Michaela Mabinty Bangura DePrince
1995-2024
A ballerina featured on the cover of a tattered magazine resting outside the orphanage gave the little girl hope. She realized she could escape her ugly and cruel reality and journey toward a future of beauty and gentleness though dance.
Her mother had died of starvation. Before that loss, the Sierra Leone Civil War had taken her father's life. Brought to and left in an orphanage by her uncle when she was a toddler, the little girl endured ostracization, ridicule and neglect from her cold caretakers. along Other orphaned children made fun of her too. The orphanage workers and townspeople often called her “the devil's child” because of her autoimmune condition vitiligo, which targets the skin's melanin. Vitiligo affected her chest most of all.
Rejected by most adoptive parents because of her vitiligo, the little girl Mabinty Bangura and her close friend and fellow orphan also named Mabinty were eventually adopted by a married white New Jersey couple named Charles and Elaine DePrince. Mabinty took on the name Michaela in honor of the DePrinces’ late eldest son, Michael. Before adopting the two tiny Sierra Leonean girls, Charles and Elaine had adopted and raised three boys with hemophilia who later died of AIDS because of contaminated blood transfusions.
The terpsichorean spark ignited in Michaela by the magazine’s en-pointe ballerina became enflamed under the DePrinces’ love, care, nurturing and anti-racism. The 2011 documentary First Position introduced DePrince to U.S. audiences and the world. The documentary showed Michaela competing for a spot at a prestigious ballet school. For her talent, Michaela won a scholarship to the American Ballet Theatre Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis’s School.
After graduating, DePrince performed at the Dance Theatre of Harlem, Dutch National Ballet and the Boston Ballet. She also caught the eye of Beyoncé who had DePrince choreograph and perform in her video for “Freedom” in Mrs. Carter’s astonishing Lemonade video album.
With her mother, Michaela wrote her YA memoir Taking Flight: From War Orphan to Star Ballerina that became a best seller. Madonna had optioned her memoir in 2018 and planned to direct it for a future feature film. Michaela also told her inspirational story in a harrowing but hopeful 2014 TEDx Talk.
Even with all her achievements and success, Michaela never forgot her challenging origins. In addition to her ballet work, DePrince worked as an ambassador for War Child. Along with that service, Michaela created, promoted and sustained her gala benefit-fundraiser “Dare to Dream” that supports and strengthens children impacted by war.
Michaela DePrince passed away suddenly on September 10, 2024. Despite being only 29 years old, Michaela’s legacy in the ballet world and in life is secure. Her resilience and drive remain lessons each one of use should embrace and practice every day.
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For the first 23 years of my life, dance was my life. My late beloved mother started me at the age of 3 in ballet and tap. Mom had been a tapper. I was featured in Dance Magazine at 4y/o as a “Star of the Future”. I loved every minute. Then I grew…very tall. By the time I was 16 I was 5’9” and had expanded my repertoire to include Jazz and Interpretive dance. I was discouraged from continuing ballet because of my height but refused to stop. Between my Jr and Sr years in HS reached 6’ but my mentors and teachers had learned not to discourage and by then Judith Jameson had come on the scene with Alvin Ailey’s company and tall women dancers all of a sudden became viable and visible. My heart leapt. Fast forward to my junior year in college when I earned the choreographer position in the drama dept for the annual musical “Brigadoon” that year. There was a Senior who was very upset that I got the position. Long story short…during the process and rehearsals I had an accident running with a good friend over the slate sidewalks in my college town…most of the slate pieces had been pushed up by giant tree roots…picturesque but not safe. I tripped, went up in the air and landed on my right kneecap, dislocated it and all that involved and I had to resign and hand my duties over to that Senior who had been so nasty. That was basically the end of my dream of dancing on Broadway. The Senior who got the job became humble and credited me, flowers on crutches opening night and top billing in the program. All very nice but I never felt that elation of a grand jete with legs as long as mine are again. I subsequently went into broadcasting. Maybe performing wears many faces. RIP beautiful dancer 🩷
Beautiful Michaela Mabinty. 💙🌹