Mao’s Last Dancer

At the age of 11, Li was plucked from a poor Chinese village by Madame Mao's cultural delegates and taken to Beijing to study ballet. In 1979, during a cultural exchange to Texas, he falls in love with an American woman. Two years later, he managed to defect and went on to perform as a principal dancer for the Houston Ballet and as a principal artist with the Australian Ballet.

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  Bruce Beresford

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  Amanda Schull
  Elizabeth Mackey
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  Chi Cao
  Li Cunxin - adult
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  Chengwu Guo
  Li Cunxin - teenage
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  Wen Bin Huang
  Li Cunxin - boy
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  Joan Chen
  Niang
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  Wang Shuangbao
  Dia
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  Bruce Greenwood
  Ben Stevenson
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  Aden Young
  Dilworth
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  Kyle MacLachlan
  Charles Foster
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  Jack Thompson
  US Federal Judge
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  Penne Hackforth-Jones
  Cynthia Dodds
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  Camilla Vergotis
  Mary McKendry
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  Madeleine Eastoe
  Lori
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  Steven Heathcote
  Bobby Cordner
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  Kip Gamblin
  David
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  Christopher Kirby
  Mason
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  Suzie Steen
  Betty Lou
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  Yang Li
  Cunmao - 19 yrs
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  Ferdinand Hoang
  Consul Zhang
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  Xiguo Wu
  Director Wang