Iuliia Elkhimova Shares Insights on Blending Ballet and Drama in the Performing Arts

Written by Jon Stojan

In recent years, the performing arts are embracing interdisciplinary creativity, with productions like Some Viscera by Lykanthea and Broken Aquarium by Every House Has a Door blending dance, theater, music, and multimedia. Featured in the 2024 Chicago Performs Festival, these works highlight the growing trend of flexibility and adaptability in the arts.

Amid this shift, Iuliia Elkhimova, a former ballet dancer, has forged a distinctive path by merging the precision of dance with the raw expressiveness of theater. Her unique style feels natural and captivating, showcasing her ability to transcend boundaries. Her story exemplifies resilience, adaptability, and the boundless potential of reinvention.

The transition from ballet to acting is a familiar path, with icons like Charlize Theron and Zoe Saldana turning setbacks into opportunities. Similarly, Iuliia Elkhimova has redefined her artistry, blending ballet’s precision with theater’s expressiveness, and is here to share her insights with us.

From Ballet Dreams to Acting Ambitions

For many young dancers, graduating from ballet school is a triumphant milestone. For Iuliia Elkhimova, it was a harsh awakening. She was told that her physical attributes were not strong enough to support a future as a soloist, leaving her to face an existential crisis. “It felt like my entire world was falling apart,” Elkhimova recalls. “But the thought of leaving the stage entirely? That was unbearable. I needed to find another way to perform.”

Her passion for expression and storytelling led her to acting, a discipline she had admired from afar but never pursued. Without hesitation, she immersed herself in the craft, studying Stanislavski’s methods and preparing for auditions. Acting became her new stage—a realm where she could explore the human experience beyond the boundaries of dance. 

Her fresh approach stood out when she entered GITIS, Russia's most prestigious theater school. Her ballet background was initially seen as a challenge by the directors, who viewed her disciplined posture and precise movements as too rigid for acting.  They were accustomed to a more fluid and natural approach, which clashed with the structured elegance of her dance training. However, she recognized the opportunity to blend ballet and drama in a way that felt new and exciting. “My movements were too controlled, too precise. But I learned to adapt—how to relax my body for a natural posture and bring back that precision when it was needed. It taught me how to move seamlessly between freedom and control, which became a powerful tool in my acting,” she recalls.

Such transition from dancer to actor revealed a deeper truth: true reinvention demands not only technical adaptation but also emotional and physical transformation.

The Struggle and Triumph of Adapting

Shifting from ballet to acting required Iuliia to unlearn ingrained habits and master new skills—a process as daunting as it was transformative. For years, she had perfected the upright posture and graceful movements of a ballerina, but to broaden her opportunities, she had to reimagine her physicality. Deliberately relaxing her posture, adopting a more casual gait, and even practicing slouching felt entirely unnatural. “Even walking like an ordinary person felt like an entirely new skill,” she admits.

The adaptation extended beyond physical adjustments. Years of shallow breathing during ballet rehearsals left her ill-prepared to project her voice on stage. To overcome this, she trained in diaphragmatic breathing, harnessing her breath to support her voice without sacrificing the stamina required for physical performances. It was a painstaking journey of transformation, balancing the technical precision of her former discipline with the emotional and physical demands of her new passion.

The ultimate test of her transformation came when she was cast as Liza Kraynova, a professional ballerina, in It Doesn’t Hurt Me at the Moscow Theater of the Moon, a production that required her to blend the technical demands of ballet with the emotional depth of a dramatic role. “I had to transition seamlessly between acting and dancing, sometimes in the span of a single episode,” she says. To meet this challenge, she developed a hybrid approach. She maintained her ballet technique through rigorous training four to five times a week while deepening her acting skills with advanced methods like the Lee Strasberg technique, which helped her evoke emotions tied to her physical performance.

One of the most critical skills she mastered was selective control over bodily tension. “For a dancer, tension is your foundation—it makes you appear light and effortless on stage. But for an actor, that same tension can make you seem artificial. I had to learn when to engage it and when to let it go.” This nuanced skill became essential in her performances, allowing her to combine the precision of ballet with the natural expressiveness of acting.

Her efforts have borne fruit. She has starred in three short horror films directed by Alex Magaña, where her controlled physicality added depth to her characters. In her role as Princess Marshmallow in the Candy Land production, she performs on pointe—a detail that continues to captivate audiences. Through determination and adaptability, Iuliia has bridged her ballet background with her acting ambitions, creating a unique artistic identity that resonates across disciplines.

She also realized the importance of embracing imperfection. Ballet had taught her to strive for flawless execution, but acting required her to show vulnerability and rawness. This shift in mindset was transformative, allowing her to explore new depths in her performances. Her approach paid off in productions like Gavriiliada, a play based on Pushkin’s poem. Performed in an intimate venue in Los Angeles, the show consistently sold out. The success of Gavriiliada highlighted Iuliia’s ability to connect with audiences on a profound level, combining her refined physicality with emotional authenticity.

Turning Challenges into Triumphs

Today, Iuliia Elkhimova continues to refine her craft, blending the precision of ballet with the emotional depth of acting to craft performances that challenge traditional boundaries. “What once seemed like an obstacle became an opportunity to create something new,” she says. Her approach is not just about combining disciplines but about finding fresh ways to tell stories, evoke emotions, and engage audiences.

For that, she collaborated with director Stanislav Stanis and co-founded the Metaphysical Theater in Los Angeles, where she now serves as an actress, choreographer, and acting coach. Their theater is rooted in the techniques of Roman Viktyuk, aiming to expand traditional perceptions of theater, deeply move the audience, and touch their souls on a profound level. In addition, Iuliia is working on her book, The Art of Theatrical Replacements, which explores the nuances of stepping into established roles and offers practical insights for actors navigating repertory theater.

Interdisciplinary approaches in the performing arts, like those embraced by Iuliia Elkhimova, offer practical ways to explore new forms of expression and storytelling. Combining techniques from different disciplines helps artists move beyond traditional limits, opening opportunities for fresh ideas and adaptable practices. This shift reflects a natural progression in the arts, encouraging creativity and new perspectives.

Photo Credit: Iuliia Elkhimova

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