‘I wasn’t really sure that I wanted to be a ballet dancer’: The English National Ballet's prima ballerina on playing Clara in The Nutcracker and her consuming passions

Ivana Bueno and I are both 26 years old. We have brown hair, brown eyes and are petite in stature. We both enjoy spending time with our friends and families and have jobs we adore. We are similar in many ways apart from one. She is a prima ballerina at the English National Ballet, and I am not. This is immediately obvious, when I meet her at the ballet company’s east London headquarters, by the way she sits (tall and composed), her physique (lean but strong) and how she’s dressed (a red tutu and pointe shoes). Her perfection is ruined only by her nails, bitten down to stubs, a habit she has had since she was a child. The minute our interview ends she will be off to dance. Disciplined and composed, it’s hard to imagine her as a naughty four-year-old who wouldn’t be told what to do in her first ballet class — but she was.

‘I hated it at the beginning, because the teacher would scream at me because I couldn't behave,’ says Ivana, who will be dancing the lead role of Clara in The Nutcracker at the London Coliseum until January 11. When I saw her in it, she took my breath away. ‘I started ballet when I was four years old, but it was always just a fun activity to do, I didn’t know I could live off it,’ she says. Born to a psychologist mother and a father who ran a transport business in Córdoba, Mexico, it was her older sister that encouraged Ivana to begin dancing, along with a family friend who was the director of the local ballet. Ivana attended dance classes after school almost every night. ‘I would finish school at 2:30pm, go home, eat, get changed, and go to ballet from 4pm to 9pm, then go home and do my homework for the next day,’ she recalls.

At the age of 14, Ivana was offered a scholarship to finish her training at the Academy Princess Grace ballet school in Monte Carlo. ‘I only saw it as an opportunity to go abroad and leave home. I wasn’t really sure that I wanted to be a ballet dancer,’ she admits. ‘But once I got there, everything was so professional. Every girl that was there, was there because they wanted to be a ballet dancer. They had it clear, that's what they wanted to do.’ Homesickness hit hard for the teenage dancer. ‘I love ballet, but I've also always been very close with my family and friends in Mexico. So I did struggle quite a bit at the beginning when I got there,’ Ivana says. ‘In fact I was crying every day for three months, missing my parents. But, at the end of that first year in Monte Carlo, when we did the end of the year show, I stepped on stage and I felt goosebumps in my body that — I even get them now, because I remember that moment so well. Then I was like, “No, this is really what I want to do”’.

She was scouted by Tamara Rojo, the then artistic director of the English National Ballet, a year before she graduated, but deferred the offer until she had finished her studies. She then came to London aged 18. ‘It was so different from Monte Carlo,’ she says. ‘I was living by myself and, I'm not gonna lie, it was really difficult… I felt like they’d thrown me into an empty pool and I didn't know how to swim. But then eventually things got better,’ she pauses. ‘I felt so much freedom and I didn’t know how to control it [at first].’

The turning point came when she was given the opportunity to compete in the Emerging Dancer competition. Covid came and pushed it back, but she trained everyday during lockdown. ‘It was like a motivation for me, because I knew that when we came back to work I would still have to do that competition.’ She won, and her career reached new heights again when she was thrown in as the lead of Christopher Wilden’s Cinderella at the Royal Albert Hall, 10 days before the show was due to open, when another dancer became injured. ‘I was really nervous,’ she says. ‘But I have really good memories of it.’ Two years later the same thing happened at the same venue, this time during Swan Lake, but Ivana was ready.

‘I have so much fun in the role,’ she says of dancing Clara, who she describes as ‘curious’ and ‘brave’ in this version of the iconic Christmas ballet, The Nutcracker. She does not have ambitions to be a choreographer: ‘I don’t think that’s my talent, but I enjoy working with them, and I like having someone who lets me input my own ideas from time to time.’ This won’t be a hindrance; she is not only incredibly beautiful but, I realise during our interview, incredibly tough and strong-willed. In short, the perfect Clara for our modern age.

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Your aesthetic hero

My mum.

An exhibition that has really impressed you

I went with my ballet teacher to The Wallace Collection. It was amazing. I was so impressed.

The last thing you bought yourself

They’re going to kill me about this one, but I bought a Prada bag recently. I don’t really want to say it, but I don’t regret it! It’s white.

The person that would play you in a film of your life

People always say I look like Anya Taylor-Joy, but with brown hair. She could do it… if she can dance. It has to be someone who can dance. Maybe I could do the dancing and she could do the acting.

A hotel you could go back and back to

Growing up I went to this hotel and I have so many good memories of being there with my family. It was in Puerto Aventuras in Mexico, but I think they’ve changed the name of it now.

The most memorable meal you’ve ever eaten

I would say New Year’s Eve at home, when I was young. Every year it was a really nice gathering.

The music that you work to

When I am not at work I always listen to Latin music, but I like house music as well. My Spotify Wrapped listening age was 25 — I’m very normal.

Your favourite painting

Botticelli’s ‘Three Graces of the Primavera’.

A book you’ve found inspiring

I like reading stories — romantic stories, or thrillers. I recently read Colleen Hoover’s Verity. I couldn't stop reading it, it was so good. I wasn’t really a reader before as when I had free time I would go out with my friends, but it's something I always wanted to become. Eventually I would like to get into more psychology books — for self wellbeing.

The last podcast you listen to

I like Mel Robbins’s The Let Them Theory.

A possession you’d never sell

I would never really sell my Cinderella pointe shoes. I would sell any of the others, but that pair is special. I gave one to my ballet teacher, and I have the other one.

What you'd take to a desert island

This is so simple. I would do water — to survive. And I’d take my mum, if I could.

The thing that gets you up in the morning

Just the ability of being grateful for another day in life. Like this morning, I woke up and I was already complaining because I was cold, and then I was like: ‘I can't complain about this. There is so much going on in the world, and I just have to be so grateful for where I stand and that I'm here to live another day.’

The items you collect

I like to collect travel souvenirs from other countries. And photo booth pictures, because I take them and put them in my dressing room, and I have memories with all of my friends. So every time I see a photo booth, I have to take photos with whoever I am with, to remember the memory.

The best present you’ve ever received

I mean, it's not really a present, but something I'm really grateful for is that my parents always allowed me to live my life and explore without putting limits on me. They always guided me, but never really stopped me from doing anything. They let me go very young and even now they allow me to live my own life. Now that I’m grown up, I think this must be really hard for them, and I think that when I have my kids I will want to protect them so much, and I feel like they never protected me in that way. So that's something I'm very grateful for from them — they always gave me the chance to go and live my life. It's a present, because not everyone has it.

The Nutcracker is playing until January 11, 2026, at the London Coliseum. For more details see their website.