When she was just 3 years old, Carolina Rodríguez was captivated by the ballerinas in a Cuban television show called “Eternal Dance.” She set her sights high, entering the government-run Cuban National Ballet School at 8. In ninth grade, the students were sorted into two groups: those on a path to become dancers in the storied national company and those on a teaching path. She was accepted as a performer.
While dancing, Rodríguez said, “I could forget about the issues happening around me.”
But by last year those issues proved impossible to ignore. Rodríguez, now 21, left her prized spot as a soloist in the National Ballet of Cuba, joining a growing exodus of dancers fleeing the country’s collapsing economy.
Now Rodríguez lives in Oslo and dances for the Norwegian National Ballet. “It’s not because of the National Ballet of Cuba but what’s happening outside of it,” she said, “that makes you realize that you need a better future for yourself and your family.”
In Cuba, ballet remains a proud beacon of the revolution: an art form as beloved as a national sport and one of the nation’s proudest cultural exports. But with the country facing what may be its worst crisis since the revolution, many dancers are making the hard decision to leave. Today, there are just 55 dancers in the National Ballet — a company that has at times had more than 100 dancers — bringing it back to its size in its infancy. (A representative from the National Ballet declined to comment on how many dancers have left in recent years or on how the economic situation is affecting the company.)
The company that became the National Ballet of Cuba was founded in 1948 by Alicia Alonso and her husband, Fernando. Melding classical technique with what she considered a natural musicality in Cuban culture, the company emerged as one of the world’s best.
After the 1959 revolution, the company was nationalized and Alonso emerged as an artistic powerhouse of the new nation. Not only did her dancers tour abroad, winning international acclaim, but they also went to small towns and remote provinces in Cuba, building a nationwide appreciation for ballet. (Alonso, nearly blind, danced into her 70s and led the company until her death at 98, in 2019.)
Since the revolution, though, Cuban dancers have slipped away, seeking opportunities, both creative and financial, abroad. In 1966, 10 dancers defected, requesting political asylum in Paris at the International Dance Festival. In 2003, 20 dancers defected during international tours. In the 2010s, small groups fled during performances in Canada, Puerto Rico and Mexico.
Around that time, international relations were being relaxed and Cuba appeared to be on an economic upturn. Then, the first Trump administration imposed new penalties and the coronavirus pandemic halted tourism.
Now, inflation is skyrocketing, tourism has cratered, and last year, for the first time, the government requested aid from the World Food Program. Grocery shelves are often bare and power rationing leaves Havana residents without electricity for as many as 10 hours a day. According to Cuban government data, the population shrank by 10 percent from 2021 to 2024; unofficial estimates put the figure at nearly 25 percent. Recently, some television stars and musicians have joined the exodus.
The dancers who remain are “stuck between survival and artistry,” said Eduardo Vilaro, the director of Ballet Hispánico in New York. “That art keeps them alive through difficult times.”
For most Cubans, leaving is difficult, particularly as the United States shuts its doors. It’s easier for dancers: They can defect while on tour, or audition for international companies. And many from the Ballet Nacional are quietly choosing to leave behind difficult conditions: Blackouts that make rehearsal spaces and exercise rooms swelteringly hot. Scarce medical supplies. Pointe shoes stuck in customs for months.
Rodríguez, who arrived in Norway in August 2024, knew she had made the right decision when she saw the modernist Oslo Opera House and its facilities: huge mirrored studios, elaborate costumes and sets, and a dedicated department for pointe shoes.
At the National Ballet of Cuba she had earned about 4,700 pesos a month, or $14, which is the average monthly income for Cubans. (At that time, the Columbia Law Project estimated Cubans needed at least seven times that amount to cover basic expenses.) She lived at home with her family, and there was food on the table, but times were hard.
“I decided I wanted to support them, and I didn’t want to be a burden for them,” Rodríguez said about her decision to leave.
After emailing a number of companies she was invited to try out for the Norwegian National Ballet. She auditioned virtually and was accepted. In Cuba, she had been a soloist. In Norway, she started at the bottom, in the junior company’s corps de ballet.
Her salary of 3,200 euros a month allows her to send money home. And to travel home herself. For years, Cuba had a combative relationship with its citizens who moved abroad, including dancers, who were banned from returning to perform on their home stage. Today, they are free to come and go.
In August, Rodríguez visited Cuba and took her parents and grandparents out to dinner — a treat previously reserved for birthdays. “It was something I wanted to do for a long time,” she said, adding that she got great joy from watching them order whatever they wanted, and paying the bill.
For dancers leaving Cuba, former members of the National Ballet have provided guidance. Yasiel Hodelin, 23, got advice from Carlos Acosta, the Cuban superstar who now directs the Birmingham Royal Ballet. When Hodelin joined the Birmingham company in 2023, Acosta urged him to open a saving account. This January, Hodelin had saved enough to buy his family in Cuba a car. It has transformed their lives, he said. “That’s what you want, you know — just to help your family.”
When Narciso Medina, 26, joined the National Ballet of Cuba as a soloist in 2019, it was difficult to advance. Then the pandemic hit, and dancers began leaving, opening opportunities for others. “The company had to increase how fast they trained the new dancers coming from the school,” Medina said, adding that he was cast in more important roles.
As the economy faltered, though, audiences stayed away from theaters. The company’s international tours provided a lifeline, allowing dancers to return home with $500 to $1,000 each trip. Even so, Medina said, some dancers would decide not to return. Company leadership seemed to understand. “They never stopped us from leaving,” he said.
As a student, Medina had received scholarship offers from companies in the United States and England, which his parents, both dancers, urged him to accept. “They knew the situation in the country better than me,” he said. But joining the Cuban National Ballet had been his childhood dream, so he stayed until the end of 2022, when he left to join his family abroad. In November 2023, he joined the BalletMet in Columbus, Ohio.
When Medina talks to his friends still in the Cuban company, they rarely discuss ballet. “We talk a lot about the fact they need to leave the country,” he said. When he talks to old friends from his neighborhood, they tell him how hard it is to get groceries; how there’s often not enough to eat.
“In Cuba, things we take as a luxury are normal here,” Medina said. “Like having internet 24/7 or eating chocolate.” He would like to move back someday, but first politics and the economy need to improve. “If those things change, I will go back,” he said. “But I don’t think they will.”
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