In a standout moment at the 2026 Oscars, legendary ballerina Misty Copeland made a triumphant return to the stage just three months after undergoing hip replacement surgery.
Copeland delivered a surprise routine to the Best Original Song nominee I Lied to You from the film Sinners, revisiting her iconic Firebird role and leaving attendees in awe.
Dressed in a fiery orange tutu and brown pointe shoes, her performance served as a powerful reminder of ballet’s enduring cultural impact, proving the retired star still possesses the grace and strength to captivate a global audience.
Her appearance comes weeks after actor Timothée Chalamet faced backlash over remarks perceived as dismissive of ballet and opera.
In a February 21 interview with Matthew McConaughey on CNN, the Marty Supreme actor said, “Hey! Keep this thing alive, even though no one cares about this anymore. All respect to the ballet and opera people out there … I just lost 14 cents in viewership. I’m taking shots for no reason.”
Several celebrities responded to the 30-year-old’s comments, including Copeland.
According to E! News, she told a panel for Aveeno on March 10, “It’s very interesting that he invited me to be a part of promoting Marty Supreme with respect to my art form. I think it’s important that we acknowledge that, yes, this is an art form that’s not ‘popular’ and a part of pop culture as movies are. But that doesn’t mean it doesn’t have enduring relevance in culture.”
Oscar-winning director Steven Spielberg also weighed in.
Speaking at the 2026 SXSW festival, the Jurassic Park filmmaker pushed back against Chalamet’s claim that “no one cares” about ballet or opera. Spielberg argued that these art forms create a unique, unifying emotional experience that is just as vital as cinema, emphasizing the need to sustain them.
“For me, the real experience comes when we can influence a community to congregate in a strange, dark space where all of us are strangers. At the end of a really good movie experience, we are all united with a whole bunch of feelings that we walk into the daylight or into the nighttime. And there’s nothing like that,” Spielberg said.
The 79-year-old added, “It happens in movies, and in concerts. And it happens in ballet and opera. And we want that to be sustained. We want that to go forever.”
Singer Doja Cat also chimed in on Chalamet’s remarks in a since-deleted TikTok post.
The Paint the Town Red singer said, “Hey, by the way, opera is 400 years old, ballet is 500 years old. Somebody named Tim-oh-tay Cha-lam-et had the nerve, big guy, by the way, had the nerve to say, on-camera, that nobody cares about it… You show up in a nice outfit. You sit down and shut up. That’s the usual etiquette around those things. Maybe learn something from that.”