Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers
Encyclopedia
Fred Astaire
Fred Astaire was an American film and Broadway stage dancer, choreographer, singer and actor. His stage and subsequent film career spanned a total of 76 years, during which he made 31 musical films. He was named the fifth Greatest Male Star of All Time by the American Film Institute...
(May 10, 1899- June 22, 1987) and Ginger Rogers
Ginger Rogers
Ginger Rogers was an American actress, dancer, and singer who appeared in film, and on stage, radio, and television throughout much of the 20th century....
(July 16, 1911- April 25, 1995) were the most famous dance team in motion picture history. From 1933–1949 and until today they are known as one of the greatest dance pairs, in any art form, who ever lived. They made a total of 10 movies, 9 with RKO Radio Pictures and their only color (Technicolor
Technicolor
Technicolor is a color motion picture process invented in 1916 and improved over several decades.It was the second major process, after Britain's Kinemacolor, and the most widely used color process in Hollywood from 1922 to 1952...
) movie and also their only movie with M-G-M, The Barkleys of Broadway
The Barkleys of Broadway
The Barkleys of Broadway is a 1949 musical film from the Arthur Freed unit at MGM that reunited Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers after ten years apart...
(1949) .
Beginning (1933–1935)
Fred Astaire started dancing in the early 1900s as a child on stage, in VaudevilleVaudeville
Vaudeville was a theatrical genre of variety entertainment in the United States and Canada from the early 1880s until the early 1930s. Each performance was made up of a series of separate, unrelated acts grouped together on a common bill...
, partnering his older sister, Adele. He made his first movie in 1933 where he had a small role. The movie was Dancing Lady
Dancing Lady
Dancing Lady is a 1933 musical film starring Joan Crawford and Clark Gable, and featuring Franchot Tone, the fourth of eight collaborations between Crawford and Gable. It was directed by Robert Z. Leonard, produced by John W. Considine Jr. and David O. Selznick, and was based on the novel of the...
starring Clark Gable
Clark Gable
William Clark Gable , known as Clark Gable, was an American film actor most famous for his role as Rhett Butler in the 1939 Civil War epic film Gone with the Wind, in which he starred with Vivien Leigh...
and Joan Crawford
Joan Crawford
Joan Crawford , born Lucille Fay LeSueur, was an American actress in film, television and theatre....
. Ginger Rogers made her first appearance in a 1929 movie short, then made feature Pre-Code
Pre-Code
Pre-Code Hollywood refers to the era in the American film industry between the introduction of sound in the late 1920s and the enforcement of the Motion Picture Production Code censorship guidelines. Although the Code was adopted in 1930, oversight was poor and it did not become rigorously...
movies with Warner Brothers Pictures such as 42nd Street
42nd Street (film)
-Cast:*Warner Baxter as Julian Marsh, director*Bebe Daniels as Dorothy Brock, star*George Brent as Pat Denning, Dorothy's old vaudeville partner*Ruby Keeler as Peggy Sawyer, the newcomer*Guy Kibbee as Abner Dillon, the show's backer...
and Gold Diggers of 1933
Gold Diggers of 1933
Gold Diggers of 1933 is a pre-code Warner Bros. musical film directed by Mervyn LeRoy with songs by Harry Warren and Al Dubin , staged and choreographed by Busby Berkeley...
. Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers made their first pairing in a movie in 1933, Flying Down to Rio
Flying Down to Rio
Flying Down to Rio is a 1933 RKO musical film noted for being the first screen pairing of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. Astaire and Rogers were not the stars of the film, however, Dolores del Río and Gene Raymond were top-billed. Among the featured players Franklin Pangborn and Eric Blore are...
. In Flying Down to Rio Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers had supporting roles; the main star was Dolores Del Rio
Dolores del Río
Dolores del Río was a Mexican film actress. She was a star of Hollywood films during the silent era and in the Golden Age of Hollywood...
. In 1934 Astaire and Rogers made the musical movie The Gay Divorcee
The Gay Divorcee
The Gay Divorcee is a 1934 American film based on the musical play Gay Divorce written by Dwight Taylor, Kenneth S. Webb, Samuel Hoffenstein, with screenplay by George Marion Jr., Dorothy Yost and Edward Kaufman, from an unproduced play by J. Hartley Manners...
which co-starred Edward Everett Horton
Edward Everett Horton
Edward Everett Horton was an American character actor. He had a long career in film, theater, radio, television and voice work for animated cartoons. He is especially known for his work in the films of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers.-Early life:Horton was born in Brooklyn, New York, to Isabella...
; it was their first starring role in a movie; the movie also featured the Cole Porter
Cole Porter
Cole Albert Porter was an American composer and songwriter. Born to a wealthy family in Indiana, he defied the wishes of his domineering grandfather and took up music as a profession. Classically trained, he was drawn towards musical theatre...
classic song "Night and Day
Night and Day (song)
"Night and Day" is a popular song by Cole Porter. It was written for the 1932 musical play Gay Divorce. It is perhaps Porter's most popular contribution to the Great American Songbook and has been recorded by dozens of artists....
". The song "The Continental" was a big hit song from the movie and was also the first song to win the Academy Award for Best Original Song in the 1935 Academy Awards ceremony for 1934.
1935
Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers made two movies in 1935, RobertaRoberta (1935 film)
Roberta is a 1935 musical film by RKO starring Irene Dunne, Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, and Randolph Scott. It was an adaptation of a 1933 Broadway theatre musical of the same name, which in turn was based on the novel Gowns by Roberta by Alice Duer Miller...
, which featured the song "I Won't Dance" and Top Hat, which also co-starred comedian Edward Everett Horton
Edward Everett Horton
Edward Everett Horton was an American character actor. He had a long career in film, theater, radio, television and voice work for animated cartoons. He is especially known for his work in the films of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers.-Early life:Horton was born in Brooklyn, New York, to Isabella...
. In Roberta, Astaire and Ginger had a supporting role with Irene Dunne
Irene Dunne
Irene Dunne was an American film actress and singer of the 1930s, 1940s and early 1950s. Dunne was nominated five times for the Academy Award for Best Actress, for her performances in Cimarron , Theodora Goes Wild , The Awful Truth , Love Affair and I Remember Mama...
starring. In this film the song and dance, "I'll Be Hard to Handle", was an early example of the electricity and vivacity of the pairing. Though it seems impromptu, nothing could be further from the truth, for the performance took many hours in creation and practice. In Top Hat, Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers had starring roles is the first film written solely for them. The whole movie had a bright Irving Berlin
Irving Berlin
Irving Berlin was an American composer and lyricist of Jewish heritage, widely considered one of the greatest songwriters in American history.His first hit song, "Alexander's Ragtime Band", became world famous...
musical score with all new songs for the time. The most famous number in Top Hat is the dreamy "Cheek to Cheek
Cheek to Cheek
"Cheek to Cheek" is a song written by Irving Berlin, and first performed by Fred Astaire in the movie Top Hat . Astaire's 1935 recording with the Leo Reisman Orchestra was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2000....
" song and dance. It was also, with "The Gay Divorcee
The Gay Divorcee
The Gay Divorcee is a 1934 American film based on the musical play Gay Divorce written by Dwight Taylor, Kenneth S. Webb, Samuel Hoffenstein, with screenplay by George Marion Jr., Dorothy Yost and Edward Kaufman, from an unproduced play by J. Hartley Manners...
", among the most profitable films RKO Radio Pictures made in the 1930s.
Later years
Follow the Fleet
Follow the Fleet is a 1936 Hollywood musical comedy film with a nautical theme and stars Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, Randolph Scott, Harriet Hilliard, and Astrid Allwyn, with music and lyrics by Irving Berlin. Lucille Ball and Betty Grable also appear, in small supporting roles...
and Swing Time
Swing Time
Swing Time is a 1936 RKO musical comedy film set mainly in New York City and stars Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, Helen Broderick, Victor Moore, Eric Blore and Georges Metaxa, with music by Jerome Kern and lyrics by Dorothy Fields...
which were both hits. Swing Time is the movie that introduced the Oscar winning song, by Jerome Kern with lyrics by Dorothy Fields, The Way You Look Tonight
The Way You Look Tonight
"The Way You Look Tonight" is a song featured in the film Swing Time, originally performed by Fred Astaire. It won the Academy Award for Best Original Song in 1936. The song was sung to Ginger Rogers as Penelope "Penny" Carroll by Astaire's character of John "Lucky" Garnett while Penny was busy...
, where Fred sang to Ginger, with her hair bubbly with shampoo. John Mueller has cited Swing Time, for possessing "the greatest dancing in the history of the universe.". "Pick Yourself Up
Pick Yourself Up
"Pick Yourself Up" is a popular song composed in 1936 by Jerome Kern, with lyrics by Dorothy Fields. It has a verse and chorus, as well as a third section, though the third section is often omitted in recordings...
", the 'Waltz in Swing Time", "Bogangles of Harlem", (Fred's solo), and "Never Gonna Dance
Never Gonna Dance
Never Gonna Dance is a Broadway musical featuring the music of Jerome Kern. The musical was based on the 1936 Fred Astaire/Ginger Rogers film Swing Time. Lyricists include Oscar Hammerstein, Ira Gershwin, P. G...
", are all top classics of their genres. The dance sequences for Never Gonna Dance are considered by Arlene Croce, the high point of their art, and took 55 takes ascending stairs, and spinning, until they got it "in the can". Rogers's feet bled though her shoes, at the end of the long shoot. Follow the Fleet with another great Irving Berlin score, which featured the markedly brilliant vignette within the film: Let's Face the Music and Dance. Here Rogers and Astaire become near deities, as they act, sing, pantomime, and dance, the classic depression era dance of despair, strength, and hope.
1937
1937 for Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers featured only one movie Shall We Dance which co-starred Edward Everett HortonEdward Everett Horton
Edward Everett Horton was an American character actor. He had a long career in film, theater, radio, television and voice work for animated cartoons. He is especially known for his work in the films of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers.-Early life:Horton was born in Brooklyn, New York, to Isabella...
. It was a successful film, though it raised a red flag, as production costs cut into profits. Shall We Dance, with the only Hollywood score by George and Ira Gershwin, featured the song They Can't Take That Away From Me
They Can't Take That Away from Me
"They Can't Take That Away from Me" is a 1937 song written by George Gershwin and Ira Gershwin and introduced by Fred Astaire in the 1937 film Shall We Dance....
which, like many of the songs Fred and Ginger sang in their movies, became a timeless classic. The end of Shall We Dance culminated in a big production number, the "mask dance", where Fred must find Ginger among the masked chorus of female dancers. Shall We Dance
Shall We Dance
Shall We Dance may refer to:In film and television:* Shall We Dance , a Fred Astaire/Ginger Rogers musical, or the film's title song* Shall We Dance? , a Japanese film about ballroom dancing...
also included Rogers's idea, for the first ever filmed dance on roller skates.
1938
In 1938, like 1937, Fred and Ginger only made one movie together, the 80 minute, CarefreeCarefree (film)
Carefree is a 1938 musical film starring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. With a plot similar to screwball comedies of the period, Carefree is the shortest of the Astaire-Rogers films, featuring only four musical numbers...
. Carefree was originally going to be shot in color by Technicolor, but RKO considered the costs prohibitive, so Carefree was filmed in regular black and white. Color waited for eleven years later when Fred and Ginger would make The Barkleys of Broadway
The Barkleys of Broadway
The Barkleys of Broadway is a 1949 musical film from the Arthur Freed unit at MGM that reunited Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers after ten years apart...
an M-G-M color (Technicolor) musical. This movie also had an Irving Berlin musical score with only 4 songs, the least songs any Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers film. It featured not only the highly energetic Yam, but also, Rogers's idea, the beautiful and tender, "trace dance", to the music of Change Partners. This was their first film that essentially broke even, and led directly to their last film of the 30s.
1939
In 1939 what is to be considered Hollywood's greatest year, Fred and Ginger only made one movie, The Story of Vernon and Irene CastleThe Story of Vernon and Irene Castle
The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle is an American biographical musical comedy, released in 1939 and directed by H.C. Potter. The film stars Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, Edna May Oliver, and Walter Brennan....
which culminated the partnership until 10 years later with Barclays of Broadway. This film was a musical biography of ballroom dancers Vernon and Irene Castle
Vernon and Irene Castle
Vernon and Irene Castle were a husband-and-wife team of ballroom dancers of the early 20th century. They are credited with invigorating the popularity of modern dancing. Vernon Castle was born William Vernon Blyth in Norwich, Norfolk, England...
. The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle was Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers's last film with RKO Radio Pictures. The dancing was Astaire's, less than completely original version, of the choreography of an earlier era. Fred and Ginger's last dance was the Missouri Waltz, which several thousand people came to the studio to see, in an emotional farewell to the great dance team. In their last scene, they wistfully dance down a leafy lane into the sunset; into eternity, it seems.
Ginger Rogers wanted more dramatic roles in the movies. And Fred, though he shared a life long friendship with Ginger, no longer wanted to be paired with a permanent partner. So Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers went their own way for ten years.
Solo years
At the 1941 Academy Awards ceremony, Ginger Rogers won the Academy Award for Best ActressAcademy Award for Best Actress
Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role is one of the Academy Awards of merit presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize an actress who has delivered an outstanding performance while working within the film industry...
for Kitty Foyle
Kitty Foyle (film)
Kitty Foyle, subtitled The Natural History of a Woman, is a 1940 film starring Ginger Rogers, Dennis Morgan, James Craig, Ernest Cossart and Gladys Cooper.-Plot:...
, her first big film after she left Fred Astaire. She, before and after their partnership, made other classic films as well: Bachelor Mother, Primrose Path, Stage Door, and The Major and the Minor.
While Rogers left Fred he still continued to make musicals like Holiday Inn
Holiday Inn (film)
Holiday Inn is a 1942 American musical film starring Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire, with music by Irving Berlin. The film has twelve songs written expressly for the film, the most notable being "White Christmas"...
(1942) with Bing Crosby
Bing Crosby
Harry Lillis "Bing" Crosby was an American singer and actor. Crosby's trademark bass-baritone voice made him one of the best-selling recording artists of the 20th century, with over half a billion records in circulation....
, Sky's The Limit (1943) with Joan Leslie
Joan Leslie
Joan Leslie is a retired American film and television actress.-Early life:Leslie was born Joan Agnes Theresa Sadie Brodel in Detroit, Michigan, and raised Roman Catholic. She began performing as a singer at the age of nine as part of a vaudeville act with her two sisters; Betty and Mae Brodel...
and Blue Skies
Blue Skies (film)
Blue Skies is a 1946 Hollywood musical Technicolor comedy film, released by Paramount Pictures and starring Bing Crosby, Fred Astaire, Joan Caulfield, Olga San Juan and Billy De Wolfe, with music, lyrics and story by Irving Berlin; most of the songs were recycled from earlier works. The film was...
(1946), his second and last movie Bing Crosby. Blue Skies was also going to be Fred Astaire's last movie. At the time he made Blue Skies he was already 47 so he figured he should retire and he did for two years. In 1948 Gene Kelly
Gene Kelly
Eugene Curran "Gene" Kelly was an American dancer, actor, singer, film director and producer, and choreographer...
was supposed to star in MGM's Easter Parade, but he broke his ankle, and MGM convinced Fred Astaire to get out of retirement and star in that movie with Judy Garland
Judy Garland
Judy Garland was an American actress and singer. Through a career that spanned 45 of her 47 years and for her renowned contralto voice, she attained international stardom as an actress in musical and dramatic roles, as a recording artist and on the concert stage...
. He officially came out of retirement and would continue to make more movies for the next 30 years, but would give up dancing in movies in his 60s. Fred Astaire was supposed to make more movies with Judy Garland, but due to health issues with Judy Garland they never made another movie together. One movie he was supposed to make with Judy Garland was The Barkleys of Broadway
The Barkleys of Broadway
The Barkleys of Broadway is a 1949 musical film from the Arthur Freed unit at MGM that reunited Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers after ten years apart...
, but Ginger Rogers took over her place and starred with Fred Astaire in their first color by Technicolor movie and also their first movie in ten years.
1949 and later
In 1949 Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers made their only movie with MGM and their only color (Technicolor) movie, The Barkleys of BroadwayThe Barkleys of Broadway
The Barkleys of Broadway is a 1949 musical film from the Arthur Freed unit at MGM that reunited Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers after ten years apart...
. The movie was originally going to be titled You Made Me Love You if Garland was going to star in it after the hit song she sang in Broadway Melody of 1938
Broadway Melody of 1938
Broadway Melody of 1938 is a 1937 musical film, produced by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and directed by Roy Del Ruth. The film is essentially a backstage musical revue, featuring high-budget sets and cinematography in the MGM musical tradition...
. They Can't Take That Away from Me
They Can't Take That Away from Me
"They Can't Take That Away from Me" is a 1937 song written by George Gershwin and Ira Gershwin and introduced by Fred Astaire in the 1937 film Shall We Dance....
was also in this movie 12 years after he sang it to Ginger Rogers in Shall We Dance (1937). This is the only Hollywood feature of Jacques François while under contract shortly before returning to France. Oscar Levant
Oscar Levant
Oscar Levant was an American pianist, composer, author, comedian, and actor. He was more famous for his mordant character and witticisms, on the radio and in movies and television, than for his music.-Life and career:...
and Billie Burke
Billie Burke
Mary William Ethelbert Appleton "Billie" Burke was an American actress. She is primarily known to modern audiences as Glinda the Good Witch of the North in the musical film The Wizard of Oz. She was nominated for an Academy Award for her performance as Emily Kilbourne in Merrily We Live...
also co-starred in this movie. Two years later Oscar Levant would have a supporting role in the musical classic An American in Paris
An American in Paris
An American in Paris is a symphonic tone poem by the American composer George Gershwin, written in 1928. Inspired by the time Gershwin had spent in Paris, it evokes the sights and energy of the French capital in the 1920s. It is one of Gershwin's best-known compositions.Gershwin composed the piece...
starring Gene Kelly and would also make another movie with Fred Astaire in 1953, The Band Wagon
The Band Wagon
The Band Wagon is a 1953 musical comedy film that many critics rank, along with Singin' in the Rain, as the finest of the MGM musicals, although it was only a modest box-office success. It tells the story of an aging musical star who hopes a Broadway play will restart his career...
also starring Cyd Charisse
Cyd Charisse
Cyd Charisse was an American actress and dancer.After recovering from polio as a child, and studying ballet, Charisse entered films in the 1940s...
, Jack Buchanan
Jack Buchanan
Walter John "Jack" Buchanan was a British theatre and film actor, singer, producer and director. He was known for three decades as the embodiment of the debonair man-about-town in the tradition of George Grossmith Jr., and was described by The Times as "the last of the knuts." He is best known in...
and Nanette Fabray
Nanette Fabray
Nanette Fabray is an American actress, comedienne, singer, dancer, and activist. She began her career performing in vaudeville as a child and then became a musical theatre actress during the 1940s and 1950s, winning a Tony Award in 1949 for her performance in Love Life...
. The Barkleys of Broadway would become Fred Astaire and Ginger Roger's last movie with each other and would continue to make movies separately with other stars. In the mid 50s Ginger Rogers's movie career declined because star vehicles of classic stars were scarce, but Fred Astaire's career never really declined. Today Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers are still greats to many movie fans.
Home video
Every movie Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers made together is today on DVDDVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....
individual or together in a box set collection in volumes of 1 and 2 with 5 movies each.