Let's put it this way about this routine. Fred Astaire, who was not only Michael Jackson's main influence, but is arguably the best dancer/performer of all time, stated that this dance routine by the Nicholas Brothers is the best/greatest dance routine to ever be put to film. That's from Fred Astaire. Both he and Gene Kelly wanted to perform with the Nicholas Brothers, but Hollywood was so segregated at the time that it took a long time for that to happen.
To join Cabs orchestra you couldn't be any old musician. He had the creme de la creme of contemporary talent on board. Each and every one of his band members were top notch in their field.
It was the same with Spike Jones and the City Slickers. You not only had to be the best at your instrument, but because of the frantic comedy in Spike's shows, you had to have dplot second timing to help pull off a gag, then back to your instrument.
They famously claimed this was done in one take. Though, it consists of several scenes with the change of camera angles being another scene. Back then it was considered important to show the dancer's skill by filming them in full length for up to a minute before a change in camera angles "justified" ending one scene before the dancers tired. So there would have been a pause from dancing on the stage as they moved equipment around to set up the next camera angle. Dance scenes were not typically filmed in one take. The Astaire Rodgers rolling skate dance took over 100 takes to get right. Even normal dances were often filmed a couple dozen times to get the best one. One of the trademark Nicholas Brothers moves was rising from the splits with no hands. That's not something Astaire or Gene Kelly ever did, not even when Kelly danced with them in The Pirate. Also, there is one small mistake in this dance. As they jump from the bandstand to the floor, only one of them does the jazz splits. The other is mostly split, but lands on a front foot.
@@taverngeek1631 This one actually was filmed in one take. This was one of the first scenes to use multiple cameras during the same take, which gives you those angles you refer to. There were seven different cameras being used for this single scene. All of this was explained by Fayard Nicholas himself, who said - on camera at that - that this was done in one take.
@@athlonen I respectively disagree. It would have been pointlessly complicated and risking needing to redo the dancing due to technical errors if trying to film it as one long dance. Movies are shot in sequences of scenes with designed lighting and so on. The number of takes is how many times it is needed to film one scene. So Fayard was correct to say it was done in one take, but that does not means it was done as one long continuous dance. The camera for the jump from the stage onto the piano would be located where the introduction of the Nicholas Brothers has people sitting at tables. Every reason to plan to break it into a another scene to get the camera angle right and give the brothers a chance to cool down so they don't look sweaty. Likewise, for the change of scene to the giant staircase. This was not a big budget movie in a position to spend extra money to film this as a continuous dance. It would have been planned as multiple scenes and being quite happy to film just one take per scene. Larger budget movies will film multiple takes in case there is some flaw such a microphone or lighting error in the first take.
Because of segregation, there was a 'separate' Black film industry. There were many all-Black films. This film, Stormy Weather, starring Lena Horne, is one of my favorites. Because it was during WWII, it didn't matter, a Black film or a typical white Hollywood film, there were always men and women in uniform.
This DJ first says whites are in the audience and thinks that's crazy. At the end of the film he finally realizes that it is an all black film. He probably thinks the women were white because only light skinned black women were hired for film. According to the biographer of Lena Horne, light skinned actresses/ dancers were referred to as "chlorines". Even though the DJ says he saw the Ken Burns's jazz documentary, he really is clueless how popular and exemplary the Nicholas Brothers were. Fred Astaire said Jumping Jive was the greatest dance number ever made for American film. The Nicholas Brothers choreographed this routine and did it in one take. They also starred with white performers, Glenn Miller and Gene Kelly.
Calloway and his band were the house band at the Cotton Club in Harlem. My dad's favorite singer was Lena Horne, who sang the title song in this film. It became her trademark. I can recall her singing it on TV when I was growing up. I was born 10 years after this film. One of the brother's was married to the wonderful Dorothy Dandridge, who is also in this film.
Cab Calloway sings with his band because he's a singer. Benny Goodman plays the clarinet with his band because he is a clarinetist (one of the best ever). Glen Miller played the trombone--you get my drift. Louis Armstrong & Ray Charles were.extra special.
I believe the piano player is Fats Waller, and yes, he was famous (Ain't Misbehaving). Cab is "scatting" when he sings a run on. Lived this! Thank you!
The piano player looks nothing like Fats Waller. Fats Waller was in Stormy Weather but not in this part of the movie. Here is Fats: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-PSNPpssruFY.html
It is not Fats Waller, however Fats Waller is in this as well as Bill "Bojangles" Robinson, Ada Brown and Lena Horne, ALL GIANTS. You really need to watch it...
In the late '80s, I went to a tap concert in Boston. At one point a screen was lowered and a filmed performance of the Nicholas Brothers was projected onto it. And then the brothers themselves came onstage and matched the routine step for step. The whole concert was one of the most joyous I've ever been to.
Thanks, Old School - the dance routine, as I've heard, was pretty much one take... Cab is doing what used to be called "Scatting" in the jazz world.. he was amazing... but this performance really features Harold & Fayard Nicholas... nobody has been able to touch their tap talent.... even Fred Astaire was amazed... hope you also see more Cab & the brothers... (Nicholas Bros.. in "Down Argentine Way"... they started as young children.. and they also sang.. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-ecBAeN9yzOc.html) For Cab.. if you haven't seen him do "Minnie the Moocher" you are missing out, big-time: he was an astonishing performer: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-8mq4UT4VnbE.html) appreciate your reactions...
Great to see a Hip-Hop head recognize that Cab was spittin' verses here. My introduction to Hip-Hop was right after I moved from Detroit in 1978 when Kool Herc put on a block party in Central Park.
Most of these big bands would play for a guest singer. Or they would have a roster of singers. The band leader usually played an instrument. Some singers, like Calloway, had their own band.
So many great dancers back in the 30's 40's and 50's. The Nicholas brothers were probably the best. I'm white from the 50's and listened to Cab Calloway all the time.
Everything was done FOR REAL back then, no movie tricks or fancy cuts - these guys danced live all the time in large supper club and dance stage venues on a regular basis, they WORKED for their money.
First of all this is pure genius. This was done in one take. The Nicholas Brothers are the best tap dancers in the world. They danced with nothing but elegance. No one today could do this routine. No, there were no special effects done in this. This was all GOD given talent. Cab Calloway is the leader of the band and lastly, you talk too much during the whole video. Watch the video and then talk.
You said you know Cab Calloway, then you proceed to call him a band leader. He was a singer who, sometimes, pretended to be a band leader. When it comes down to it, he was an entertainer. And a damn good one.
Cab was the band leader of his band. He picked those players himself. At one time the great Dizzy Gillespie was member of his band. Cab fired him because he thought that Dizzy had thrown a spitball during a show. Dizzy was very adamant about having not thrown the spitball, but Cab did not believe him. Anyway Dizzy ended up stabbing Cab in the leg after Cab said something like he would whoop Dizzy's ass.
In the movie he was the club owner (“the Gator”). So him jumping in to be the conductor makes sense. But seriously- it’s jazz. If the conductor wants to burst into song, that’s what the he’ll do.
YES! Recognize! Cab Calloway is the true origin of Hip Hop, not some obscure 1980's minor one hit wonder! His showmanship was also a major influence on Rock and Roll. Cab started it ALL! BTW, the Nicolas Brothers did all that in 1 take.
The first interracial dance scene in the movies was in 1935's The Little Colonel with Shirley Temple and Bill Robinson. It was a pretty cool scene where they tap danced up and down a staircase. Unfortunately, the scene had to be cut when the movie played in the south.
One of the most amazing things about this performance is that they did this song/dance routine for the movie in one take! Amazing! Great reaction and analysis! Thank you!
I’m glad to see young people finally learning about their musical history. Cab Calloway was Hip half a century before HipHop. Jive talk was created by him and his era which ushered in today’s Ebonics. Please do some research on the iconic Zoot Suit and its impact on American history. In the following video Cab is in a b/w clip so it doesn’t show that he’s wearing a canary yellow Zoot Suit. Please react to: Cab Calloway Geechy Joe 1941
@@beaujac311 Harlem Jive was speech created by jazz and bluesmen of that time. “In 1938, jazz bandleader and singer Cab Calloway published the first dictionary by an African-American, Cab Calloway's Cat-ologue: A "Hepster's" Dictionary, which became the official jive language reference book of the New York Public Library.” “Cab Calloway was taking ownership of language for a people who, just a few generations before, had their own languages taken away."
@@Xcris_crosX Jive talk was just another way of speaking slang. Ebonics was how many black people talked in their everyday lives. Ebonics is now called African American Vernacular English (AAVE).
Fayard Nicholas' unusual first name was suggested by a family friend who had traveled to France and encountered the name there. Harold Lloyd Nicholas was named after a famous silent film comedian of the time.
The greatest musical number ever put on film -- or ever will be. I was lucky enough to see Cab Calloway on stage in a production of a very early jukebox musical called "Bubblin' Brown Sugar," featuring songs by Duke Ellington, Eubie Blake, Count Basie, Cab Calloway and Fats Waller. Eubie Blake may still have been alive (he lived to 100, I think), but only Cab was in this -- and it was in a road company playing at the Paper Mill Playhouse in Millburn, NJ. This was probably 1979. Cab was an old man by then, but he still brought the house down. A year later he'd be in "The Blues Brothers" movie. The hot gal in the black gown on stage is Lena Horne and the fellow next to her is Bill "Bojangles" Robinson. This movie had a star-studded cast of everyone who was anyone in Black show business. Now you have to check out the Lindy Hop sequence in "Hellzapoppin'. Frankie Manning is like a Lindy Hop god. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-YFpU5ypLrKQ.html
I heard somewhere that Feyard named Harold he also taught himself to dance then his brother. was fluent in multiple languages. and sang in Portuguese in Down Argentine Way.
I fell in luv with Cab Calloway when i saw "The Blue's Brothers." He was the King of Scat and the Nicholas Brothers were the Kings of Aerobic Tap. I've watched this so many times and it never gets old. (I still say ouchy everytime). ❤
Band leader is the famous Cab Calloway, and the dancers are the incomperable Nicolas Brothers, the two best tap dancers that ever lived, not just dancer but bonafide atheletes.
They did this dance in one take, no cuts or edits, the first time. Of course they rehearsed on the full set, with Cab, the orchestra members and extras…but when the director yelled “action” and it was time to film, they got it right the first time. However, the music and singing was prerecorded…they just danced to it…and the tap dancing sounds had to be later altered/created/overdubbed in final editing. There’s simply no way, even nowadays with more modern technology, to record that tap dancing considering the few hundred square feet they were dancing around.
Not only were they brilliant dancers, they had an extremely strong work ethic. Like Fred Astaire, the Nicholas Brothers put in the time and work. They would rehearse over and over, again and again, until they knew it couldn't be any better. The highest standard, and damn, it showed!
The film was shot in 2 months in 1943; this dance number was done in one take. However, editing was an advanced art (many editors in the early decades of film were women) and pioneered many techniques still used today-they were done by hand instead of by computers. The entire film is filled with song and dance numbers and definitely worth watching. Since great care was taken by the costumers, makeup & hair designers, lighting designers, cinematographers and set designers to make the film look best in black & white (adding lots of high contrast and shadows), the colorization doesn’t add anything and in fact can make many films look more faded and less dramatic since the sharpness is lost.
It was a joy watching your reactions to this, and your knowledge from watching the Ken Burns docu. Also, you took the time in the beginning to read some of the tnfo. to give you clarify on what you were watching. Kudos to you.
Since this is 1943, not long after the Great Depression, most of these performers probably started out as children literally singing (or dancing or playing) for their supper in the 1930s.
Brother, I'm sixty and I grew up in Detroit and I remember "Bill Kennedy At The Movies" and I do believe it was Bill Kennedy At The Movies, that I saw this movie for the first time when I was sick and home from school sometime in the mid 70's. To this day, "Stormy Weather" is of my favorite movies of all time. Also when I fell in love with Lena Horne. I'm a white dude btw.
On stage behind Calloway are Lena Horne and Bill "Bo Jangles" Robinson. "Stormy Weather" was Horne's signature song; Robinson was one of the greatest tap dancers of his generation.
I'm so glad to see this. I've always loved old movies and was the weird kid who hanted rock and roll but love the sound from those big bands. I was in college who I had a name for it, swing. Now I'm an old lady and still feel the same. I am thrilled that those much younger than me see how wonderful this music is! It gives me hope that this music will always be appreciated and seen.
What they would do back then is do a number of rehearsals before they would do the actual filming. FYI, Harold Nicholas was married to Dorothy Dandridge!
You should watch the whole movie. Lena Horne is amazing in it! The whole movie and cast is amazing!❤❤❤❤ I was lucky enough to grow up on movies like this!
Imagine going to dinner and this is your entertainment? From 1920 to 1950. Black people thrived. Spiritually, emotionally, physically, and financially. No rampant Black on Black crime, no teenage pregnancy all the time, Church going Bible believing Christians, our own Banks, Businesses, and entertainment. You've witnessed how we had fun. Cherish those times and bring them back people. Bring them back...
I think this may have been filmed at the Cotton Club. The Cotton Club was the premier spot for musicians of color from the 20's to the 4o's. They hosted the best of the best Black, white all welcomed.
1943's "Stormy Weather" as well as "Cabin In The Sky" were groundbreaking because they were big budget musicals with an all black cast. That's why you see the rare spectacle of a black audience at a club.
There were a lot of places where the performers were black and the audience was white... like the Cotton Club. My grandmother used to go to the Cotton Club, and wherever Count Basie was playing to do dancing around the time this movie was made.
They were at a club , thats what clubs looked back then . That were we went after a hard week of work . Class all the way , women dressed up looked beautiful , men wore suits and hats
Fats Waller, legendary pianist (you called it, he was someone). This movie, Stormy Weather, was one of the original films with an all-black cast and crew. Watch the film if you ever get a chance. history. Really enjoyed your reaction and comments.
it wasn't a matter of band members saying, _"Fuck this. I got my own thing."_ it was about the new guys having to earn their chops and the respect of the other performers. they had to spend time in the proverbial salt mines to prove themselves. then once they showed what they had and what they could do, they'd made a name for themselves and could attract another "generation" of musicians/performers to be the new guys with their band. think of it as a Master-Apprentice relationship.
When Cab Calloway starts singing nonsense syllables, that's known as 'scat singing'. From what i understand, it was invented on the fly by Louis Armstrong when his sheet music fell off the music stand during a recording session, and it would have been too expensive to start over with a new wax disc. (Since recordings were made by a sharp needles carving grooves in a wax master disc, performers were said to 'cut a record', much as one would 'burn a disc' today.) The Nicholas Brothers were self-taught, Their jump-splits were iconic, You can see Aladdin and the Genie do them at the end of the live-action 'Friend Like Me'. Harold also recreates them during the Challenge Scene in dance film 'Tap', featuring Gregory Hines, Sammy Davis, Jr., and a host of old-school tap legends.
There were people if color in the movie because ALL were getting shipped out to go to war. The storyline was to show that it made no difference who was leaving, because all were fighting for the same freedoms .
This whole movie is well worth watching. This is the big finish, but before that you get Bill "Bojangles" Robinson, Lena Horne, and Fats Waller, among others.
I don't have my glasses on so I can't see if someone else already commented. The most famouts part of this movie is Lena Horne singing Stormy Weather. If you haven't already, please look that up on RU-vid. Stories and stories and stories about this magnificent talent.
Okay, so, I picked up my grandmother's year book that was in the 40's once and was surprised to see black people, and she looked at me and said, "I WAS RAISED IN CALIFORNIA!" Not every state was segregated. LOL.
Indeed Cab Calloway was famous for his naturally straight hair and he used to whip it hard as his trademark, as he does at the beginning of the song. The Nicholas Brothers had wavy hair. There are no men in this film with pressed hair.
Wait one damn minute. Yes, if you mention Bill Kennedy, you ARE from Detroit. Dude is still legendary. He mainly showed Westerns, WWII and gangster movies. I'm 66, and grew up watching his show, as well as Rita Bell's Prize Movies, which had mainly comedies and musicals, also called 'white telephone movies'...ultra glam films during the Great Depression and WWII. Marcelled hair, slinky dresses, tuxedos, and the shiniest shoes you'd ever see.
Black clubs in the Harlem renaissance in the 20's was where Cab got his start. Black clubs remained a thing, but in the 40's the "regular" entertainment industry started to buy out the black artists. In the short term, it led to the collapse of the "black clubs", but eventually (60+ years? - is it here yet?) led to blacks being included in the entertainment industry generally.
It would be best if you did more research about names, my friend. Harold is a Scanadavain name meaning the leader of an army. Feyard may be a Carribean name that came from the Norse or French. They were born just before the Harlem Renaissance began to flourish to parents who were accomplished musicians. The names were not randomly picked and meant something.
