Like many sensitive boys thrust into that snake pit known as middle school, San Francisco corps de ballet member Myles Thatcher, who just won a life-altering mentorship under Bolshoi Ballet Director Alexei Ratmansky through the Rolex Mentor & Protégé Arts Initiative, yearned to participate in something athletic that didn’t involve pigskins or touchdowns. “As a kid, it was hard for me to find something that was athletic and artistic but noncompetitive,” says Thatcher, 24, an Atlanta native who discovered ballet at age 8 and started choreographing at 12. A few moves around the country later, Thatcher joined the SF Balletat the age of 20. In addition to performing featured roles in Giselle, Don Quixote, and Onegin, the dance prodigy has already choreographed two ballets and has four new works in the pipeline. Before you see his latest conception, Program 3, in February 2015, witness his leaps and bounds in The Nutcracker. 

See the Nutcracker December 12–29; War Memorial Opera House (Civic Center). Get tickets here. 

This article was published in 7x7's December/January 2014 issue. Click here to subscribe.