Vicky Simegiatos Dance Company's "The Nutcracker", New York

Former students of Vicky Simegiatos Dance Company have gone on to perform with some of the city's finest dance companies—a trait they have in common with the company's founder and namesake. Discovered by the directors of American Ballet Theatre during a trip to Greece, Simegiatos traveled to the United States to join the company, eventually leaving the professional ballet world behind to raise a family in Brooklyn. But the dancing bug never really left her. In the early '70s she founded what is today named the Vicky Simegiatos Performance Arts Center to teach young twirlers throughout the neighborhood Balachine-technique ballet, Greek dancing, and how to crack walnuts with their toe muscles.