Essayist Joseph Epstein paired up with dance critic Elizabeth Kendall on our show today, to discuss Fred Astaire’s lasting legacy.
The late Fred Astaire lives on as a song-and-dance legend in thirty-one musical films. Onscreen, he cut a suave, elegant figure that never broke a sweat, even as he danced on the ceiling. What looked effortless and on-the-fly was actually the result of a “weeks and weeks, sometimes months, of rehearsals” before a movie could be shot.
It made life hard for his leading ladies, but it wasn’t easy on him either. Here’s an excerpt from a 1968 interview, where a sixty-nine year old Fred reflects on “Funny Face,” one of his last musical films, released over a decade earlier (1957).
httpv://www.onpointradio.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/astaire.mp3
ASTAIRE: I thought it had a lot of very good things in it. I could pick 4 or 5 holes that I think would have helped the picture. I think a lot of us felt that afterwards.
INTERVIEWER: But as a whole, it was quite beautiful
ASTAIRE: Oh I loved it, of course I love Audrey Hepburn. Anyone who has the privilege of working with Audrey Hepburn… I enjoyed working with her. I don’t know if I gave her the very best.
That’s Fred in his own words – ever modest, and ever the perfectionist. It’s also Fred in a different light – thoughtful, unpolished, unpracticed.
If you want to hear more of Fred Astaire off-screen, check out the rest of the interview at http://www.kaneprod.com/astaire/astaire.htm.
It’s not easy to sift through, but it’s a different side of Fred.
This was a lovely segment. My father, who was born and raised in Israel in the 1930s, 40s and 50s, used to and still loves to watch Fred Astaire movies and in fact, taught himself to dance by watching those movies growing up there.
And whenever those films were on TV at my house growing up in New York, he would try teaching me to dance some of the steps while the movie was on. I was so embarassed at the time, but actually, it was really cute of my dad to do that with me. He still loves to watch those films.
Posted by Allegra, on April 17th, 2009 at 9:34 am EDTThank you for referencing and including a link to the radio interview Joel Reisner and I did with Fred Astaire at his home in 1968. It’s a moment and memory I treasure greatly. As I say on the website, he greeted us at the door and actually told us he didn’t know what we would have to talk about. As you can see when you listen to the interview, he had a great deal to talk about.
Posted by Bruce Kane, on April 17th, 2009 at 1:21 pm EDT