Monday, April 26, 2010

Does she dance very beautifully, the girl you're in love with?

A small bit of business to take care of before going on with the list. Let's all give SassyGinger and emma wallace a big, hearty pat on the back (each) for correctly the naming the movie of last week's quote of the week. It was from Summer Stock. Hooray!!!

Now, for #2!

2. Ginger Rogers


Favorite solo: "Let Yourself Go" from Follow the Fleet. Yet again, we come into that frustrating conundrum of few solos for female dancers. Eleanor Powell was one of the few who got multiple memorable ones. And Ginger Rogers, one of the most famous dancers ever, got so few - I honestly can't remember any others. Despite the slim pickings, however, I must say, I like her solo a great deal. I wish she'd done more of them. She has so much personality and class.


Favorite duet: "Pick Yourself Up" from Swing Time. I love this song. I can never get enough of it! And I especially love Ginger in this one. I love how we follow her surprised reaction all the way to the end of the number where it's evident she's thoroughly enjoying herself. She is, apparently, having a blast and she's taking us along for the ride. It's wonderful!




Other favorites: "Hard to Handle" from Roberta, "The Carioca" from Flying Down to Rio, "Night and Day" from The Gay Divorcee. Okay there are tons and tons more. That's for a later post, though, I think. In the meantime, enjoy these marvelous Ginger numbers. Which one is your favorite?



I think one of the most difficult things about Ginger Rogers is that most of the dancing she did was in the form of a duet. And her main dancing partner, almost exclusively, was Fred Astaire. This being the case, we, sadly, don't get to see much of Ginger dancing in anything beyond the Fred-and-Ginger format. She was marvelous with Fred Astaire, of course - his best partner (in my opinion) but how neat would it have been to see her with Gene Kelly? What would it have been like if she'd danced with Danny Kaye? Ricardo Montalban? I've heard that Jimmy Stewart was a wonderful ballroom dancer (according to Ginger) - I wonder what they were like together? It saddens me that she did so few musicals without Fred Astaire. But we can't forget that she was one major half of a major dance team and that is enough to make her tops in my book!

8 comments:

  1. Oooh, she is so amazing! She is so easy to fall in love with. And I agree, her work with Fred Astaire was incredible, but it's not all she did. She is so talented though, and didn't she win an Oscar?

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  2. She won an Oscar in 1940 or Kitty Foyle.

    She also had two more dance solos in In Person, a rather obscure 1935 B vehicle, which is surprisingly good.

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  3. Ginger is definitely one of my favorite dancers! It really is too bad she didn't do very many musicals outside of her ones with Fred. I guess she wanted to move on from the musical genre and prove she could act, but there's no reason she couldn't have done more musicals after winning an Oscar. "Let Yourself Go" is one of my favorite numbers, I used to love the song so much when I was little (and her costume!).

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  4. I didn't mean to suggest that her dancing was all she could do! She was an incredible actress as well. I just wish she'd done more dancing post-Fred Astaire.

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  5. Your number two is my number one :) She was great, as a dancer and as an actress. One of my favorite numbers is "I'm putting all my eggs in one basket" in Follow the fleet, she's hilarious.
    My favorite movies starring Ginger are probably "Bachelor mother" & "Vivacious lady".

    Have a great day.

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  6. Great overview, Sally! Yeah, other than the few in the GandF movies, and a few routines in the movie 'In Person', not many more Ginger solo dance routines...the only other 'solo routine' of any significance she had was in Roxie Hart, when she did a little tap number on the 'steel steps'...thought it was quite cool... well, Stage Door has a small routine with her and Ann Miller... not anything major, but that outfit...dang, I love her in that...the top hat deal...

    ALTHOUGH...I am kinda curious to see who is #1... of course, I am just a WEE bit biased... :-]

    Keep It Gingery!

    VKMfan
    ---

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  7. I'm with you, Clara! My very favorite Ginger dance is "All My Eggs in One Basket!" It's just so funny and makes me happy every time I watch it.

    iamemmamusic.blogspot.com

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  8. I love that everyone is bringing up "All My Eggs in one basket" but whats with the pants?

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