Goldrush Dance Rhee Gold Teacher Studio School Bob Rizzo K.C. Patrick KC

Amy Arnaz never considered herself much of a gambler, despite growing up in Las Vegas. But throughout her career, first as a dancer and then as a teacher,the former ballerina who prides herself on a method of “discipline with love” has shown a knack for rolling the dice and coming up a winner.

As the director of Dance Etc., her studio in Boulder City, Nevada, Arnaz runs a school and its affiliated student company, the Boulder City Ballet Company. And, with the help of her husband, she operates a performing-arts venue, the Boulder Theatre, conveniently located next door to the studio. And, oh yes—that husband, dutifully helping out with sound and lighting as most studio spouses inevitably seem to do, is none other than former teenage heartthrob Desi Arnaz Jr.

“I never thought I’d be in a situation like this—with my own studio, my own theater, and Desi’s involvement,” Arnaz says. But there were early signs that she was on a less-than-ordinary path. Growing up in Las Vegas, where her father worked as a credit manager for the old Flamingo and Desert Inn casino hotels, Arnaz might have succumbed to the lure of glitz and glamour. She studied ballet with Christina Carson and eventually took the professional-level classes frequented by the dancers who worked on the Vegas Strip. But, she says, “I never wanted to be a showgirl. I never wanted to be a part of the nightlife. To this day I can’t stay up late. I go to bed at 9 p.m.” She adds, “Besides, I’m too short to be a showgirl—I’m only 5' 5". I made one attempt to get into a Vegas show, at the Tropicana. I didn’t get in, and that was perfectly fine with me.”

Instead, Arnaz attended San Diego State University and performed with the San Diego Ballet, directed by Sonja Arova and Thor Sutowski. When she did return home to Vegas, it wasn’t to work in the casinos but to perform in another ballet company—Vassili Sulich’s Nevada Dance Theatre. She also began teaching at the University of Nevada–Las Vegas.

Then, after a brief marriage ended in divorce, Arnaz showed that she had a gambler’s spirit after all. The suddenly single mom of a daughter, Hayley, decided to make a radical change. “I had $6,000 to my name. I was a single mother of a 1-year-old, and I was 26. I knew I had to do something. I didn’t want to stick my daughter in daycare all day long,” Arnaz recalls. Her solution? Open her own dance studio.

Arnaz moved to Boulder City (30 minutes outside of Las Vegas), where she opened a 700-square-foot school, starting out with only 40 ballet students. Today, 26 years later, Arnaz has expanded her space to 5,000 square feet that encompasses three studios—barely enough, she says, to accommodate the more than 500 students who study ballet, tap, jazz, hip-hop, Pilates, and yoga.

Although he’s not on the faculty, Desi Arnaz Jr. is a big part of the studio, helping out with sound and lighting for the school’s recitals and the company’s performances.He and Amy met while attending inspirational classes with Boulder City-based author Vernon Howard in 1977; ten years later, they married.

The Arnaz family’s legacy is evident in the photos of Desi’s mom, Lucille Ball, hanging in the studio and the I Love Lucy-related items in the gift shop. “Desi will tell you that he never thought he’d be doing this at this point in his life, but he loves it. The kids all call him Mr. Desi,” Arnaz says. “Before we were even married, Desi would come to our recitals at the high school. The school only had an antiquated light board and there was no sound system, so I played the music from a boom box. He was amazed at what we were trying to do with what we had. He started bringing in lights, then a sound system, then walkie-talkies so we could communicate backstage. I used to edit our music and it was bad. It drove him crazy, so now we go to a recording studio and everything is digitally and professionally done.”

Arnaz credits her husband with the improvements she’s made in the studio’s productions. “I wouldn’t have any of this if not for Desi,” she says. “He’s elevated everything. He brought in all this new energy from growing up in the [performing arts] and lifted my business into this wonderful thing.”

The Boulder Theatre, Arnaz says, has helped the school meet the demands of its steadily growing student body. The school holds some of its larger advanced classes on the theater stage, and the venue plays host to the school’s recitals, the studio company’s Nutcracker, and a smattering of professional events, including performances by her husband’s cronies and his band.

“Desi and I bought the theater about six years ago,” Arnaz says. “We used to drive by it and think how sad it was that it was all closed up and just sitting there—this big, beautiful old movie theater that had been built in 1931.” The studio owner had found herself in the same situation as many of her colleagues, paying increasingly higher rates to rent the local high school for performances. “It got harder and harder to book, and every time we did, they would charge me more,” says Arnaz, echoing a common complaint among teachers. “Our real dream is to make this into a working theater, with more acts performing year round.”

That dream may soon become reality. Arnaz, who has been hobbled recently by knee injuries, says she’s planning to sell the studio. “My faculty does all the teaching now; I take care of the books and paperwork. Because of my knee problems, I can’t even jump anymore. I still do choreography and run the company, but I’m looking at the next phase now,” she says. “Once I sell the studio, in the next year or two, I’ll still be in charge of the company, but I’ll be able to turn more of my attention to the theater and making that work. I’m looking forward to that challenge.” Another gamble—but then, Arnaz is on a winning streak.