Olivia Rodrigo’s music video for “stupid song” features several New York City Ballet and American Ballet Theatre dancers including Tiler Peck, India Bradley (in 2025, she became the first Black female soloist in NYCB’s 77 years of existence), Grace Scheffel, Kayla Mak, Kennedy Targosz, Kloe Walker, Lauren Collett, and Rommie Tomasini.
When New York City Ballet principal dancer Tiler Peck was hired to choreograph the music video, she insisted that all of the other dancers had to be professional ballet dancers because she wanted to “show ballet and show real dancers” so that fellow dancers would be proud of the ballet choreography seen in the video. She also hopes that seeing ballet in a pop music video will make ballet more accessible and give it more visibility to people who don’t get to see professional ballet in person at places like NYCB.
behind the scenes photos (including bodega cats!):
Director Mitch Ryan wanted to create a slow motion effect which required the performers to dance to a sped up version of the song (the opposite of the way P!nk’s “I’m Coming Up” video was filmed). Originally he wanted to film them at 2x speed, which Tiler said made the song sound like a chipmunk was singing it. Dancing so quickly required precision because any flaws would be highlighted when the footage was slowed down to the original speed of the song.
see slide 6 for rehearsal footage:
When she discussed the pitfalls and difficulties of dancing so quickly, he suggested that they settle for hitting on the ones and fives of the music “because there’s no way to actually stay on beat and do something every single count if you’re going that fast.” Eventually they compromised at using the song at 1.6x speed while filming which was more doable.
The dancers had a 4:45 AM call time and they began shooting on the streets of New York at 6 AM. Olivia wanted the dancers to wear pink, but the original tutus they sourced weren’t quite right. Tiler asked NYCB if they could use some of their handmade practice tutus, which are normally white. The NYCB costume shop custom dyed them pink for the video.
see slide 3 for the moshing (volume on):
