Dance

SAN DIEGO — The adage that “the show must go on” applies as much to ballet as it does to Broadway.

Rayna, the leader and lead dancer of Rayna’s Spanish Ballet, was in an automobile accident about a week before her scheduled performances at SDSU’s Studio Theatre, but she was on stage Friday and Saturday, doing a flamenco that seemed more intent on cracking a couple of ribs than nursing them.

“I had to get other dancers to back me up,” Rayna said, afterward, “but there never was any doubt that I would be dancing--although the doctors told me not to.”

Dancing under adverse conditions is nothing new to Rayna. When she was a Southern California school girl, she traveled to Los Angeles for an audition with Jose Greco, and danced while ill with walking pneumonia. If Greco felt the heat, he credited it to Rayna’s passion, and before long, she was dancing leading roles with his internationally acclaimed company.