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Top Hat is a 1935 American musical screwball comedy film in which Fred Astaire plays an American tap dancer named Jerry Travers, who comes to London to star in a show produced by Horace Hardwick. He meets and attempts to impress Dale Tremont to win her affection. The film also features Eric Blore as Hardwick's valet Bates, Erik Rhodes as Alberto Beddini, a fashion designer and rival for Dale's affections, and Helen Broderick as Hardwick's long-suffering wife Madge.
Ginger Rogers was an American actress, dancer and singer during the Golden Age of Hollywood. She won an Academy Award for Best Actress for her starring role in Kitty Foyle (1940), and performed during the 1930s in RKO's musical films with Fred Astaire. Her career continued on stage, radio and television throughout much of the 20th century.
Fred Astaire was an American dancer, actor, singer, musician, choreographer, and presenter, whose career in stage, film, and television spanned 76 years. Widely regarded as the "greatest popular-music dancer of all time," he received numerous accolades, including an Honorary Academy Award, three Primetime Emmy Awards, a BAFTA Award, two Golden Globe Awards, and a Grammy Award.
This is a list of notable events in music that took place in the year 1936.
Holiday Inn is a 1942 American musical film starring Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire, with Marjorie Reynolds, Virginia Dale, and Walter Abel. It was directed by Mark Sandrich with music by Irving Berlin. The composer wrote twelve songs specifically for the film, the best known being "White Christmas". The film features a complete reuse of the song "Easter Parade", written by Berlin for the 1933 Broadway revue As Thousands Cheer and used as a highlight of the 1948 film Easter Parade, starring Astaire and Judy Garland. The film's choreography was by Danny Dare.
Swing Time is a 1936 American musical comedy film, the sixth of ten starring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. Directed by George Stevens for RKO, it features Helen Broderick, Victor Moore, Betty Furness, Eric Blore and Georges Metaxa, with music by Jerome Kern and lyrics by Dorothy Fields. Set mainly in New York City, the film follows a gambler and dancer, "Lucky" (Astaire), who is trying to raise money to secure his marriage when he meets a dance instructor, Penny (Rogers), and begins dancing with her; the two soon fall in love and are forced to reconcile their feelings.
Blue Skies is a 1946 American musical comedy film directed by Stuart Heisler and starring Bing Crosby, Fred Astaire, and Joan Caulfield. Based on a story by Irving Berlin, the film is about a dancer who loves a showgirl who loves a compulsive nightclub-opener who can't stay committed to anything in life for very long. Produced by Sol C. Siegel, Blue Skies was filmed in Technicolor and released by Paramount Pictures. The music, lyrics, and story were written by Irving Berlin, with most of the songs recycled from earlier works.
Flying Down to Rio is a 1933 American pre-Code RKO musical film famous for being the first screen pairing of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers, although lead actors Dolores del Río and Gene Raymond received top billing. Among the featured players are Franklin Pangborn and Eric Blore. The songs in the film were written by Vincent Youmans (music), Gus Kahn and Edward Eliscu (lyrics), with musical direction and additional music by Max Steiner. During the 7th Academy Awards, the film was nominated for the new category of Best Original Song for "Carioca", but it lost to "The Continental" from The Gay Divorcee, the next Astaire and Rogers film.
Follow the Fleet is a 1936 American RKO musical comedy film with a nautical theme starring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers in their fifth collaboration as dance partners. It also features Randolph Scott, Harriet Hilliard, and Astrid Allwyn, with music and lyrics by Irving Berlin. Lucille Ball and Betty Grable also appear, in supporting roles. The film was directed by Mark Sandrich with script by Allan Scott and Dwight Taylor based on the 1922 play Shore Leave by Hubert Osborne.
"They Can't Take That Away from Me" is a 1937 popular song with music by George Gershwin and lyrics by Ira Gershwin. It was introduced by Fred Astaire in the 1937 film Shall We Dance and gained huge success.
"Cheek to Cheek" is a song written by Irving Berlin in 1934–35, specifically for Fred Astaire, the star of his new musical, Top Hat, co-starring Ginger Rogers. In the movie, Astaire sings the song to Rogers as they dance. The song was nominated for the Best Song Oscar for 1936, which it lost to "Lullaby of Broadway". The song spent five weeks at #1 on Your Hit Parade and was named the #1 song of 1935. Astaire's 1935 recording with the Leo Reisman Orchestra was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2000. In 2004, Astaire's version finished at No. 15 on AFI's 100 Years...100 Songs survey of top tunes in American cinema.
Carefree is a 1938 American musical comedy film directed by Mark Sandrich and starring Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers and Ralph Bellamy. With a plot similar to screwball comedies of the period, Carefree is the shortest of the Astaire-Rogers films, featuring only four musical numbers. Carefree is often remembered as the film in which Astaire and Rogers shared a long on-screen kiss at the conclusion of their dance to "I Used to Be Color Blind," all previous kisses having been either quick pecks or simply implied.
Shall We Dance is a 1937 American musical comedy film directed by Mark Sandrich. It is the seventh of the ten Fred Astaire-Ginger Rogers films. The story follows an American ballet dancer (Astaire) who falls in love with a tap dancer (Rogers); the tabloid press concocts a story of their marriage, after which life imitates art. George Gershwin wrote the symphonic underscore and Ira Gershwin the lyrics, for their second Hollywood musical.
Mark Sandrich was an American film director, writer, and producer.
"Let's Face the Music and Dance" is a song published in 1936 by Irving Berlin for the film Follow the Fleet, where it was introduced by Fred Astaire and featured in a celebrated dance duet with Astaire and Ginger Rogers. The jazz song has also been covered by various artists years following its release, including Nat King Cole, Ella Fitzgerald, Frank Sinatra, Mel Torme, Todd Gordon and others.
"I Won't Dance" is a song with music by Jerome Kern that has become a jazz standard. The song has two different sets of lyrics: the first written by Oscar Hammerstein II and Otto Harbach in 1934, and second written by Dorothy Fields in 1935.
Roberta is a 1935 American musical film released by RKO Radio Pictures and directed by William A. Seiter. It stars Irene Dunne, Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, and features Randolph Scott, Helen Westley, Victor Varconi and Claire Dodd. The film was an adaptation of the 1933 Broadway musical Roberta, which in turn was based on the novel Gowns by Roberta by Alice Duer Miller. It was a solid hit, showing a net profit of more than three-quarters of a million dollars.
Sid Kuller was an American comedy writer, producer and lyricist/composer, who concentrated on special musical material, gags and sketches for leading comics. He collaborated with Ray Golden and Hal Fimberg on the screenplay of the Marx Brothers' vehicle The Big Store, for which he also supplied the lyrics to the musical climax, "The Tenement Symphony". Earlier in their careers, Kuller and Golden wrote comedy songs and special material for the Ritz Brothers. Although he wrote prodigiously and with facility throughout his life, Kuller admitted, "The creation of comedy is a painful experience".
Swing jazz emerged as a dominant form in American music, in which some virtuoso soloists became as famous as the band leaders. Key figures in developing the "big" jazz band included bandleaders and arrangers Count Basie, Cab Calloway, Jimmy and Tommy Dorsey, Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman, Fletcher Henderson, Earl Hines, Glenn Miller, and Artie Shaw. Duke Ellington and his band members composed numerous swing era hits that have become standards: "It Don't Mean a Thing " (1932), "Sophisticated Lady" (1933) and "Caravan" (1936), among others. Other influential bandleaders of this period were Benny Goodman and Count Basie.
References
- ↑ Croce, Arlen, The Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers Book, Outerbridge & Lazard, 1972, p. 67 ISBN 0-88365-099-1
- ↑ Billboard, February 28, 1942.
- ↑ Lax, David, One Man Show, Washington Irving Gallery, 1976, p. 158
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