ballet company based in New York City and having an affiliated school. It was founded in 1939 by Lucia Chase and Richard Pleasant and presented its first performance on Jan. 11, 1940. Chase was director, with Oliver Smith, from 1945 to 1980; the dancer Mikhail Baryshnikov (Baryshnikov, Mikhail) was artistic director from 1980 to 1989.

Works were created for the company by such choreographers as Antony Tudor, Agnes deMille, Jerome Robbins, Michael Kidd, Eliot Feld, Twyla Tharp, Glen Tetley, and Mikhail Baryshnikov; Michel Fokine (Fokine, Michel) revived many of his masterpieces for the company and created Bluebeard (1941) and Russian Soldier (1942). Such dancers as Alicia Alonso, Baryshnikov, Erik Bruhn, Anton Dolin, André Eglevsky, Cynthia Gregory, Rosella Hightower, Nora Kaye, John Kriza, Hugh Laing, Natalia Makarova, Alicia Markova, Ivan Nagy, Janet Reed, Violette Verdy, and Igor Youskevitch were members of the company.