The massive employment of Filipino performers by Hong Kong Disneyland has led to a dire brain drain, with Its impact strongly felt in Ballet Philippines (founded in 1969 as a national ballast of culture) rapidly losing half of its prima dancers within the last decade.

 

Today, the persistent exodus of Filipino labour into the 'global theme park' showbiz is a common destiny for most Filipino performers, a survival means outside a home country under economic and political impasse.

 

Created with the young and dextrous dancers of Ballet Philippines, 'Your Highness' is a concert that prefigures their potential transition into the industry of happiness. It endlessly rehearses their becoming 'real' within the fantasy hall of 'performed happiness': of manufactured desires built upon privilege and the idealized Other.

 

As a study of classical ballet in the Philippines - its romanticized form and repertoire now intersected with pop entertainment and vernacular bodies - 'Your Highness' entreats us to observe the colonial narrative and embodiment of the Prince/ss archetype which hosts and re/produces contemporary Filipino servility and mobility within the global empire.