Nicolai Legat (1869-1937) and his brother Sergei (1875-1905) were dancers, choreographers, teachers of ballet and caricaturists. Both worked for the Russian Imperial Ballet. Nicolai became an important teacher and after leaving the Imperial Ballet in 1914 went on to teach dance in Russia, Paris and London, where he eventually settled. Sergei, regarded as the greater choreographer and perceived as the natural successor to Pavel Gerdt as the Imperial Ballet's Premier danseur noble, committed suicide, aged 30.

The brothers worked together to produce caricatures of fellow dancers, choreographers and musicians. Pierina Legnani (1863-1923) was an Italian ballerina, considered Prima Ballerina Assoluta with the Tsar's Imperial Ballet at the Maryinsky Theatre in St. Petersburg. She was the first ballerina to perform 32 fouettes en tornant in Russia the title role of the ballet Cinderella on 17 December 1893 (other Italian ballerinas had performed this feat elsewhere in Europe). Legnani had trained at the school of La Scala, Milan, and developed into a ballerina who was both a virtuoso and a dramatic performer. She is remembered for her creation of Odette/Odile in the Petipa/Ivanov Swan Lake (1895) and the title role of Raymonda (1898). For a decade from 1888 she regularly danced at the Alhambra, Leicester Square, London.