Birthplace: Osaka, Japan. Training: Vaganova Ballet Academy, Ellison Ballet. Joined Trockadero: August 2018. Previous company: Atlantic City Ballet.

VARVARA LAPTOPOVA is one of those rare dancers who, with one look at a ballet, not only knows all the steps but can also dance all the roles. As a former member of the Kiev Toe and Heel Club, she was awarded first-prize at the Pan-Siberian Czardash and Kazotski Festival for artistic mis-interpretation.

BORIS DUMBKOPF has been with the greatest ballerinas of our time; he has even danced with some of them. One of the first defective Eastern Bloc male stars, he left the motherland for purely capitalistic reasons. Amazingly, between his appearances on television and Broadway and in movies, commercials, magazines, special events, and women’s nylons, he occasionally still has time to dance.