Fred Astair Great Dancing Memories

A huge apology to Fred Astaire fans - I spelt his name incorrectly in the url and I apologise most humbly for this ommission...

In my totally non-biased view Fred Astaire would be the greatest song and dance man who ever lived. A star of many early movie productions he wowed the audiences and with his varied but stunningly beautiful and clever dancing partners; kept thousands of people coming back for more of his fancy foot work. Even now clips of his particular dance routines fly around the internet at the speed of light - bit like his feet really!

Fred Astair was born Federick Austerlitz on May 10, 1899 in Omaha, Nebraska and died at the grand old age of 88 in Los Angeles, on June 22, 1987. His stage film career spanned a total of 76 years. He had many dancing partners but his main dancing partner during his brilliant career was a lady of prodigious talent; one Ginger Rogers. He made 31 musical films, ten of which were made with Ginger. It has been said that she was not as good technically as some of his later partners but, that she had this remarkable ability to look as if her entire life and joy was focused on dancing with Fred, and so it was that many ladies watching these brilliant,funfilled routines also yearned to have the pleasure of dancing with Fred...

Fred Astaire is generally acknowledged to have been one of the most influential dancers in the history of film and television musicals. He was named the fifth "Greatest Male Star of All Time" by the American Film Institute despite the fact that this bit of noteworthy information was unearthed about his first screen test for RKO Pictures. Seems that his first RKO screen test is reported to have read : "Can't act, can't sing, balding but can dance a little" ". How incredibly shortsighted were those words since we obviously still know the name of the dancer being auditioned, but oddly enough the name of person carrying out the audition has been lost in the mists of time!

Although Fred Astaire was most reluctant to be a part of another dancing team - the first team he was a part of was as a child entertainer where with his elder sister Adele as his dancing partner, they performed for audiences throughout the US; however his second but most well known dancing team was formed when he joined up with Ginger Rogers. And together they, Astair and Rogers made ten films which included The Gay Divorcee (1934), Roberta (1935), Top Hat (1935), Follow The Fleet (1936), Swing Time (1936),Shall We Dance (1937), and Carefree (1938). All of these films brought honour and fame to the RKO Studios with six of these musicals becoming the biggest money spinners of these times.

It was his input into the choreography along with that of Hermes Pan, which enabled him to ensure that dancing became an integral part of the musical films of Hollywood; which were all the rage in 1930's and the 1940's. Katharine Hepburn in her inimitable style, is reported as describing this beautiful dancing couple with these words "He gives her class and she gives him sex."1.

Fred was so imaginative, enthusiastic and such a consummate dancer and choreographer that he was given a very rare contractual honour - a percentage of the film's profits,plus autonomy over the presentation of the dances "so allowing him to revolutionize dance on film" ²

Astaire was incredibly talented with an ability for showing a wide range of emtions, which ranged from a lightness of being to a deep darkness of the soul. e was greatly admired for his technical control and sense of rhythm.His dance routines were prized for their elegance, grace, originality and precision;and he was eclectic in his striving for excellence. The sources he borrowed from for his creations included tap and other black rhythms, classical dance and in doing so he set standards for those who followed on - standards that today are still considered to be very high in both performance and entertainment values. As Jerome Robbins stated, "Astaire's dancing looks so simple, so disarming, so easy, yet the understructure, the way he sets the steps on, over or against the music, is so surprising and inventive" 3.

Astaire who choreographed all his own routines, further observes:

"Working out the steps is a very complicated process--something like writing music. You have to think of some step that flows into the next one, and the whole dance must have an integrated pattern. If the dance is right, there shouldn't be a single superfluous movement. It should build to a climax and stop!."4.

He was often inspired by the words of a song or the music itself which could suggest a certain emotion or feeling.It is said that his perfectionism was legendary; however,the steps he took to achieve this was hard on those who were not blessed with the same energy or mindset.^.

"In fact his consummate artistry won him the adulation of such twentieth century dance legends with Margot Fonteyn, Mikhail Baryshnikov, Gene Kelly, Rudolph Nureyev, Bob Fosse, Michael Jackson and George Balanchine being among them.Balanchine summed Astaire's influence and talent, "He is like Bach, who in his time had a great concentration of ability, essence, knowledge, a spread of music. Astaire has that same concentration of genius."5.

His friend, another firm favourite of mine, David Niven, (have you ever read "The Moon's a Balloon" or "Bring on the Empty Horses - both written by David Niven - totally hysterical! you may it a little hard to obtain these books but I found my copy at the St Vincent de Paul's Store.) in WIKIPAEDIA described him as "a pixie — timid, always warm-hearted, with a penchant for schoolboy jokes." "He remained physically active well into his eighties. At age 78, he broke his left wrist while riding his grandson's skateboard" 6.

After a long and dance filled life Astaire died at 88 years of age from pneumonmia on June 22, 1987.

Astaire has never been portrayed on film.7.

He always refused permission for such portrayals, saying, "However much they offer me - and offers come in all the time - I shall not sell." Astaire's will included a clause requesting that no such portrayal ever take place; he commented, "It is there because I have no particular desire to have my life misinterpreted, which it would be."9

May the memory of this fabulous man live on and may all our children and their children's children continue to be inspired by his gifts of song and dance.

copyright: a.a.gallagher 2009

1. Croce, Arlene (1972). The Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers Book. London: W.H. Allen..ISBN 9780810943742

2. The only other entertainer to receive this treatment at the time was Greta Garbo.

3 Mueller, John (1986). Astaire Dancing - The Musical Films. London: Hamish Hamilton. .ISBN 0-241-11749-6. page 18.

4. Mueller, John (1986). Astaire Dancing - The Musical Films. London: Hamish Hamilton.ISBN 0-241-11749-6.page 15

5. Mueller, John (1986). Astaire Dancing - The Musical Films. London: Hamish Hamilton.ISBN 0-241-11749-6.page 3

6.Thomas p. 301) Astaire was awarded a life membership in the National Skateboard Society (Satchell p. 221). He remarked "Gene Kelly warned me not to be a damned fool, but I'd seen the things those kids got up to on television doing all sorts of tricks. What a routine I could have worked up for a film sequence if they had existed a few years ago. Anyway I was practicing in my driveway." (Satchell p.221)

7. (Thomas p. 301) Astaire was awarded a life membership in the National Skateboard Society (Satchell p. 221). He remarked "Gene Kelly warned me not to be a damned fool, but I'd seen the things those kids got up to on television doing all sorts of tricks. What a routine I could have worked up for a film sequence if they had existed a few years ago. Anyway I was practicing in my driveway." (Satchell p.221)

8. Satchell p.253.

9. In 1986,Federico Fellini released Ginger and Fred, which, although inspired by Astaire and Rogers, portrays an Italian ballroom dancing couple. In 1996, his widow allowed footage of him to be used in a commercial for Dirt Devil vacuum cleaners in which he dances with a vacuum. His daughter stated that she was "saddened that after his wonderful career he was sold to the devil." cf Royal Wedding

10. Wikipaedia is a fountain of knowledge and contributed to the overall hub..for morwe informaton go to:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_Astaire