Fred Astaire

Dancer

• Born: May 10, 1899
• Birthplace: Omaha, Nebraska
• Died: June 22, 1987
• Place of death: Los Angeles, California

American dancer

Astaire was one of the greatest popular dancers of the twentieth century. His films with Ginger Rogers and other partners defined the essence of the American motion picture musical.

Areas of achievement Dance, theater and entertainment, film

Early Life

Fred Astaire (eh-STEHR) was born Frederick Austerlitz, the son of Frederic and Ann Austerlitz, in Omaha, Nebraska. The elder Austerlitz worked in the brewing business. Frederick’s ambitious and stage-struck mother soon mapped out a show-business career for her son and her daughter Adele, who was eighteen months older than Frederick. Realizing that her children had talent as singers and dancers, Ann relocated her children to New York City, where Adele and Frederick studied at the Ned Wayburn school in Manhattan. Frederick soon displayed a gift for dancing, including the new style of tap-dancing. By the time Frederick was eight, he and his sister were already onstage in the entertainment medium known as vaudeville.

Over the next decade, the siblings changed their name to Astaire and began gaining the attention of theatrical producers. In 1917 they appeared in Sigmund Romberg’s Over the Top. The show flopped, but the Astaires received good critical notices. Throughout the 1920’s the Astaires were a smash success on Broadway and in London. They sang and danced in George Gershwin’s Lady Be Good (1924) and in The Band Wagon (1931), a hit revue that featured songs by Howard Dietz and Arthur Schwartz. By this time, however, Adele had decided to marry an English nobleman and leave show business. It was time for Fred Astaire to go out on his own.

Life’s Work

In the early 1930’s, Astaire went to Hollywood, California, to begin a career in motion pictures. According to motion picture legend, one insider’s reaction to Astaire was, “Can’t sing. Balding. Can dance a little.” The story is probably a fable, but it did suggest the problems that Astaire faced in making the shift from the stage to the motion picture studio. In fact, success came relatively quickly. He soon signed a contract to appear in Dancing Lady (1933) with Joan Crawford and was also committed to team with newcomer Ginger Rogers in Flying Down to Rio (1933). With his film career now well under way, Astaire married Phyllis Livingston Potter in New York City on July 12, 1933. The Astaires had a son, Fred, Jr., and a daughter, Ava. Phyllis would die of lung cancer in 1955. It was a devastating personal loss for Astaire.

Astaire’s first motion picture with Rogers, Flying Down to Rio, was not a starring vehicle for either of the performers. Amid the rather confused plot, it became apparent that Astaire was an adroit comic actor and that he had a pleasant way with a song on the screen. When Astaire and Rogers danced, however, the screen came alive with the indefinable chemistry that became a key to their enduring popularity. Flying Down to Rio was a surprise hit, largely because of the Astaire-Rogers magic. Happy executives at Radio-Keith-Orpheum (RKO) Pictures Corporation at once began planning a full-fledged starring performance for the hot new team.

Their next motion picture, The Gay Divorcee (1934), established the format that would dominate the Fred and Ginger series throughout the 1930’s. The dance numbers rather than the thin and silly plot kept the story moving. The high points of the film were two songs: Cole Porter’s “Night and Day,” which depicted Astaire and Rogers in a musical seduction, and the elaborately staged “The Continental,” which ran for sixteen minutes. Audiences again responded by flocking to the theaters, and the box office receipts helped keep RKO going throughout the 1930’s. The Astaire-Rogers combination became one of the big attractions of the decade.

Of the eight films that Astaire and Rogers did as costars in the 1930’s, the standouts were Irving Berlin’sTop Hat (1935), which included such outstanding songs as “Cheek to Cheek” and “Isn’t It a Lovely Day?”; Swing Time (1936), directed by George Stevens, with a dazzling score by Jerome Kern and Dorothy Fields that included “A Fine Romance” and “The Way You Look Tonight”; and Shall We Dance (1937), which included songs by George and Ira Gershwin such as “Let’s Call the Whole Thing Off” and “They Can’t Take That Away from Me.” Lesser works, which nonetheless contained many pleasant moments and good dances, were Roberta (1935), Follow the Fleet (1936), and The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle (1939).

A primary factor that made the motion pictures succeed at the box office, with the critics, and with moviegoers for several generations was Astaire’s insistence that the dances be filmed with the fewest interruptions possible. He devised innovative camera techniques to make such shots possible, and the result was the flowing, graceful duets that came to be the trademarks of such films as Top Hat and Swing Time. Astaire and Rogers were a creative partnership, and the key to their success was hard work, imagination, and good taste. They were able to convey the essence of romance on-screen even though they were never romantically involved in person. Without an indecent word or an erotic gesture, the couple danced in a manner that exuded sex appeal.

Astaire created an indelible image of sophistication and elegance in these films. Tall, thin, and graceful, he epitomized style and charm. At a time when upper-class Americans wore top hats, white ties, and tails for an evening out, Astaire could dress in a more fashionable way than the average man. He moved with ease on the dance floor and made his carefully rehearsed numbers seem spontaneous and fresh. Because of his experience with his sister, he knew how to make his partners stand out. Of all the women he danced with, Rogers blended with him the best, and her skill brought out the excellence in his craft.

Although he was not a technically gifted singer, Astaire had a pleasing, lilting voice that had a dancer’s sense of the rhythm and the lyrics of a tune. Songwriters such as Berlin, the Gershwins, and Jerome Kern enjoyed composing for Astaire because they knew he would showcase their words and music in the most effective manner. Astaire introduced such standards as “Cheek to Cheek,” “A Fine Romance,” “They Can’t Take That Away from Me,” and “One for my Baby and One More for the Road.” As Mel Torme and other gifted popular singers have remarked, Astaire was an influential vocalist whose style impressed many song stylists in the 1930’s and 1940’s.

At the end of the 1930’s, Astaire and Rogers went their separate ways. The parting was amicable, but their films had begun to lose money, and Rogers wanted to try her abilities as a serious actor. They would be reunited once in The Barkleys of Broadway (1949), in which some of their old magic was evident in their dance numbers.

As a dancer, Astaire remained a star attraction throughout the 1940’s. Some of his most exciting work included his “Begin the Beguine” duet with Eleanor Powell in Broadway Melody of 1940 (1940). Their tapping talents made this an electric example of popular dance at its finest. Other excellent achievements from this period of Astaire’s work included his teaming with Bing Crosby in Holiday Inn (1942), his pairing with Judy Garland in Easter Parade (1948), and The Band Wagon (1953), which many of his admirers consider his best motion picture from the post-Rogers era. In the film Royal Wedding (1951), Astaire used camera artistry and imagination to create a rotating room so he could show himself dancing on walls and the ceiling in the number “You’re All the World to Me.”

Astaire continued to make motion pictures into the 1950’s, including Daddy Long Legs (1955) and Funny Face (1957). In 1958 he turned to television, and his program An Evening with Fred Astaire garnered nine Emmy Awards for him and his partner Barry Chase. He won additional Emmy Awards for similar programs in 1959 and 1960. As his dancing career wound down, Astaire turned to acting in a more sustained manner. Some of his better performances included his role as a scientist in the antinuclear film On the Beach (1959) by Stanley Kramer and the light comedy The Notorious Landlady (1962). He recalled some of his best work during his brief appearance in That’s Entertainment (1974), where he even performed briefly with his old friend and fellow dancer Gene Kelly. On June 24, 1980, Astaire married Robyn Smith, a former jockey. In 1981 he received the Life Achievement Award of the American Film Institute. At that occasion, he said, “All the dances in the film clips shown tonight look good to me.” He died of the effects of pneumonia and old age on June 22, 1987.

Significance

Astaire created a personal style of dance and song that came to symbolize the era of the 1930’s in American entertainment. In the middle of the Great Depression, he took audiences away from their troubles and into a world of romance and gaiety. In his clothes, walk, song style, and dancing moments, Astaire embodied elegance and sophistication. His achievement was the product of hard work. He was a perfectionist who insisted on take after take until he had just the images he desired on the screen. The audiences saw only the spontaneity and the fun in the final product.

In the process, Astaire was responsible for some of the great moments in the history of American film. Several of the motion pictures that he and Rogers made are among the best musicals ever done. His dancing in other films such as The Band Wagon and Royal Wedding are masterpieces of imagination and artistry. Throughout his long and distinguished career, Fred Astaire gave amusement and pleasure to millions of people. His style of dancing transcended national boundaries and became universal in its appeal. Actor James Cagney once said, “Fred Astaire is the greatest dancer I’ve ever seen in my life.” Generations of moviegoers would agree.

Further Reading

Adler, Bill. Fred Astaire: A Wonderful Life. New York: Carroll & Graf, 1987. An admiring biography with many fascinating quotations from people who knew Astaire.

Astaire, Fred. Steps in Time. New York: Harper & Bros., 1959. Astaire’s autobiography is interesting for his insights into his career, but it is not very revealing for personal details of his life.

Croce, Arlene. The Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers Book. New York: E. P. Dutton, 1972. An eminent film critic examines the films of Astaire and Rogers in a perceptive and analytic manner. An indispensable source for Astaire’s artistry.

Gallafent, Edward. Astaire and Rogers. New York: Columbia University Press, 2002. Gallafent, a film studies scholar, analyzes the nine RKO Studios’ films in which the two appeared in the 1930’s and the subsequent films they made after they separated.

Hackl, Alfons. Fred Astaire and His Work. Vienna: Josef Schwarz Erbin, 1970. A valuable source book that lists all of Astaire’s theater, film, television, and singing appearances to 1970.

Henderson, Amy, and Dwight Blocker Bowers. Red Hot and Blue: A Smithsonian Salute to the American Musical. Washington, D.C.: National Portrait Gallery and the National Museum of American History, 1996. This superb overview of the musical and its heritage has some incisive remarks about the impact of Astaire and Rogers on the evolution of an American art form.

Rogers, Ginger. Ginger: My Story. New York: HarperCollins, 1991. The autobiography of Astaire’s most famous dancing partner includes insights about their on-screen partnership and the films they made together.

Thomas, Bob. Astaire: The Man, the Dancer. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1984. The best biography written while Astaire was still alive to cooperate with the author.

Torme, Mel. My Singing Teachers: Reflections on Singing Popular Music. New York: Oxford University Press, 1994. Torme’s book has a brief but significant chapter on Astaire’s singing style that indicates the esteem in which other singers held him.