Manga / La Magnifique Grande Scène

Clockwise from top: Rebecca, Shouko, Evelyn, Keira, Kanade, Sakura, and Ema.

I'm sorry Mom, Daddy, I know how much trouble I'm causing and how worried you are about me, but there is only one road for me right now. I want to dedicate my life to dancing, and I want to do it on the world stage!!

— Kanade Ariya

One day, Kanade Ariya goes with her mother to a ballet in which her neighbor Risa is performing. Completely entranced by Risa, who seems to have transformed into a real fairy in front of the young girl's eyes, Kanade begs her parents to sign her up for ballet lessons. Armed with a cheerful attitude, a desire to learn everything she can, and the simultaneous support and competition provided by both friends and rivals, Kanade slowly works to achieve her dream of becoming a professional ballerina.

La Magnifique Grande Scène (Kenrantaru Grande Scène) is a Seinen manga by Cuvie focused on ballet with something of a sports twist. It follows Kanade on her quest to become a professional dancer starting from early childhood through to the present. The manga began serialization in Champion RED in 2013, and is licensed in English by e-book publisher MEDIA DO.

On their own roads to becoming pros are an assortment of other girls whose paths are closely intertwined with Kanade's: Shouko Itou, a classmate of Kanade's at their dance studio and her closest friend. Sakura Kurisu, daughter of a former professional, taught from an early age on how to be the best. Ema Fujita, blessed with a photographic memory and natural talent, despite her flippant attitude. Rebecca, an uptight Singaporean-British girl who has been attending the Royal Ballet School since childhood. Evelyn Fox, a spirited American girl who idolizes the famed ballerina Abigail Nichols. And Keira Luttinen, an extremely shy Finnish girl who desires to be a great choreographer. They're joined by a large (though tight) supporting cast of parents, mentors and other dancers.

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This work provides examples of the following:

• Adults Are Useless: Not so much averted as smashed through with abandon. Most of the adults are themselves complex characters who, despite their own self-doubts, serve as well-respected mentors and parents to the kids they interact with, especially Kanade. The closest person to this trope (but again, just barely) is Abby, whose reckless method in approaching, teaching, and interacting with students is noted to be detrimental to their mental growth.
• An Aesop:
  • "It's a small world." A light-hearted take on how small the ballet industry actually is, despite its massive popularity. See Master-Apprentice Chain below for more direct examples, but apart from the dancers, ballet's own history contains a lot of intermingling people from vastly different cultures, meaning aspiring dancers and choreographies from the most obscure corners of the world likely has a connection with each other.
  • "You have to eat well." Played for Drama, solely to showcase the danger of self-destructing from things as simple as diet alone. Sakura and Shouko almost became victims of this, while Keira's close friend, Sharon, was expelled because her malnourished body, which she refused to fix despite the school's assistance, was unable to dance to the Royal Ballet's exacting standards. And this was just the examples directly related to Kanade's life—there's a lot more ballerina out there who suffer from this, sleep deprivation, drugs, and other self-harming habits.
  • Kanade's Catchphrase: "Dancing is so fun!" There were many older characters in the manga who grew disillusioned with the world of professional ballet, and all of them, without exception, stopped personally dancing when they reached this stage. Risa, Nobuko, Mrs. Kurisu—the list went on and on. In the end, it's an art form one should enjoy when performing, and if one's mental state has reached this low point, it's better to stop rather than putting oneself and others in danger.
• Author Appeal: Cuvie is a massive fan of European culture and food. Expect gratuitous shots of historical buildings and western meals.
• Both Sides Have a Point: Regarding the two main "camps" of ballet teaching.
  • Nobuko and Eugene (and Oliver, to a certain extent) place a lot of emphasis on natural growth, providing as comfortable an environment as possible so what they teach is actually fun, instead of insisting on an unreasonably high standard. They don't care much about what their students achieve in life, only how they mature as a person and a dancer, regardless if they eventually turn professional or not. This notably negatively impacts the students' preparation for a higher, global stage, when they want to chase a better career, as most immediately crumple under the much higher scrutiny, foreign culture, and physical disadvantage.
  • Mrs. Kurisu (and Abby, to a certain extent) puts her students through gruelling Training from Hell, separating the wheat from the chaff as quickly and brutally as possible to find those talents worth investing her time into. This results in an uncomfortable, military-like, and borderline sadistic environment where failure means death. Many, many prospective students are turned away at the door if they don't show immediate talent (notably Kanade, whom Sakura now considers better than her). However, when it comes down to it, those who survive are very well-equipped to enter the industry immediately, since what she simulates is basically a pseudo-professional living environment where backstabbing is perfectly normal.
• Broken Pedestal: Not completely, but the pedestal that Kanade had placed Abigail Nichols on is certainly damaged when she finds out she wasn't the only girl Abby promised a Royal Ballet scholarship to. Though she admits she was conceited to think that wasn't the case, it does allow her to realize she has other options besides the Royal Ballet.
• But Not Too Foreign: A lot of characters are of mixed blood or backgrounds.
• Cast Herd: Not initially, but as the series went on, more and more groups are introduced with their own unique storylines and problems (most of which Kanade finds herself in the middle of), making the current chapters this. The main page's image above is already a very limited example, while groupings are usually drawn per arc, such as the first one◊, YAGP◊, and Royal Ballet◊.
• Cast of Snowflakes: No matter how similarly they're dressed up in their ballet costumes, there's usually a distinguishing marker between the characters (typically their bangs and eye designs). This trope much easier to observe when the girls are in their casual clothes.
• Chekhov's Gunman: Minor ones during award ceremonies, combined with Foreshadowing. The presenters (for Kanade) usually dictate where she's going or about to interact with in the next arc. Eugene was the one handing her both her award and short-term scholarship for Marseille during the YAGP Japan preliminaries, while Abby did so for Kanade's pan-division championship in New York for Royal Ballet's one-year scholarship. The two workshop teachers for John Cranko also personally delivered Ema her prize, which resulted in her one-year scholarship there too.
• Coming of Age Story: Starting off when Kanade is around 7- or 8-years-old, it follows her and the other core characters as they go from neophyte children just learning to dance, to teenagers who have left home in order to live abroad and realize their dreams of becoming professional dancers.
• Dancing Royalty: Sakura is the arrogant version of this at her dance school, because she's won numerous competitions thanks to being the daughter of a professional ballet dancer. When a classmate wants to befriend her, it takes a while for Sakura to be won over.
• Defeat Means Friendship: Kanade vows to turn Sakura from a fearsome rival into a valued friend, something Sakura scoffs at. Though she never officially beats Sakura in a competition, Sakura admits defeat to her more charming Aurora in an impromptu one, and from that point on becomes one of Kanade's most loyal friends.
• Determinator: Once Kanade has set her mind to something, stopping her becomes a near impossibility, bar real potential of injury.
• Deuteragonist: There's usually one per arc. Given how much Abby matters in Kanade's life, you can argue she's one for the entire series, as the following examples also have her fingerprints all over them.
  • Both teachers, Nobuko and Mrs. Kurisu, are this in the first arc, during the main characters' childhood and preteen years.
  • Marseille: Andrea, following her family's troubles in Venezuela and her difficulty in adapting to her new life away from them.
  • YAGP: Akito, following his Character Development from being an extreme The Stoic to a... relatively normally-emoting boy.
  • Royal Ballet: Keira, Evelyn, and Rebecca (in that order), discussing their backgrounds, motivations, current passion, and how Kanade is changing them (or not).
• Engrish: Invoked when Kanade (who only has very rudimentary English knowledge to start with) first tries talking to English speakers like Garrel or Abby. Her English gets much better later on, and she's able to hold conversations with native speakers, though at times misunderstandings still occur.
• Exposed to the Elements: Some characters complained about the extreme climatic difference between where they are and where they come from, such as Kanade in Marseille (though she's fully adapted in London), Evelyn in London, etc.
• Fair-Weather Mentor: It's all but outright said that Abby is one of these, though Kanade and especially Evelyn idolize her far too much to heed the warning signs.
• Fantastic Racism: It's much better in this generation, but in the previous one, when Nobuko and Mrs. Kurisu were still active, it's very rampant. It did start from the more general interpretation of racism, but it soon expanded into palpable ridicule, discrimination, and outright sabotage. Back then, there weren't even any effort in attempting to include Asians into social cliques, as well as intentional ignorance of the cultural difference. This was the main motive for both women to build their studios in Japan, though they went about it in completely opposite ways. For comparison, Japanese girls won the last 2 YAGP in a row: Erika Matoba won it the previous year when Sakura and Andrea competed, then Kanade won it in her year.
• Fighting Fingerprint: All over the place, given how much ballerinas are in the story and how few the classical choreographies are. Additionally, there's a lot of historical schools who have exclusive rights to some particular productions, meaning if you're dancing or know how to dance that very choreography, you're likely from that select few schools. In contrast, different choreographers from different eras are immediately distinguishable to the experienced eyes, regardless of who's dancing. Even the same source material is often noted to differ considerably under different hands. For instance, the Nutcracker Kanade and Sakura learn are considerably different in both technique and storyline.
  • The most extreme example is explained when the professional judges have to grade Aurora, purely because how popular it was due to its low entry barrier and excellent platform to showcase one's foundations. Shouko's was often compared to a princess, Sakura's was described as a blooming flower, while Ema did it ethereally and lightly. There's Kanade's, Abby's, and Saki's variations, too, but theirs weren't really covered in-depth. Aurora is once again used as a measuring stick when Kanade returns from Royal Ballet after a year, when she dances it on-stage to great critical response.
  Nobuko (regarding Aurora): It's a cute and flashy variation, which one could argue represents the quintessence of beauty in classical ballet.
  • Various characters repeatedly analyze other dancers' signature strengths and eye-catching techniques, but on occasion, they'll get reminded of a single person's signature, historical performance. Sakura, Eugene, and Nobuko could instantly tell Kanade's performing Abby's Swanhilda, while Nobuko and Ema immediately recognizes Mrs. Kurisu's distinct choreography in Sakura. Kanade and Andrea quickly observed they're very similar to each other simply from a few basic exercises (not the whole choreography), while Keira's take on mythologies is also distinct among the student bodies when choreographing.
  • This is also implied to be the ultimate goal for most ballerinas: Be accomplished and skilled enough their likeness and style are immortalized and recognizable anywhere, instead of being dubbed as a rendition of someone else's. Abby is the best example of this.
• Fire-Forged Friends: Kanade and her roommates in London. Things are initially rocky, but their experiences together in the competitive Royal Ballet School, Kanade and Evelyn's participation in YAGP, and especially working together in the choreography competition, leads to them becoming much closer.
• Fish out of Water: Happens to Kanade after she moves to London. Most of the other characters experience it as well after moving abroad.
• Freudian Excuse: If a character appears bitter or cynical, chances are they have a good reason for it.
• Friendly Rivalry: All over the series. Most of the characters are simultaneously good friends and fierce rivals. The only one that comes close to falling into outright hostility is the one between Shouko and Ema, and even then, it's largely one-sided on Shouko's part and Shouko admits after watching Ema perform, she can't hate her. Shouko herself puts it best:
  Shouko (to her father): I want to improve alongside my rivals. Is that too naive a thought?
  • When Evelyn first shows up at the YAGP Finals, her interaction with Kanade seemed to be an indication of a more traditional rivalry. However, after they start rooming in London, they become fast friends due to their similar personalities.
• Game-Breaking Injury: Risa suffers one early in the series and retires from dancing soon afterwards. The actual reason for her retirement is much more complex, with the injury serving as the last straw. In a way, though, Risa is grateful as it let her leave before she might grow to hate ballet and led her to find her real passion: costume design.
  • Ema had a minor one as a child, which actually shortened her right leg slightly when she grew taller. This mostly impacted her mental state, making her lack the courage to push herself as hard as her competitors, though her physical abilities are mostly unhindered.
  • Zixuan inflamed her ankles before New York. While this was usually very minor, the stakes at hand (a top 12 place in YAGP finals) meant she forced herself to compete, aggravating it further. To add insult to injury, she didn't even make it through.
• Genki Girl: Kanade's defining trait. She's upbeat, optimistic, extroverted and just plain has fun when she dances, something that other characters find infectious. Later on, Evelyn is also this.
• Gratuitous Foreign Language: In the fan translation at least, non-Japanese characters largely speak their respective languages and others they might know. Garrel, for instance, speaks almost exclusively in French and English, the dialogue of Sakura's classmates in Munich is rendered in German and so on. There's characters speaking in Chinese and Spanish as well.
• Hard Work Hardly Works: Absolutely inverted. There's nothing but hard work for a ballerina to achieve the top level. Talent is important, yes, but the work ethic, the grind, and gruelling expectation of oneself must be cultivated as early as possible. There's several characters in the manga who, despite their genius, wasted several years by coasting on their talent alone, abandoning their training half-heartedly.
• Heroic BSoD: Sakura suffers one after her performance at the YAGP finals when told by her mother that the crowd was applauding out of pity, not respect, following her fall. Kanade suffers one herself when she finds out that Abby's promise of a scholarship to the Royal Ballet, the goal she's spent over a year chasing, was also offered to other girls.
  • Kanade went into another one when her continued scholarship in the Royal Ballet may be terminated.
• Humiliating Wager: Kanade makes a bet with Sakura that if she doesn't beat her in an upcoming ballet competition, she'll join the "Let's Dance for Fun!" class at Sakura's mom's school, a class mostly full of little kids that poor performers in the ballet class get exiled to. Kanade ends up going there for one class, which proves surprisingly helpful for her.
• Language Barrier: Having a large number of non-Japanese characters in the cast means Kanade and others are constantly running into this issue and having to find ways to overcome it.
• Male Gaze: See Ms. Fanservice below. However, there's considerable gratuitous shots of naked backs from some custom leotards, plus Female Gaze for the shirtless, ripped male dancers.
• Master-Apprentice Chain: Starts from a small ballet company in Toulouse. Nobuko trained and grew up there, building up and advancing her career as an aspiring dancer. Kanade's current general teacher at Royal Ballet, Vasilisa, often guest-starred there, guiding Nobuko with the same tips she's giving Kanade now. When she became soloist, she was joined by two recent graduates, Eugene and Abby (from Paris Opera and Royal Ballet, respectively), both of whom have taught and was currently teaching Kanade, along with Andrea, Chloe, Maho, Evelyn, Brenda, Zixuan, and others. When she opened her own studio in Japan, Risa and Saki enrolled there, followed by Kanade, Shouko, Julia, Akito, and others. Currently, Kanade often gives pointers to the younger generation, such as Ryou, Zooey, and Zixuan. A small world, indeed.
• Metalhead: Keira is implied to be one, as the song she uses for her choreography is a metal song, much to everyone else's surprise.
• Ms. Fanservice: Subverted. Despite Cuvie's background in drawing hentai, all characters are clothed conservatively when they're off-stage, and depicted realistically when they're on it, almost without any Male Gaze.
• New York City: Just like in real life, the finals of the YAGP are held here. Averts New York Is Only Manhattan much to the disappointment of the characters, as the first half of the finals are held at Purchase College in Westchester County.
• Oblivious to Love: Nobody notices when they're being crushed upon. Not Yamamoto's and Yuuki's on Kanade, not Sakura's male classmate on her, and certainly not Rebecca's on Matt (at least at first).
• Out of Focus: Kanade's school friends. Addressed in-universe, as Kanade's father asks her if she's worried that by focusing so intently on dancing she's abandoning any semblance of a normal childhood. A lot of the cast falls into this after the YAGP, as Kanade is now living and training in London.
• Parents as People: If any parent gets notable screen time, expect them to fall into this.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni:
  • Kanade and Sakura, the two main rivals. One's a bright-eyed, naive newcomer from a middle-class family, while the other is an experienced, somewhat jaded semi-professional from a well-to-do environment. Their dancing styles, learning method, and motivations are almost exact opposites, though they're currently good friends (not that Sakura's going to admit it anytime soon.)
  • Evelyn and Rebecca, two of Kanade's roommates in London. Evelyn, the Red Oni, is more passionate, outgoing and extroverted while Rebecca, the Blue Oni, is more reserved and uptight. In fact, their opposite personalities lead to open hostility from Evelyn towards Rebecca.
• Ripped from the Headlines:
  • Being from Venezuela, the ongoing political and social crisis in that country plays a large part in Andrea's moody and homesick attitude during Kanade's stay in Marseille and a large part of the conflict between the two.
  • Right after Kanade's Year 11 intra-school choreographic competition, the COVID-19 pandemic hit the globe. There was a real scare Keira actually caught it, but it turned out to just be a normal fever, if quite severe. As we know now, transport and travel were all instantly shut down. This particularly impacted Zixuan, who's from China. The foreign students in Royal Ballet were sent home during the ensuing winter vacation as the school closed down, with its reopening in doubt.
• Shading/Colour Dissonance: Quite egregiously. For example, Shouko's light brown with Abby's, Miriam's, and Keira's pale blonde; Evelyn's dark blonde with Ema's plain brown; Andrea's dark brown and Kanade's pitch black. Thank goodness for colour pages.
• Shout-Out: Many.
  • Kanade and her father enjoy a lot of shonen genre, such as Valkyrie Profile and Mythical Detective Loki Ragnarok, and plenty of Defeat Means Friendship tropes. She did a Kamen Rider pose◊ and tried to turn Super Saiyan once.◊
  • Evelyn is a massive fan of Tom Hiddleston, particularly his portrayal of Loki in the MCU.
  • Not quite this trope, since this manga happens and follows real-world history as closely as possible, but there's a lot of legendary ballet productions named left and right, plus famous ballet dancers, choreographers, artists, political figures, etc. For instance, John Neumeier shows up himself during one of Sakura's rehearsal of his Cinderella, while videos of Margot Fonteyn and Rudolf Nureyev were repeatedly watched by various characters.
• Spoiler Cover: Not exactly spoiler per se, but the chapter covers give snapshots to the main characters' daily lives away from ballet lessons, most◊ often◊ showing scenes◊ of◊ them hanging◊ out◊ or casual◊ selfies◊. These weren't included in the main story for some reason.
• Technician vs. Performer: Ultimately, ballet serves as a combination of this. An overly-technical performance without any acting is just as bad as an emotional performance full of mistakes. There's shades of this between the characters during their early years, yes, but the measure of how much they've improved is how successful they combine these two types, capturing the attention and entertaining the paying audience as best they can. There's Kanade vs. Sakura, Andrea vs. Sakura, Shouko vs. Ema, Keira vs. Toby, etc.
• Time Skip: One of about three years after the second chapter, placing Kanade around 11-years-old afterwards. Minor ones are present throughout the series, though. As of the most recent chapters, Kanade is in her early teens. There's also several mini-ones in some chapters every now and then, usually indicated by the passing of the season via trees and flowers, encompassing a few months.
• Tragic Dropout: An unfortunate realistic effect of the COVID-19 pandemic. Both Evelyn and Gabriella quit Royal Ballet, implied to be their parents' forceful decision, to continue their ballet studies closer to home. Not even Abigail can pull enough strings to prevent this.
• Vitriolic Best Buds: Once Rebecca and Evelyn make up, their relationship becomes this. Evelyn likes to take every opportunity she can to tease Rebecca, much to Rebecca's consternation, but they otherwise manage to get along just fine.
• What Happened to the Mouse?: Early in the series, a girl named Rena is introduced as a member of Mrs. Kurisu's studio and thus introduces Sakura into the series. She eventually joins Takimoto's studio and seems set up to be a supporting character, but very quickly disappears from the series once the competitions start and is never acknowledged again.
• Write What You Know: Cuvie practiced ballet when she was younger, which likely plays a large part in the more realistic focus of the series. She's otherwise supported by a wide array of consultants from the professional ballet industry.