In Étoile, Luke Kirby and Charlotte Gainsbourg Battle to Save Ballet

Geneviève proposes a fix to Luke Kirby’s Jack, executive director of the Metropolitan Ballet Theater at New York City’s Lincoln Center: a one-year swap of their top talent, complete with tandem seasons and a splashy transatlantic marketing campaign. A similar exchange of dancers between Paris and New York City actually happened back in 2009. But when asked about it, the Palladinos say they were unaware of any real-life basis for the series. Instead, the eight-episode Étoile, which premieres on April 24, was partially inspired by Frederick Wiseman documentaries like La Danse: The Paris Opera Ballet, which capture “the tough world behind this very delicate art form,” says Palladino.

Ballet is still endangered, thanks to budget cuts and a lengthy post-pandemic rebuilding process. These are “external forces pounding back an art form that is always trying to survive anyhow,” says Sherman-Palladino, “where you’re almost guaranteed to never get rich, and you have to truly love it.” Only a handful of ballerinas have transcended the medium: “There’s [Mikhail] Baryshnikov, there’s Misty Copeland, and you’re out,” she continues. “These are people whose careers are short and their commitment is 100%. It’s every single day from the time they were young children. One injury can knock you out. It’s a scary world.”

Adds Palladino, “We have literally heard 29-year-old amazing dancers talk about how old they are, like they’re turning 76.”

Sherman-Palladino herself quit dancing for a good reason: “I stopped dancing the minute I realized somebody was going to actually pay me to do something, and I could have a sandwich,” she says. Nevertheless, “my whole life, I’ve known [that] without ballet, the world is a lesser place. And a place that I don’t think a lot of people want to be in, even if they don’t realize it.”

Toward the end of The Marvelous Maisel’s Emmy-winning five-season run, the Palladinos realized they needn’t look far for their next leading man. “They beckoned me to a free meal, which is hard to pass up. We had just finished on Maisel and were saying our farewells, and it was very sad,” says Kirby, who won an Emmy in 2019 for playing Maisel’s soulfully wounded Lenny Bruce. “Then at dinner, they started to tell me about this new thing they were working on. I was entranced by the notion of doing something around dance, because I have a secret affection for it. And any excuse to get to stay with them sounded good to me.”

The affection is very mutual. “Luke Kirby is never going to leave our world. He has no choice in the matter,” says Sherman-Palladino. “Even if there’s no show, he has to come over to the house and just sit here.”

The Palladinos were far more surprised by the eventual casting of Gainsbourg, who replaced Call My Agent! star Camille Cottin amid scheduling conflicts. “She’s just annoyingly cool,” Sherman-Palladino says of the actor, daughter of slow French musician Serge Gainsbourg and actor turned fashion icon Jane Birkin. “In my wildest dreams, I could never be that cool. It’s like walking down the street and Lenny Kravitz is standing there. You go, ‘God damn it, just go away.’ Charlotte shows up with her trench coat and T-shirt and unbrushed hair, and I’m like, ‘Fuck, I’ll never be able to carry it like that.’”