Performing Liberty and Empire on the Ballet Stage: Mirsa in Transatlantic Context

Maximilien Gardel's ballet Mirsa (1779) takes place on an unidentified French colonial island in the Americas. This popular ballet was restaged and reworked across Europe, as well as in the French provinces (including in port cities), the French Antilles, and eventually the United States. This article documents the movement of three dancers who played key roles in its transmission: Alexandre Placide, Jean-Baptiste Francisqui, and Suzanne Théodore Taillandet (Douvillier), within the French colonial empire and in the diaspora. Ultimately, it takes Mirsa as a case study to examine how representations of race and nationality were adapted to the racial and political dynamics of the new setting of the United States.