Sergei Polunin

Sergei Vladimirovich Polunin (Russian: Сергей Владимирович Полунин; Ukrainian: Сергій Володимирович Полунін, romanized: Serhiy Volodymyrovych Polunin; born 20 November 1989) is a Russian ballet dancer, actor and model. He has Russian and Serbian citizenships, and has "always regarded himself as Russian". In 2025, he was stripped of his Ukrainian citizenship.

Born in Kherson, Ukrainian SSR, Polunin started out in gymnastics before switching to ballet at the age of eight and attended the Kyiv State Choreographic College. After graduating, he joined the British Royal Ballet School at the age of 13 in 2003. Polunin has received numerous awards, including the Prix de Lausanne and Youth America Grand Prix in 2006, and in 2007 was named the Young British Dancer of the Year. In 2010, at the age of 20, Polunin became the Royal Ballet's youngest ever male principal dancer.

After two years, he quit the ballet company to focus on a freelance career. As a freelance principal dancer, Polunin has been a guest artist at various theatres worldwide, such as Royal Opera House, Sadler's Wells Theatre, Bolshoi Theatre, Stanislavski and Nemirovich-Danchenko Moscow Academic Music Theatre, La Scala Theatre, Teatro San Carlo and was a guest artist for the Bayerisches Staatsballet.

Sergei Polunin was born in Kherson, Ukrainian SSR. From the age of four to eight, he trained at a gymnastics academy, and then spent another four years at the Kyiv State Choreographic Institute. His mother, Galina, moved with him to Kyiv, while his father, Vladimir Polunin, worked in Portugal to support them.

After Polunin graduated from the Kyiv Choreographic Academy (КДХУ), he joined the British Royal Ballet School at the age of 13 in 2003, sponsored by the Rudolf Nureyev Foundation. Polunin has received numerous awards, including the Prix de Lausanne and Youth America Grand Prix in 2006, and in 2007 was named the Young British Dancer of the Year. He became a first soloist at the Royal Ballet in 2009. In June 2010, at the age of 20, Polunin became the Royal Ballet's youngest ever male principal. The New York Times described Polunin as "a fabulous dancer, with a steely technique and beautiful line" in its review of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (2011) when he danced as the Knave, who doubled as Alice's romantic interest.

After two successful years with the Royal Ballet, on 24 January 2012, Polunin announced his resignation from the company with immediate effect. He said he had become so unhappy that, "the artist in [him] was dying." Several months later, in summer 2012, Polunin was invited to Russia by the artistic director of ballet of the two Russian theatres, Igor Zelensky, and became a principal dancer with the Stanislavsky Music Theatre and Novosibirsk State Academic Opera and Ballet Theatre. In early April 2013, it was reported that Polunin had walked out on the Schaufuss Ballet's performance of Midnight Express just days before its opening night.

He was first shown in the international spotlight in the role of Slavemaster/Sheppard in the 25th Anniversary The Phantom of the Opera at the Royal Albert Hall. Polunin was shortlisted as the best male dancer for the 2014 National Dance awards in the U.K. In 2014, Polunin started his collaboration with American photographer and music director David LaChapelle and took part in his new projects, including a dance video to the song "Movement" by Hozier in February 2015. The video went viral and exposed Polunin to a wider audience. Polunin was the subject of the 2016 documentary film Dancer, directed by Steven Cantor, analyzing his childhood, training, and rise to international fame.

In 2017, he set up Project Polunin, which aims to create new dance and ballet works for both stage and film. Project Polunin aims to bring together dancers, contemporary artists, musicians and choreographers from various creative backgrounds to work together. In June 2018, a promotional video starring Polunin was featured in a grand ceremony of the reopening of the National Museum of Serbia after 15 years of renovation and in July of the same year, Polunin performed on the Main Stage of the Serbian EXIT festival for the grand opening ceremony of 18th festival edition. His performance was inspired by the festival's theme, dubbed EXIT Freedom. The company was reincorporated as Polunin Ink in 2018.