Within the quiet ambiance of a hotel bar near London's Royal Ballet, Matthew Ball requests a mint tea. The dancer's carriage is effortlessly upright, his limbs muscular beneath a plain tee. On stage, ballet dancers can seem like powerful deities, yet often offstage they are petite. This is not true for Ball, whose height is one reason for his popularity for heroic roles and pas de deux work. With fine traits and intense eyes, there's a hint of a brooding actor about him.
A Seamless Rise to the Top
Now 31, Ball is enjoying the crest of a career that has advanced seamlessly. Growing up in Liverpool, he encountered little teasing for his childhood passion in ballet. Entering the Royal Ballet School at 11, he graduated straight into the company and was advanced each year, reaching the highest position of principal in 2018. He has loved taking on meaty dramatic roles, particularly the emotional angst found in Kenneth MacMillan's ballets.
"Your lungs are burning, your legs get heavy, but it’s really a mental fatigue."
Ball's next featured role is in a talk, in an "Evening With" event designed to offer behind-the-scenes perspectives into a dancer's craft. He will walk the audience through a role, showing his cognitive workflow during performance. Yet in more comedic ballets, the challenge is profound. "Don Quixote is one of the most demanding from a skill perspective," he states.
The Psychological Game and After the Show Feelings
What about following a show, when he has pulled it off? "It's pretty good," he admits. "But because I'm trying to squeeze all the emotion out of it, and get lost in the role, quite often I do feel self-conscious later. Following an intense role I'm always like: God, what must people think?"
In person, Ball is thoughtful, mild-mannered, and quick to laugh at himself. Yet a dance maker once remarked on a "kind of suffering in him." Is there? "I am very active usually, but I do have a melancholy streak," he confesses. "I kind of enjoy pessimism sometimes. I've always felt that negativity has been an instigator for positive change."
Formative Drivers and Creative Influences
His tenacity stemmed from youthful setbacks. Not doing well in competitions at school made him "vengeful!" It was motivation to prove he could succeed. Discovering the book *Mao's Last Dancer* was a "watershed" moment. "It changed everything, it made me go a bit fanatical," he remembers.
The next endeavor is making his own choreography. In his view, "there's nothing wrong with." "Challenging the conventions is interesting, but just pretending that they’re not a reality any more – I don’t know how far you can go with that." He wants his work to be loaded with substance, drawing ideas from literature, music, and art.
Close-Up Dance and Private Dynamic
He also favors presenting dance in smaller venues. "It was just really exciting," he says of a previous experience. "You’re so close to the viewers. I felt as if they were realizing: 'That’s a person, and they’re sweating.'"
Ball has made pieces with his partner, fellow principal Mayara Magri. The degree of trust between them is evident. "We tried it out on the beach first," he says of a daring lift. "It resembled Dirty Dancing." They aren’t usually matched on stage at their main theater, which is perhaps healthy. "We’re both quite strong-willed people, so it’s not always smooth sailing," he notes. "Yet I feel like we’re each other’s favorite cheerleader."
Regarding Instagram and Physical Perception
On Instagram, fans can see videos from his projects and images that showcase a sculpted physique. Does he mind that the response can be somewhat focused on appearance? Not particularly. "The body is just what we use, so I don’t feel very protective about it," he states. He relates it to viewing Michelangelo’s David—an object that can be interpreted on multiple levels.
Ball describes his early self as "eager for success." Has it lived up to his hopes? "I am conscious of how reality is a separate thing to the aspirations you made as a child," he reflects. He likely has another decade of dancing ahead. "I guess in the time to come, I want to be a bit more kind with myself."
