Fred Astaire
Frederick Austerlitz, better known as Fred Astaire (Omaha, Nebraska, May 10, 1899-Los Angeles, California, June 22, 1987), was an American actor, singer, choreographer, dancer for stage and screen, and television host. He is widely considered the greatest dancer of the 20th century, and is generally recognized as 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, Balanchine and Nureyev considered him the greatest dancer in history.
His stage career and subsequent film career spanned a total of seventy-six years, in which he appeared in 31 musical films. She formed one of the best dance partners in the history of cinema with Ginger Rogers, with whom she made ten films that revolutionized the genre.
Early years and career
Her father was Frederic "Fritz" Austerlitz, an Austrian Catholic immigrant, his mother was born in the US to German Lutheran parents, Astaire converted, along with his sister, to the Episcopal Church in America in 1912.
Fred and his sister Adele took the surname Astaire for their vaudeville performance in 1905. A family legend attributes it to an uncle named "L'Astaire" The couple's show business career continued, with a mix of successes and some interruptions to avoid problems with the child labor laws of the time. In 1917 they appeared on Broadway with Over The Top, some sources claim that the Astaire brothers appeared in a 1915 film titled Fanchon, the Cricket, starring Mary Pickford, but this is not corroborated. Fred Astaire met George Gershwin, who was working as a song plugger in Jerome H. Remick's music publishing house, and in 1916 they began a friendship that was to profoundly affect both artists' careers.
During the 1920s, Fred and Adele performed on Broadway and in various London theaters in shows such as Lady Be Good, Funny Face and The Band Wagon , earning acclaim from audiences on both sides of the Atlantic. They made several recordings as a team. The couple broke up in 1932, when Adele married Charles Cavendish, son of the Duke of Devonshire. Fred continued to work with great success on Broadway and in London with The Gay Divorcee (The Merry Divorcee), while weighing some offers from Hollywood.
According to Hollywood legend, a report from an Astaire film test with RKO Pictures stated, "He can't sing. He doesn't know how to act. With tickets. He knows how to dance a little ». Astaire-Rogers film producer Pandro S. Berman claimed that he had never said it in the 1930s and that it only came to light years later. Astaire, in a 1980 interview on ABC's 20/20 with Barbara Walters, insisted that in the report he actually stated: “He can't act. slightly bald. He also dances ». However, the test was clearly disappointing, and in a 1933 studio notebook David O. Selznick, who had hired Astaire at RKO and commissioned the test, described it as "dreadful." In any event, the test report did not affect RKO's plans for Astaire, first loaning him out for a few days to MGM in 1933 for his Hollywood debut, where he appeared as himself, dancing with Joan Crawford in the hit musical film Dancing Lady (Dancer Soul).
Fred and Ginger
On his return to RKO Pictures, Astaire led the cast in the 1933 film Flying Down to Rio (Flying Down to Rio) alongside Ginger Rogers and the two great RKO stars at that time: the Mexican Dolores del Río and the Brazilian Raul Roulien and in which the role of the Astaire-Rogers couple was secondary. A review in Variety magazine attributed the film's enormous success to Astaire's presence: "The main point of Flying Down to Rio is the screen promise of Fred Astaire... It's a sure bet." after this movie, because the screen clearly wants him, the mic is kind to his voice and as a dancer he is in a class all by himself. The latest remark will not be news to the profession, which has long admitted that Astaire begins to dance where the others do not. Although Astaire was initially very reluctant to be part of other dance couples, he was convinced by the obvious pleas of the public, who completely forgot about del Río and Roulien, the theoretical stars of the film and who only had eyes for the couple formed by Astaire-Rogers, so RKO bet on its new values; Astaire and Ginger Roger were paired in a total of ten musical films.
The conjunction with Rogers and the choreography of Astaire and Hermes Pan, contributed to making dance an important element of Hollywood musical movies. The Astaire-Rogers series is among the best films of the 1930s. They include The Gay Divorcee (1934), Roberta > (1935), Top Hat (Top Hat) (1935), Follow the Fleet >) (1936), Swing Time (On the wings of dance) (1936), Shall We Dance (Crazy Rhythm) (1937), and Carefree (Amanda) (1938). Their work together elevated them to stardom; as Katharine Hepburn said, "He gave her class and she gave him sensuality." (Author's note: Katharine's exact phrase was: "He gave her class. She gave him sex." and it was known at that time how little sympathy there was between the two).
Astaire is credited with two important innovations in musical films; first, his insistence that the (almost stationary) camera film a dance routine in a single take, if possible, while keeping the dancers in full frame throughout—a policy Astaire upheld since The Gay Divorcee (1934), until it was overruled by Francis Ford Coppola—who also fired Hermes Pan—when he was directing Finians' Rainbow (1968). Second, he was adamant that all the songs and dance routines be smoothly integrated into the film's plot, thus helping the story move forward. Typically, an Astaire film included a solo performance for Astaire, a couples comedy dance routine, and a couples romantic dance routine.
Dance critics Arlene Croce and John Mueller consider Rogers to have been Astaire's best dance partner, while acknowledging that some of his later partners displayed superior dance technique prowess, a view shared by Hermes Pan and Stanley Donen. Film critic Pauline Kael takes a more neutral stance, while film critic Richard Schickel of Time magazine writes "Nostalgia around Rogers-Astaire tends to to discolor other couples".
Mueller sums up Rogers' abilities as follows: "Rogers stood out among Astaire's couples not because she was superior to others as a dancer but because, as an intuitive and skillful actress, she was cautious enough to realize that acting was not it ended when the dance began... the reason many women have fantasized about dancing with Fred Astaire is that Ginger Rogers conveyed the impression that dancing with him is the most exciting experience imaginable." According to Astaire, "Ginger had never danced with a partner before. She faked it a lot. She didn't know how to tap and she didn't know how to do this and that... but she Ginger had style and talent and she improved on it as she accompanied him. She understood it so much that after a while anyone who danced with me seemed wrong to me ».
However, Astaire remained reluctant to have his career tied exclusively to one partner, having previously been linked to his sister Adele on the stage. He even negotiated with RKO to go solo with 'A Damsel in Distress' in 1937, which turned out to be an unsuccessful film. He returned to make two more films with Rogers, Carefree and The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle, and when both lost money, Astaire left RKO, while Rogers stayed on and became in the studio's strongest ownership in the early 1940s. They reunited in 1949 for their tenth and final appearance in The Barkleys of Broadway.
Song and dance skills
Astaire was a virtuoso dancer, capable of nonchalantly conveying risk or deep emotion when called for. His technical control, balance and sense of rhythm were amazing; According to one anecdote, he was able, when he was called back to the studio, to redo a dance number he had filmed several weeks earlier for a special effects number, reproducing the routine exactly down to the last gesture. Astaire's execution of a dance routine was first class for its elegance, grace, originality and precision. He drew on a variety of influences, including tap and other African-American rhythms, classical dance, and the elevated style of Vernon and Irene Castle, to create a unique and recognizable dance style that greatly influenced the American Smooth style. of ballroom dancing, and set the standards by which later film musicals would be judged. He choreographed all of his own routines, usually with the help of other choreographers, mainly Hermes Pan.
His perfectionism was legendary as was his modesty and consideration for his fellow artists; however, his relentless insistence on rehearsals and retakes was a burden to some. Though he viewed himself primarily as an artist, his accomplished art of dancing in a jaunty, aristocratic style earned him the admiration and recognition of some of the century's dance legends XX as Michael Jackson, George Balanchine, the Nicholas brothers, Mikhail Barýshnikov, Margot Fonteyn, Bob Fosse, Gregory Hines, Gene Kelly, Rudolf Nureyev and Bill Robinson.
Extremely modest about his singing abilities—he frequently claimed he couldn't sing—Astaire performed some of the most celebrated songs in the Great American Songbook, most notably Cole Porter's "Night and Day" on Gay Divorce (1932); "Isn't it a Lovely Day" by Irving Berlin, "Cheek to Cheek" and "Top Hat, White Tie and Tails" on Top Hat (1935), "Let's Face the Music and Dance” in Follow the Fleet (1936) and “Change Partners” in Carefree (1938). He hosted & # 34; The Way You Look Tonight & # 34; by Jerome Kern in Swing Time (1936); "They Can't Take That Away From Me" of the Gershwins' in Shall We Dance (1937), "A Foggy Day" and "Nice Work if You Can Get it" in A Damsel in Distress (1937) and featured "One for My Baby" by Johnny Mercer in The Sky's the Limit (1943) and "Something's Gotta Give" in Daddy Long Legs (1955) along with Harry Warren and "This Heart of Mine" by Arthur Freed in Ziegfeld Follies (1946).
Astaire also co-introduced a number of classic songs through musical duets with his partners. For example, with his sister Adele, he co-hosted the Gershwins' "I'll Build a Stairway to Paradise" in Stop Flirting (1923), & # 34;Fascinating Rhythm & # 3. 4; in Lady, Be Good (1924), "Funny Face" and "'S Wonderful" in Funny Face (1927); and, in duets with Ginger Rogers, he introduced "I'm Putting All My Eggs In One Basket" by Irving Berlin in Follow the Fleet (1936), "Pick Yourself Up" by Jerome Kern and "A Fine Romance" in Swing Time (1936), along with "Let's Call The Whole Thing Off" from The Gershwins' in Shall We Dance (1937). With Judy Garland he sang "A Couple of Swells"; Irving Berlin in Easter Parade (1948); and, with Jack Buchanan, Oscar Levant and Nanette Fabray, he sang "That's Entertainment"; by Betty Comden and Adolph Green in The Band Wagon (1953).
Although he possessed a soft voice with a limited horizon, he was admired for his lyricism, diction and construction - the grace and elegance so appreciated in his dancing seemed to be reflected in his singing, a capacity for synthesis that led to Burton Lane to describe him as "The greatest musical performer in the world." his idea of projecting a song». Jerome Kern considered him the ultimate male performer of his songs, and Cole Porter and Johnny Mercer also admired his unique treatment of his work. And while George Gershwin was somewhat critical of Astaire's singing abilities, he wrote many of his most memorable songs for him.
Other couples
In 1939, Astaire left RKO to go freelance and pursue new film opportunities. He teamed up with other stars, notably Bing Crosby in Holiday Inn (1942) and later Blue Skies (1946). He was nearly outdone in Broadway Melody of 1940 (1940) by one of his early post-Rogers dance partners, Eleanor Powell. Other couples during this period include Paulette Goddard in Second Chorus (1940), Rita Hayworth in Dancing Love Is Born You'll Never Get Rich (1941) and You Were Never Lovelier (1942), Joan Leslie in The Sky's the Limit (1943), and Lucille Bremer in Yolanda and the Thief (1945) and Ziegfeld Follies (1946). Ziegfeld Follies also contains a memorable pairing of Astaire with Gene Kelly.
After announcing his retirement with Blue Skies in 1946, Astaire soon returned to the big screen to replace the injured Gene Kelly in Easter Parade (1948) alongside Judy Garland and Ann Miller, and for a final meeting with Rogers, The Barkleys of Broadway (1949). He then went on to make more musicals through the 1950s: Let's Dance (1950) with Betty Hutton, Royal Wedding (1951) with Jane Powell, Three Little Words (1950) and The Belle of New York (1952) with Vera Ellen, The Band Wagon (1953) and Silk Stockings (1957) with Cyd Charisse, Daddy Long Legs (1955) with Leslie Caron, and Funny Face (1957) with Audrey Hepburn. His legacy at this point was thirty movie musicals in a twenty-five year period. Astaire later announced that he was retiring from film dancing to concentrate on dramatic theatre, earning rave reviews for the nuclear war drama On the Beach (1959).
Decline and retirement
Fred Astaire had a very slow retirement from the world of the musical genre and said goodbye in 1968 with “El valle del Arco Iris”, his last participation was in 1974 in the film Coloso en llamas where he appears at one point dancing to a modern song. 75 years of show business were behind him. Gene Kelly propped him up in many episodes; however, he received no accolades other than a recognition award in 1949 and an Academy Award nomination in 1975. In 1981, he received an honorary Academy Award for his lifetime achievement.
Personal life
Astaire was married to Phyllis Potter, who gave him two children, their marriage was from 1933 until the date of her death in 1954 where he was widowed and much later secretly married the young horseman Robyn Smith, who was 45 years younger and who accompanied him until his death.
Death
He died on June 22, 1987 at age 88, due to pneumonia. He was buried at Oakwood Memorial Park Cemetery in Chatsworth, California. Shortly before his death in 1987, he told the media:
"I didn't want to leave this world without knowing who my successor was, thank you Michael" (referring to the King of Pop Michael Jackson).
Filmography
- Dancer soul Dancing Lady. From Robert Z. Leonard (1933)
- Flying to Rio. Flying Down to Rio. De Thornton Freeland (1933)
- The happy divorce The Gay Divorcee. De Mark Sandrich (1934)
- Roberta. Roberta. From William A. Seiter (1935)
- Drink hat. Top Hat. De Mark Sandrich (1935)
- Swing Time. From George Stevens (1936)
- Follow the fleet. Follow the Fleet. De Mark Sandrich (1936)
- Crazy rhyme. Shall We Dance? De Mark Sandrich (1937)
- Miss in misfortune. A Damsel in Distress. From George Stevens (1937)
- Amanda. Carefree. De Mark Sandrich (1938)
- The story of Irene Castle. The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle. De H.C. Potter (1939)
- New Broadway Melody. Broadway Melody of 1940. From Norman Taurog (1940)
- At last alone. Second Chorus. De H. C. Potter (1940)
- From that kiss. You’ll Never Get Rich. De Sidney Lanfield (1941)
- Dancing is born love. You Were Never Lovelier. From William A. Seiter (1942)
- Everything is possible. The Sky’s the Limit. From Edward H. Griffith (1943)
- Blue sky. Blue Skies. From Stuart Heisler (1946)
- Ziegfeld Follies(1946)
- Easter Parade. Easter Parade. Charles Walters (1948). In Latin America: Intermezzo Lirico
- Come back to me.. The Barkleys of Broadway. De Charles Walters (1949)
- Actual. Royal Wedding. From Stanley Donen (1951). In Latin America: Royal wedding
- Broadway Melodies 1955. The Band Wagon. De Vincente Minnelli (1953)
- Dad long legs. Daddy Long Legs. De Jean Negulesco (1955)
- The beauty of Moscow. Silk Stockings. De Rouben Mamoulian (1957)
- Funny Face. From Stanley Donen (1957). In Latin America: The Cinderella in Paris
- The final hour. On the Beach. From Stanley Kramer (1959)
- The mysterious black lady The Notorious Landlady. De Richard Quine (1962)
- The valley of the Arc Iris. Finian’s Rainbow. From Francis Ford Coppola (1968)
- The Colina rides again. The Over-the-Hill Gang Rides Again. George McCowan (1970)
- Once in Hollywood. That’s Entertainment!. De Jack Haley Jr. (1974)
- The colossus in flames. The Towering Inferno. Irwin Allen (1974). In Latin America: Hell in the tower
- Hollywood, Hollywood.That’s Entertainment, Part II. From Gene Kelly (1976. In Latin America: It was again in Hollywood.
- The stunning Dobermans The Amazing Dobermans. Byron Chudnow (1976)
- History macabra. Ghost. John Irvin (1981)}
Awards and distinctions
- Oscar
| Year | Category | Movie | Outcome |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1975 | Best Cast Actor | The colossus in flames | Nominee |
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