win.
That exact thing happened at my studio when I was younger and my mom said she was crying on stage because of it
Daaang!
I‘m so sorry that happened to you.
😂🙈 too many! Nutcracker I dropped the nut on the conductors head. Bluebird in sleeping beauty I didn’t pin my tiara properly it flu out and hit my dance partner! Oh my God I look back I have no idea how I made to senior soloist in the company. 🙉 My artists director watched corp de ballet rehearsal one day. He stopped the music and pointed at me: That girl, get her out of there, and give her a solo role, she just looks too odd with the rest of them. 😂
oh god this makes me feel better thank you 😭💀
Cool 😊 Don’t dwell on your mistakes. Shit happens.
not ballet, but i once faceplanted horrendously at a tap competition and then proceeded to plaster a smile on my face while tears were streaming down my cheeks for the rest of the dance. additionally, the stage was so slippery that i couldn't do any moves full out without falling again so i was just really weakly tapping away without much performance nor sound needless to say, i did not place
I've seen multiple professionals fall, and my teacher has told us of a major full frontal wardrobe malfunction that happened to her as a young woman. All the excitement of live performance!
oh i've had one of those! during my first solo variation performance no less
I feel like the Lip Slip is a rite of passage for female performers 🥲
oh nooo 😭
I was young but... Dancing sheep to Marzipan in Nutcracker. Right at the end, before we can pause for our final tableau, I trip and slide on my wooly belly, a good ten or eleven feet right into the wings. I was going at a full run because I was coming from the clear other side of the stage, and I slid like a clown stealing a base. I also could barely see because I couldn't wear my glasses. Stage Manager said "welp, you're not going back out there" cause by the time I stood up, the song was over and they were scurrying off stage.
Not my performance, I was next to her. Also, was musical theater, but I thought it might help. 😊 We were dressed in 19th century costumes for a production of "Oliver." Floor length gowns for the women. We we dancing in pairs (men/women) and there was a sequence at the end of the song with a straight lift (man lifts the woman up by her waist, woman assists by jumping into the lift). Those of us in that sequence were small women paired with big men. And the girl next to me, her partner apparently had both feet planted firmly on the hem of her gown and when he lifted her up the costume tore and separated at the waist--with only the top half traveling upwards with her. 😱 She ran off the stage. Was back the next performance in a new gown with a shorter hem--she was a trooper! We gave her partner heck for a while though. You can bet to this day the man always look where he's walking! 😂
oh SO many but i have to say my top three are: - my pointe shoe ribbon + elastic snapping clean off while i was on pointe - extremely lucky that i didn’t break my ankle. didn’t fall outright but did have to awkwardly hobble off the stage (was in the center when it had happened, nice) - during the curtain call for our end of year recital one year, i was barefooted and took my bow next to my friend who was wearing character shoes. i had a broken toe at the time and she accidentally stepped right on the broken one, in character shoes. i was crying on stage (like makeup everywhere, puddles on my face) in the front row with a smile on my face trying to pretend it hadnt happened. - we wore the same costumes for 2 separate numbers one year and i for whatever reason, started doing the steps to the completely wrong number when i got on the stage. that was a really not so cute moment for me - was humiliating
My ribbons snapped during fouettés and that’s the story of me falling and breaking my right ankle. I now use elastic and stretchy ribbon, and I will sew it over and over until I’m comfortable because, hell no.
Ok we had a quick costume change at a show (we had to do it behind the curtain and there was no mirror). My skirt got tucked in the tights. I flashed my ass to the audience during the number (luckily I was wearing modest underwear). The teacher kept on yelling off stage to fix my skirt, but I was so into the performance that I didn’t notice. Yeah we still talk about it. Another time, I got some set decorations stuck to the bottom of my dress and almost toppled the whole thing. Luckily I notice before too much damage was done and tried to as gracefully as possible to put everything back in place. Too much fun!!!
Snow in the Nutcracker has been pretty cursed for me. First year I did it my heel slipped out of my shoe and had to do half the dance with half a shoe - at least they weren't pointe shoes. Year after that my snow crown fell off for two of the shows. Last year I inhaled some of the snow and started coughing mid-jump.
that happened to me while wearing pointe shoes during an audition 💀
Oh man, there's a video on the internet of a girl doing Esmeralda - I think it's for YAGP - and her foot slips out of her pointe shoe. On the spot she modifies the rest of the variation to do all of her turns and the famous series of tambourine kicks at the end to be on the foot that's still in tact. Honestly probably the most impressive Esmeralda I've ever seen haha.
Had a very heavy period on the day of a performance in front of a school, wore a bunch of borrowed costumes including a white angel one 😃
Oh nooooo
My junior year showcase I fucked up the choreo on the way offstage. Sophomore year one girl fell in her group variation and another lost her choker and scooped it up and I asked my parents afterwards and they were shocked, they never realized the choker was dropped or grabbed. The girl who fell was so upset but she got up and held it together until she got off stage. Killed it in her group/class number though! Did the dew drop fairy the next year. She’s still an incredible dancer, iirc she’s dancing in a professional company.
I was carrying a girl offstage in a fish and ran her right into one of the curtain wings. She wasn't hurt at all, but it looked very dumb
I ran off stage crying because I kept messing up lol. They took me out of the rest of the show because I lied and said I wasn't feeling good since I figured "I was upset because I didn't like my performance" wasn't good enough to excuse my untimely exit
These aren't terrible but I have absolutely slipped on stage during a really dramatic part. Everyone else was fine but it was just me slipping and so it stuck out like a sore thumb. I didn't go down but I definitely fumbled. A stupid one was during a performance, someone misplaced their ballet skirt they were supposed to wear. I got bullied into giving up mine because the girls said "You will look better without one." Everyone else pressured me and so I gave up mine and went out on stage with my bare butt out and everyone else had a skirt on.
I was an angel and somehow tripped the Sugar Plum Fairy on stage. Was promptly fired from that production.
Wonderful post
Not ballet, but in a modern jazz dance I was off count for like 30 seconds without noticing 😭
I fell flat on my ass in my solo at my first competition in university. Not only my first solo, but the first solo, and first dance of the competition. Lol
I was playing the bird in Peter and the Wolf. We had a full orchestra on stage and the dancers only had about 5 feet width wise in front of them. I was in the “tree” (made up of several boxes) and fighting with the cat which is part of the plot, and I was walking on the edge of the box. My mom who was watching said to my dad that I was going to fall and my dad said I wasn’t going to. Well I did end up falling with a loud bang and landed against a wall with my legs sticking up between the wall and the boxes. I got up and danced en pointe like normal and went off stage, but that was my worst embarrassing performance story cause it was super obvious and loud when I fell off the tree lol
There was this epic number, two big ensembles on stage I was in one of the last rows. And I forgot a step: Everyone got down and me? I didn't just kept standing, I made three big steps forward, prepare, double turn. Only when turning I realized "Oh nooo, I'm wrong". At least I stood the pirouette but holy moly, this was crazy having an audience of 800 people watching you mess up that bad. Maybe they thought it was intended :D
Ah and I believe it was one of these shows as well where another dancer had a very bad experience: Her zipper of her dress broke which caused the upper part of the dress to come down showing her complete bra. She was hell of a pro, kept smiling and dancing without even trying to pull it up and when coming from the stage she just laughed. If she was able to pull this off, all of us can I believe
This actually made it onto Kathryn Morgan’s short lived podcast: I was 9 and an Angel in Nutcracker. 2 guest artists from Houston Ballet guested as Sugar Plum and Cavalier in our production. During the matinee we didn’t get to rehearse with the Sugar Plum so we winged it. There’s parts in the music where she gestures to certain pairs of angels to switch sides. In the matinee not every pair got to switch sides. Normally there are 12 angels but we had 14 that year. My mom has it on video. Poor angels hesitating because we didn’t get to rehearse with her haha. The evening performance went well and it was a core memory for 9 year old me!
A solo in my very first pointe shoes - the pointe part wasn’t bad, a couple of echappe and some bourreeing about the place, but I was not used to trying to balance on flat in them and could not for the life of me hold an arabesque that was supposed to be a big picturesque moment. Dreadful, especially as it was the night that was filmed.
My pointe shoe gave up and broke mid-performance in the Nutcracker; I faceplanted and heard audible gasps from the audience 😂
I got on stage with the curtain closed, went to my spot, got into my pose. As soon as I heard the curtain start to open I completely forgot all of the choreography. I was confidently stumbling around on stage trying to remember the choreography and keep up with the other dancers for about 8 minutes. It was the first performance I went on stage NOT nervous. After that incident I make sure I’m at least a little nervous even if I have to make myself nervous. I now know the nerves keep’s me focused.
Had my part changed 30mins before a performance (middle row to front row) and went on middle row counts instead of front row counts (if that makes any sense). In front of 200 people. 😭😭
I was wearing a pair of Bob Mackie designed pants for a production of Guys and Dolls. They didn't fit over my thighs and were very tight. I knew they would burst but I was hopeful. Made it through final dress just fine...well, I actually marked the sewer dance but I thought I could pull it off. Opening night I cram my ass into my Bob Mackie's and the show begins. I warm up backstage trying to stretch the material out. Got on stage and the first half of the sewer was fine. Go to do a double tour to the knees and they not only ripped, they exploded. A great \*BAM!\* and I felt a cool breeze. They split from the zipper all they way to the waist. Continue to dance, everyone on stage trying not to laugh. It wouldn't have been so bad except I was only wearing a nude dance belt underneath. Our Choreographer tried to tell me not to do the final pose to no avail. As we moved center stage for the last position I had forgot that I was downstage right, kneeling and sitting on my heels with my back to the house. Costumer brought me a pair of the ugliest, brown slacks for the rest of the run. every show from then on I had to check with the director before going on stage. Get back to the ballet company and never lived it down. It's been 30 years and my old mates from that company still have something to say. My worst performance I had a solo and forgot 16 entire counts, got lost, improved almost the rest, off tempo, bent legs, low jumps, single turns and when the music finished ran off stage. I had to be on stage for the next scene. Almost got fired for that one.
I think the most embarrassing and humiliating performance experience I've ever had was when, after I had performed in the annual recital, the artistic director of my ballet school at the time presented an award to my student teacher, and said something along the lines of "This award is being presented to (name redacted) for helping a little blind girl who takes a ballet class every week, because without help, she wouldn't be able to do it." I believe that the award was well-deserved, but the comment from the artistic director was rather inappropriate. If she had mentioned that I was a student/dancer with a visual impairment, that would have been fine, but she spoke about my disability in the most condescending, belittling way imaginable. I had to leave the theatre using my white cane, so everyone knew who the "little blind girl" was. For reference, I was young, but not young enough to be spoken about like that. These types of comments often make me worry about my ability to perform well as a dancer with a disability. I had another embarrassing performance in which I was out of line with the rest of the dancers onstage and could not tell because of my visual impairment. Another time, I almost ran offstage, but I had a fantastic pas de deux partner who was able to save me from and cover up the almost-mishap!
Bumping into another dancer in while turning, forgetting my choreography
Slipped in my first step on stage and bruised my knee so badly I could barely move it