Sergei Polunin, the Royal Ballet-trained dancer who revels in a “bad boy of ballet” reputation, has been dropped from a production in Paris after a series of homophobic and sexist social media posts.

It was revealed last week that Polunin had been invited to play Prince Siegfried in Paris Opera Ballet’s February production of Swan Lake. By the weekend the invitation was withdrawn.

In a series of offensive posts on Instagram Polunin called for men to “man up” and realise they are wolves, lions and leaders of their family who are supposed to take care of everything.

On 29 December he wrote: “Man up to all men who is doing ballet there is already ballerina on stage don’t need to be two. Man should be a man and woman should be a woman. Masculine and Feminine energies creates balance. That’s a reason you got balls. Same think Outside ballet, Man what’s wrong with you? Females now trying take on the man role because you don’t fuck them and because you are an embarrassment.”

Ukraine-born Polunin is a fervent admirer of Russia’s President Vladimir Putin – he has a tattoo of him on his chest – and a supporter of the US president telling people “you don’t like Donald Trump because he speaks the truth and speaks his mind!!!”

On Friday, in a now deleted post, Polunin directed his attention to overweight people, writing: “Let’s slap fat people when you see them. It will help them and encourage them to lose some fat. No respect for laziness!”

The Paris Ballet dancer Adrien Couvez last week called Polunin an “embarrassment” on Twitter. “Our company advocates values ​​of respect and tolerance! This man has nothing to do with us.”

Paris Opera Ballet’s artistic director, Aurélie Dupont, wrote to the company’s dancers at the weekend about her decision to drop him. She called him a “talented artist” but said that his public pronouncements were not in keeping with the company’s values.

Polunin picked up his bad boy reputation after walking out on the Royal Ballet six years ago this month. He had trained at its school from the age of 13 and became its youngest principal at 19, compared to Rudolf Nureyev or Mikhail Baryshnikov.

At the time he tweeted about “living fast and dying young” and in one interview said he often performed after taking cocaine.

The dancer appeared to overcome his self-destructive urges and worked hard to re-establish himself as a star of the ballet world.

Polunin often seems to enjoy his punk, bad boy reputation but he is also seen by people who have worked with him as a young man who is sweet and polite.

He has managed to break out of the world of classical ballet thanks largely to a video that went viral of him dancing to Hozier’s Take Me To the Church, made by David LaChapelle.

He made his screen acting debut playing a Russian count and dancer in Kenneth Branagh’s Murder on the Orient Express and followed that up in the poorly received 2018 spy thriller Red Sparrow.

Polunin is due to present a mixed programme at the London Palladium over six nights at the end of May. Representatives of Polunin and the London Palladium have been approached for comment.