Ballerinas Pimped Out To Patrons At Famous Bolshoi Ballet, According to Ex-Dancer

According to a former Bolshoi dancer, the storied company's ballerinas are regularly pimped out to the institution's wealthiest patrons.

Anastasia Volochkova, who was reportedly kicked out of the Bolshoi in 2003 for being too fat, told the story on a Russian talkshow.

According to Volochkova, ballerinas were pressured to attend parties with the Bolshoi's biggest donors. The unspoken assumption of these arrangements was that the ballerinas would have sex with them. Volochkova claims that those who didn't were subject to reprimands and hindrance of thier professional careers within the company.

The girls were forced to go along to grand dinners and given advance warning that afterwards they would be expected to go to bed and have sex," Volochkova claimed.

"When the girls asked: 'What happens if we refuse?', they were told that they would not go on tour or even perform at the Bolshoi theatre. Can you imagine?" she added.

Volochkova says that the Bolshoi's General Director Anatoly Iskanov turned the theater into "a giant brothel."

Iskanov denied the claims saying ""I don't comment on dirt and ravings."

"Ten years ago when I was dancing at the theatre, I repeatedly received such propositions to share the bed of oligarchs," Volochkova told a Russian radio station and said that not even the ballet's stars were immune to such arrangements.

"It mainly happened with the corps du ballet but also with the soloists," she said

This is merely the latest in a string of bad press for the Russian theater. In January, the Bolshoi made global headlines when thier artistic director Sergei Filin was severely burned after having sulfuric acid thrown in his face.

Dancer Pavel Dmitrichenko and two other men confessed to the crime earlier this month.