BALLET dancer Ava May Llewellyn has made another dream come true by performing in her home city as a professional.
Ava May, from Downend, started dancing at the age of two and won a place at the Royal Ballet School when she was an 11-year-old pupil of Bromley Heath Junior School.
Graduating during the pandemic, she was the only member of her original year group of 24 girls and boys from around the world to join the Royal Ballet Company, where she performed for two years.
Now a member of the Birmingham Royal Ballet, Ava May, 21, has made her first professional appearances in Bristol, dancing in classical ballet The Sleeping Beauty at the Bristol Hippodrome.
Before the company’s four shows at the Bristol Hippodrome in April, she also took part in a special introductory evening of highlights from the ballet at Bristol Cathedral, where she helped demonstrate the choreography, techniques and hard work that goes into each ballet performance.
Ava May said: “It’s absolutely amazing to be back in my home town performing as a professional for the first time. This is the theatre where I grew up and performed many times as a child, so it’s very nostalgic for me coming back. I’m having so much fun!”
Mum Michele said: “As a child Ava May performed in numerous pantomimes and musical theatre productions at the Bristol Hippodrome.
“It has been 10 years since she was last on stage there, and she is delighted to be back performing in her home town.
“Her dad John, her brother Theo and I are extremely proud of her – she has worked incredibly hard over the years to achieve her childhood dream of becoming a professional ballet dancer.”