Ethan Stiefel was regarded as one of the best male ballet dancers in the world.
After retiring, he spent three years as the artistic director of the Royal New Zealand Ballet. Now he's back on our shores, helping put the finishing touches on Giselle, a production close to his heart.
Giselle is one of the oldest surviving ballets, first staged in Paris in 1841. It's a love story that follows an innocent village girl who dies of heartache, tangles with vengeful spirits and attempts to save her lover.
"Giselle is an iconic ballet," Stiefel says. "It's one of the greats in the classical repertoire."
Now 43 and four years into dancing retirement, choreographer Stiefel is what you'd call a ballet superstar. Over more than 20 years, the American performed in dozens of prestigious companies - at different times, a principal dancer for both the New York Ballet and the Zurich Ballet.
And he's no stranger to New Zealand.
"My grandmother was actually born and raised in New Zealand," Stiefel says.
Along with the family connection, Stiefel knows New Zealand well, having spent three years here as artistic director of the Royal New Zealand Ballet from 2011.
It was during this period Stiefel created this production of Giselle.
"I've come back to basically make sure everything is, I guess, perhaps how we'd seen it," he says.
"And just do the kind of final touches and polish both the scenic and technical elements, and of course the choreography and dancers."
The lead role of Giselle is played by Sydney-born Lucy Green.
"It's a really intense ballet, I think physically it takes a lot out of you," she says.
"But then it's also the emotional side and the acting. It's full-on."
Green also danced the role in Stiefel's first incarnation of Giselle in 2012.
"He's got kind of high expectations, and it's his ballet so you want to do him proud," she says.
While Green says it definitely adds pressure, that added pressure is likely to result in a ballet that's on-point.
Newshub.
