Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo visits Aspen on Saturday. The all-male dance troupe parodies classics like "Swan Lake" while in drag.
Alberto Pretto is one of the dancers for the nearly 50-year-old company, also known as the Trocks. He came to the company after finding traditional male ballet roles a bit lacking.
"You know, in the ballet tradition, the man is an accessory to make the girl look good, and I just didn’t like that," he said.
Pretto says that training to dance female roles took a lot of time and pain. He taught himself to dance on pointe at age 22, instead of learning as a pre-teen like many female ballerinas do.
Pretto says the Trocks’ performances both honor and poke fun at classic ballet.
"We take the original choreographies and then we find what’s nonsensical and we push it even more and so it becomes funny and reads well on-stage," he said.
Pretto says, in contrast to the quieter atmosphere at a traditional ballet, the Trocks’ audiences are encouraged to laugh and clap throughout the performance.
Les Ballet Trockadero de Monte Carlo performs Saturday at 7:30 p.m. at the Aspen District Theatre.
