Rasta's quest: ballet's maverick is still looking for a home.

FROM AGE 16 TO 20, A YOUNG MAN OFTEN grows from dependent youth to self-sufficient decision maker; a young male dancer grows from juvenile to partner or soloist. Never an ordinary youth, 16-year-old Rasta Thomas topped his already formidable trove of trophies with a gold medal at the USA International Ballet Competition in 1998. Leaping ahead precociously as he has done since he was age 4, he competed at the senior level with dancers in the 19-26 age range, many of whom had won medals in other international competitions or were already established in professional ballet companies. But where do you go after winning the gold?

Rasta had rejected the idea of joining another company after he had danced in 1997 as a principal at the ill-fated Hartford Ballet in Connecticut, where Kirk Peterson had created the role of Chosen One in Sacre du printemps for him. He preferred, he said, to be independent of organizational bureaucracy, outmoded traditions, and choreography selected by others. More like a modern dancer than a classical ballet practitioner, he saw his future as one that would suit and satisfy his own artistic needs, so he engaged in further training and appeared as a guest artist.

But he had several epiphanies in fall 2000. At dinner with Washington, D.C.-based choreographer Vladimir Angelov and a friend, the ups and downs of Rasta's career became the topic of conversation. "What a waste of time only doing galas. Rasta, you're so good. Your career is not going anywhere," the young woman observed.

"In the ballet world, the expectation always is that excellent dancers belong to a premier company," explained Angelov, who has created many dances for Rasta over the past seven years and is like a big brother to him. Shortly after their dinner, Angelov introduced Rasta to impresario Gerhard Rieder, who presents the Kirov Ballet in Europe, who in turn introduced Rasta to the Kirov's company manager, Makharbek Vaziev. Rieder recommended that Rasta be included in the Kirov's February 2001 three-hour gala in St. Petersburg, its first with invited guests. The program was already printed, and Vaziev didn't know if Rasta could be fit in at such short notice.

For a week, Rasta took class with the Kirov Ballet company. Adjusting to being a standby was a difficult experience for him. The day before the gala Vaziev said, "Rasta, show me what you can do." Rasta performed four demanding pieces back to back. Vaziev liked Angelov's Credo, a martial dance commissioned for the 1998 Autumn Season Gala in the Kyoto Fall Festival, but the Kirov gala program already had a similar dance.

"Makharbek thought two deaths in one night was too much," Rasta recalls. One hour before the gala, Vaziev asked Rasta to perform Angelov's humorous Bumblebee, which is set to "Flight of the Bumblebee."

The Russians loved him, including Valery Gergiev, artistic director of the Kirov Ballet and Opera at the Maryinsky Theater. Rasta said Vaziev offered him $150 a month to stay on in St. Petersburg as a resident dancer, with the understanding that he had freedom to continue as an independent guest artist elsewhere to supplement his income and nurture his artistic development.

"Money was not an issue for me; my earnings from dance put me in the top 5 percent of dancers' incomes," Rasta said. But he reluctantly declined because he was committed to dance in the film Without a Word, which is based on an award-winning play written by actor/dancer Patrick Swayze. Swayze and his wife, dancer Lisa Niemi, appear in the film along with Desmond Richardson and George de la Pena, who had portrayed Nijinsky in the 1980 film of the same name. So Vaziev extended the invitation to join the Kirov to the fall.

The filming experience, on location in Canada, contributed to Rasta's move to join a ballet company. Without a Word is about missed opportunity: During the filming, Rasta said, Swayze and de la Pena both told him they wished they could still dance the way he did. Further, the filming was not what he had anticipated.

"I realized I have a short-lived gift--maybe ten years to dance," Rasta said. "So I was looking for the right company to allow me to grow. Companies often do not offer the best experience because they're about political drama, not about the art. But I love the Kirov. I've been backstage watching. The curtain opens only when everything is absolutely ready. There is perfectionism; it's more real. It's not, `Rush! Rush! Time is money!' And it is the only company that tours to Paris, New York, London, Washington, D.C., to Japan, Brazil, and elsewhere, all in one year. Even though the company doesn't get the same level of government support as it did before the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Kirov is Russia's national treasure, along with the Hermitage art collection, and the Kirov will be properly sustained."

Much of the Kirov's support now comes from abroad, such as from Cuban-born philanthropist Alberto Vilar, who has underwritten the ten-year agreement for the Kirov Ballet and Kirov Opera to appear at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C.

So did the American gold medal virtuoso and international guest artist defect to Russia's Kirov Ballet? Well, yes and no.

"I want to be the best classical dancer and develop within the vision of a superb artistic director. And I wanted to show everyone how I could be a team player," Rasta explained. So this self-assured, starry-eyed American boy joined the legendary company that had trained Anna Pavlova, Vaslav Nijinsky, Rudolf Nureyev, and Mikhail Baryshnikov, Natalia Makarova, and George Balanchine.

Although the Kirov usually draws its dancers from the Vaganova Ballet Academy, Rasta is not quite an outsider. At age 9, when he and his father returned from Saudi Arabia where Dr. Daniel R. Thomas had been attached to the royal family, Rasta entered the Vaganova curriculum in the six-year program at Washington's Kirov Academy. It was run by Oleg Vinogradov, choreographer and artistic director for twenty years of the Kirov Ballet. Earlier, in 1992, Rasta had traveled to Russia to perform in a television documentary, Stars of the Kirov Ballet, which included a feature on youngsters who were destined to become stars. Now, neither Russian-speaking nor knowledgeable about company etiquette, he was confident of success even without a written contract that specified his position, roles, and income. Rasta said Vaziev told him what happened would depend on how hard he worked.

"Any first trial, of course, it's a bit scary," Rasta reflected, contemplating working in a poor, politically volatile country, but he believed his determination and natural talents would lead to key roles.

Rasta lived in St. Petersburg from October 2001 to February 2002, took company classes, was coached for principal roles in the repertoire, and watched rehearsals and performances. He danced as Swan Lake's Jester, Carmen's bullfighter, and Le jeune homme et la mort's Young Man. Because Vaziev final-cast roles right before performances, Rasta prepared all the principal roles he thought he might be called upon to dance in any particular evening. He idealistically followed this grueling regime to develop pyrotechnic superiority and artistic merit in a pattern that had always led to success for him. He became disillusioned when he was passed over for key or challenging roles that he so desired. With disenchantment and his beloved father's illness, Rasta returned to his home in Maryland. He may commute to the Kirov if definite and challenging roles are offered, he says.

"It may sound hokey, but I guess I'm kind of patriotic. I really want to dance here, for an American company, but I also want to do original work that is set on me, that stretches me and uses my strengths and variety.... I learned a lot. I had to travel 4,000 miles to realize that fifth is fifth," he reflected. Meanwhile he continues to perform at galas and as a guest artist while he searches for the perfect role, the perfect collaboration, the perfect place to work.

CERTAINLY RASTA THOMAS is unique, but does his eclectic training and his precocious accomplishments presage a new trend for other maturing dancers? Will other well-trained dancers choose to work without a net? Since he broke his leg in a jeep accident at age 2 and began disciplined therapeutic physical training, Rasta's maverick life of acquiring extraordinary skills has included winning a black belt in martial arts at age 5 (and later teaching some forms), holding records in swimming, and winning numerous dance titles in local and national competitions in virtually every style and top medals at prestigious international ballet competitions in Paris, Varna, and Jackson.

"We've known him since he was 10," said Adrienne Canterna, his fellow student at the Kirov Academy and his partner at the last USA IBC, "and my mom and dad--all our family--just love him. We've spent a lot of time together on and offstage; our house was like a second home, and he used to hang out with my brothers. He's a really loyal and close friend to me and my sister, Ashley. Rasta is off rehearsing his contemporary solo for the ceremonies at Jackson this year, and I'm doing a classical variation. We've been asked to do Shogun together, the work that won the choreography award last round."

Like Rasta, Adrienne Canterna chose to guest as a freelance and do some teaching; she didn't renew her contract with The Washington Ballet. She also produced a successful benefit for the Red Cross following the September 11 attacks.

Does this lucrative and self-directed performing lifestyle portend more of the same from a new generation of mixed-medium dancers? As global guest artist, Rasta has appeared about five times a year in Japan, danced in programs with Maya Plisetskaya, Patrick Dupond, Ethan Stiefel and others three times at the Vail [Colorado] International Dance Festival. He guested with the Dance Theatre of Harlem and the Joffrey Ballet of Chicago; he was a principal at the Hartford Ballet; he appeared in The Seven Deadly Sins at the Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival with Susan Jaffe, Robert Hill, Angel Corella, and other American Ballet Theatre dancers; and he has starred in Kennedy Center productions such as Soul Possessed and Emperor and the Nightingale. With flamenco heartthrob Joaquin Cortez he was featured in the Debbie Allen-choreographed 1999 Academy Awards ceremony. And he has been featured in numerous television documentaries in many parts of the world. All by the age of 20. But can anyone continue at such a pace for an entire performing career?

Rasta's father remarked, "The demands of this age are intense. It's possible to have a career that is deeply multifaceted--it's not unusual for folks after 20 to wear many hats. Rasta foresees following up interests in choreography, directing, producing, and acting."

"I know where I want to be going," Rasta said, "and I'm determined to be the very best."

Judith Lynne Hanna is author of To Dance Is Human; The Performer-Audience Connection; Dance, Sex, and Gender; Dance and Stress; and Partnering Dance and Education: Intelligent Moves for Changing Times.