Behind the Red Velvet Curtain

In 2012 Joy Womack made history when she became the first American ballerina to sign a contract with the Bolshoi Ballet Theater in Moscow, Russia.

Dancing in Moscow was not the Onion Dome fairy tale she’d hoped for. The Bolshoi and its school were filled with cutthroat competition, acts of violence, and coaches who encouraged obsessive devotion. They sent her on stage with broken bones, helped her forge immigration paperwork, and encouraged her to toe a dangerous political line - all for the privilege of dancing on one of the world's most storied stages.

As Joy’s career took off and she made a name for herself in the Russian ballet world, she had to face a hard choice. Were the growing dangers of a professional lifestyle descending into corruption worth the realization of her life's dream?

Joy Womack is a ballerina, currently working at the Paris Opera. She has a combined social media following of approximately 75,000 across all platforms, was featured in a 2021 independent documentary,Joy Womack: The White Swan, and is also the subject of a biopic film, The American. Her story has been followed by news outlets around the world, includingThe New York Times,The Moscow Times,Reuters,Time Magazine, theL.A. Times,NBC News.

Elizabeth Shockman is a public radio journalist based in Minnesota with nationally and internationally published work atNPR,PRI,MPR,Reuters,The Moscow Times,BBC, andmany other publications. Elizabeth met Joy while working for Reuters in Moscow and has spent more than 12 years interviewing her for this book.

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