Miami City Ballet has earned raves from performances in Miami, New York City and Paris, but it was a different kind of performance that brought the company mainstream fame.

“One of the things that I think helped us to start dispelling the image of what the ballet is was Alex Wong’s appearance on [Fox TV show] So You Think You Can Dance,” said Bill Miller, the company’s director of marketing and communications. “His appearance did more for us over last summer than maybe any other single initiative that we put into place and I would say that his appearance only helped us send our message out.”...