Meet the Coryphées: Larissa Kiyoto-Ward

I never really had that lightning strike, single pivotal moment that made me realise I wanted to be a ballet dancer. I think that growing up, I always knew that’s what I wanted to be, it was never really a question, because I always knew I wanted ballet to be my future career.

All of them! It’s so hard to choose, but I'd love to do any of the classics, Odette/Odile from Swan Lake, The Sugarplum Fairy in The Nutcracker, Aurora in The Sleeping Beauty or George Balanchine’s Tarantella.

I have so many. My mum would always be bringing ballet DVDs home growing up, so I had a lot of idols. I think I looked up to Hannah O'Neill the most when I was little though. I identified with Hannah because we went to the same ballet schools in both New Zealand and Japan.

It's nothing like the movie Black Swan (Darren Aronofsky’s psychological ballet thriller). Maybe there are some people in the world like that, but definitely not in our company.

Like a typical Gen Z’er, I'm obsessed with pop culture. I also have a beautiful grey cat called Jiji who looks exactly like the cat from the Japanese anime from 1989, Kiki's Delivery Service.