Herbert Ross' wife,
Nora Kaye, an acclaimed ballerina who was a founding member of the American Ballet Theatre in the 1940s, was the driving force behind making
Dancers (1987). Kaye, who was credited as an executive producer, persuaded the Cannon Group to finance the $7-million film. Then Kaye pushed her husband to direct it because she felt
Mikhail Baryshnikov's performance in the ballet Giselle deserved a "proper" record. Although Ross was in post-production on
The Secret of My Success (1987), he stopped editing that film to make Dancers. Kaye was on set every day of filming, before her death in Feb 1987, three months after principal photography was completed. Prior to her death, she was able to see a near-final edit of the movie.
