The Untold Truth Of Fred Astaire 

A talented man.Loved watch him dance.Especially at 1970 academy awards.Google it.

The Astaire/Rogers movies of the 1930s are classic and his innovations are unmatched. I especially love the dance scenes with no closeups and the two dancers' full body interactions and responses. Some of the scenes go on for minutes without an edit. Along with Busby Berkely, the most pleasurable and sexy musicals ever.

He was The BEST

Fred was a genius and perfectionist. He had such elegance and style whether dancing solo or with a partner or group. The only two men who could remain in his same class as singer-dancer would be Gene Kelly and Donald O'Connor. - The true stellar Stars of old Hollywood musicals (!)💎

@@johnryan3913 i couldn't agree with you more!

It must be something about dancers. They're all driven perfectionists, seemingly more than people who do other creative things. He seems to be an extremely decent and polite man, even if a private sort of person. He also had one foible, according to accounts. He always ate a bowl of chicken soup for lunch. Each day it was the same. It must hav e been a good brew but you'd think anybody would want to vary their diet a bit. But, no, chicken soup it was. From the biography written about forty years or so ago.

What a privileged man you are to have shared stage time with a legend and Francis Ford Coppola director.

@@DBEdwards to be fair, my interaction with FFC was essentially zero..he cared little for singers/musicians LOL, on the other hand, Fred DEMANDED perfection from us:) while doing everything possible to assist in its attainment. The only people he was harder on , were of course, the dancers hehe.

To look spontaneous you must practice ,not only that you must practice perfect.

@@chadwhitman1811 Totally agreed, it takes a LOT of effort to appear to do things 'effortlessly" lol.

Right, there is nothing especially tragic about dying of natural causes at 88. He wasn't going to live forever.

I understand and recognise your point, but I think here it isn't meant that it was tragic for him, but for the loss to the creative arts field. Tragedy can be defined as meaning a great loss and when he died, the field of creative dance lost a great creative dancer.

Check out what he said Eleanor Powell!

Yes, totally agree...there is none to compare!!

LeeMilly...Priceless & SO true! I stand amended...

@LeeMilly Ruby She never even dreamed of doing any of his solos. She only ballroom danced with him and did the simplest of tap routines.

@@communitypark2313 She never even dreamed of doing any of his solos. She only ballroom danced with him and did the simplest of tap routines.

I agree. A real ballroom quality to him. And he made it look effortless.

What an excellent comment. I think this is one of the reasons he was such an excellent partner--when you see him dancing with Rogers,, or Charisse, or any of his other partners, the dancing is so romantic, and part of the romance is that the partners pay so much attention to each other and treat each other with such respect. Not just solo exhibitionism, but a real give-and-take, making each other look good. I gather he led a very private life off set, and wasn't into socializing in a "look at me!" way. I suspect he was a workaholic, and much of his life was work, with the rest concentrated primarily on family and then close friends. In his leisure pursuits he seems to have valued sports with an esthetic element--horse racing, playing golf. He obviously had a real appreciation of music, too.

Yessssssssss!

Yes I always said no man could beat Fred Astaire dancing with a woman.black or white.

Remember him most with Ginger Rodgers. Great dancers both.

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Beautifully written! I felt the same way towards Jennifer Jones (ie. Song Of Bernadette) 1943 AND Pa Cartwright a Canadian Lorne Greene who reminds me of my father. I watch BONANZA everyday. He graduated from Queen's University as I did too along with Waterloo plus two colleges. Dad would come home from the family businesses in suit/tie and proceed to dance with mother always in a skirt as he loved Fred. I was spellbound and those moments were in the 60s. Andrea thank you for such wonderful commentary. Mr. David 68 yrs. old though many say I look 50 while acting like a 2 year old LOL.

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Me too or moi aussi.

I loved his and Ginger Roger's movies! I've heard stories of Gingers feet bleeding from practice, so Fred was a hard task master, but they made it look easy and flawless!

And I do sometimes!! I own all of the Fred and Ginger films, but with RU-vid I can binge watch my favorite dance scenes for hours when I’m feeling down and need a pick me up.

They blacklisted all the writers in Hollywood. The films produced after the purge hadn't any wit...

@@thebiblicalawakening4662 no one reading that shit

@@thebiblicalawakening4662 : Diarrhea of the mouth much? Also, if there is a god, why would he favor and show partiality to a certain group of people in the Middle East? It is the reason why to this day that there is much bloodshed and they are still fighting over land.

No this distinction is reserved for Gene Kelly. Fred can be second greatest!

@@patriciabailey1937 I had a friend who felt the same way, but I would rank the best dancers ever this way: Fred Astaire, Rudolf Nureyev, Mikhail Baryshnikov (whom I saw dance at The Kennedy Center in 1975), Gene Kelly.

Try this danc!! Shall you make over New dance! Happy!

@@thebiblicalawakening4662 I hope 🙏 you get the help you really need ASAP 🙏

@@patriciaoreilly8907 what a fool you are. stop your useless gaslighting and wake up out of your sleeping pod patricia

@@thebiblicalawakening4662 Love to you in this life🙂I wish only to ask of you to ponder the reason God brought Jesus into the world...the people would keep living terribly, until realizing that Jesus needed us to see that his whole purpose in life was to die for us and...that believing in Jesus brings you to his father, God, our father too...and the world and the people are loved so much by God; and wants us to live again with

God at our side. I don't know that we truly understand what this existence will look like or even, are we supposed to not know until are spirit leaves this earthly body and only then come to understand exactly God's plan. Thank you for this opportunity for me to put my thought down:-)

@@marterodden5322 I don't really wish to hear 'soothing' false doctrines of men. Our duty is to Fear God and keep His commandments. Or you can not keep His commandments and live a life of sin thinking you have to just emotionally believe in Jesus with your feelings and go to pagan sunday church every week and yell out Jesus and speak in gibberish tongues in public mass calling it the gift of the Holy Spirit to be saved. We were given free will, you choose.

Cyd Cherisse was also an amazing dancer. Funny that Bing and Fred only played one movie together, 1942's Holiday Inn. I can imitate Bing and many other singers since I entered a cathedral choir, studied opera at University. Buy the H Inn dvd and listen to the best of Irving Berlin.

@@daddydad9018 WOW, Bing Crosby, Dean Martin and Frank Sinatra were what they called crooners back in the "older days of old" (Think I just told my age.) You really had some singing experience. If you can sound like Bing Crosby YOU'RE GOOD!!!!.

@@daddydad9018 I have H Inn, love it. Irving Berlin is hard to beat. Good old songs. We don't have music like that now. You are in a Cathedral choir....I make a joyful noice unto the Lord. I imagine you have a beautiful voice. Keep up your gift.

@@lindagordon2977 I especially love the scene where Happy Holidays makes its debut wayyyy back in 1942 good God. I USE to be in a cathedral choir while simultaneously practicing opera at Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, Canada. We cut LPs I have in mint shape among ~ 12,000 records. Now when I DO sing for the fun of it, the odd lady says, "you are too loud" LOL. I love singing anything by the crooners such as power ballads. Darin, Bing, SInatra, Sting, Lightfoot, Manilow, Diamond, Denver, Frank Valli, Bee Gees, Coldplay, Hey Soul Sister by Train .... at 7 yrs. old I could out perform the older young bucks in the choir hitting Hi C. One of hardest performers to mimic was Gary Puckett from the Union Gap. My 3 brothers were also in an Anglican Church boys choir with me. Please check out Zadock The Priest and I Was Glad and one more > Warsaw Concerto by Brahms; a trio of anthems that will send shivers up and down your spine. Mom was a pianist who could whip off the ladder of the three with her having an ARTC certification. Chow for now. Mr. David.

@@daddydad9018 Bing and Fred were in two movies together, 1942's Holiday Inn and 1946's Blue Skies, both with music by Irving Berlin.

And singer

@@honeyjbc1 Indeed, yes, that too.

Poetry In Motion was also a big Top 40 hit in 1960 by Johnny T.

I agree.

Mary, thank you so much for mentioning this. I was unaware of this performance and will have to watch it. I, like you, also watch Fred and Ginger movies when I’m down for the same dose of pure happiness. I’m sure those lovely people had no idea what their films would do for us so many years after they are no longer with us. Their talent was a gift and with their abilities they were able to leave a special gift for to us. Decades later millions of people are still benefiting from it.

He was very good in that movie.

Me too

It warms my heart that young people such as yourself enjoy these older movies. I've always been afraid that the "oldies" wouldn't be passed on to the younger generation. People can say a lot of thing about the internet. But one great thing. Is people young and old can check out different genres of music/and or movies. Whether it be oldies or the newer music/movies. It is AWESOME, imo. Check out the Nicholas Brothers dance the "Jumpin' Jive" in the 1943 musical, Stormy Weather. Fred Astaire said it was "the greatest dancing he had ever seen on film." They helped pioneer tap. Astaire himself declared that his own tap heroes were Fayard and Harold Nicholas.

I hope your love of art takes you far. Don't get stuck doing something you don't like for the rest of your life. Do what makes you happy...

Fred was good but Justin Beiber I’d argue is a little better as a dancer

@@ChristopherPausz lol Beiber isn't even in the top 10.

@@sgumper4375 the Bieb makes top 3. Out of the kindness of my heart and to ease your anxiety, I will live a lie for a moment and put Beiber in the three-spot. Freddy gets number one. Good luck finding number two. May I suggest the shadow of Beiber

Correct! The entire purpose of Dance is being able to see the movement of the entire body. I don't know where the concept of cutting to Medium and Close-Up shots came from, but that is a MAJOR flaw of recent Musicals. In some cases this is done to disguise poor dancing. But this should not be necessary with good Dancers and good dancing.

@@RayPointerChannel To be fair, it took the perfectionist Astaire (and Gene Kelly too) dozens of takes (and hours of manpower) to get a perfect performance in one shot. Modern directors probably think it is not worth the time. Easier to get one halfway decent take, and cut to mediums and close ups to cover the mistakes. But I think we agree, it's a far better viewing experience watching a performance from beginning to end.

It’s been said by others in the industry that Fred wanted to be filmed by just one cameraman who just followed his movement around the stage. He knew this is how all of us individuals see the performance via our eyes and brain. It doesn’t get any better than that.

I agree, I don't want to see only the upper half of a dancer's body when they dance, I want to see the dance steps as well.

Amen

Nice! Someone mentioned the MJ connection & ADMIRATION! Ashame the video creators couldn't take a few seconds to add such a well known fact to the video-SAD!but not at all surprising...

PS: Hold on, didn't Smith allow the Hoover advert on TV ? That is solo hypocritical !

I recall that movie and a song by James Darren called "Royal Majesty" ~ 1962 when I was 9.

I think you mean "The Bandwagon", one of my favorite musical movies, starring my all time favorite entertainer.

@@leslieepstein4700 I stand corrected.

My mom introduced me to Fred's movies. I love them as much as she does. He is irreplaceable. Fred and Ginger are actually in the same cemetery I think along with his 1st wife and sister. I think his 2nd wife has done a great job with what she has done.

It's Bandwagon.

I love fred astaire, now and before. Such talent!!

Magic eh. What a master. I wasn't around in them days but what pure talented people they had.

It would have been nice if the black dancer or other non white dancers could of got the same exposure as he got.

Very important part of Fred’s life as well as his dancing partners. Ginger danced with Pan more than Fred. ☺️

Hermes was the only non-family member who attended Fred's very private funeral@@cosmicstardust7772

Watch a sermon by Pastor Charles Stanley to understand an afterlife through Jesus our Savior. God bless

He was already a major star before he ever went to Hollywood. He and his sister were on the stage from the time he was about 6 and they were headliners on both Broadway and the West End for at least a decade before he even started in films. And after his sister's retirement he successfully stared both on Broadway and the West End in The Gay Divorce, later to be filmed as The Gay Divorcee. So you could hardly say his success depended on cinema techniques. Which is not to say that he didn't make the most of them. The very least that can be said of him is that he had a unique talent (as affirmed by any number of dance experts) combined with a winning personality and a willingness to put in the hard work. I personally think there was more to it than that, a touch of magic or, shall we say, genius. He was, and is, unmatched.

You are from Slovakia?

And to have watched Fred with Bing in Holiday Inn PLUS Cyd with a perfect body, makes me feel like Irish Springtime at 68 years of age. Father and mother would try to emulate those two! Dad looked like Paul Newman while mother Audrey Hepburn. I loved reading your commentary as a trained NOT DANCER rather, singer. Back to the Maple Leafs vs. Habs game. David.

Eleanor Powell was superior to Ginger Rogers! Watch The Broadway Melody of 1940! Astaire admitted that that none of his partners was equal to her! He admitted not being able to keep up with her!

@@arthurgearheard4701 I have her movies BUT, none of his sidekick CHICKS could keep up with Fred! My father saw this too. Cyd Charisse was as close to perfection while Fred even guided her!

@@daddydad9018 . Easter Parade with Ann Miller - the greatest female dancer, ever.

I hadn't read your comment when I added mine. So far you are the only one to bring up his singing. Thank you. And you should add to your comment his singing in movies.

I read some while back (so have forgotten the source, sorry) that Richard Rodgers said he thought Fred was the best singer of his songs (or the one he liked best), because Fred sang them as they were written. I have several old vinyl records of Fred singing, and they show what Rodgers meant. For interpretation and faithfulness to the songwriter's intent, Fred is up there with Ella and Sinatra singing ballads. The way he sings goes straight to one's heart.

@@elainechubb971 I think you might mean Irving Berlin. Or perhaps George Gershwin or maybe Cole Porter. For whatever reason, Fred and Richard Rogers never worked together and I'm not sure if he ever recorded any of his numbers.

Absolutely true, though, that both Berlin and Porter wrote songs (and some great ones) specifically for Fred-either to be premiered on Broadway or in film. They and others loved his voice, and he could really “sell” a song!