As a follow-up to yesterday’s post which featured a superb Eleanor Powell number from ‘Ship Ahoy’, here’s Eleanor dancing a nifty number with Fred Astaire in ‘Broadway Melody of 1940’. Apparently this was her favorite of her own on-screen dances. That’s all the sparkling dialogue I’ve got for today–I’m late
Eleanor Powell, Metro Goldwyn Mayer’s tap-dancing super-star of the 1930s and early 40s, is now an oddly marginalized figure in the world of dance history. Perhaps it’s because the movies she appeared in–featherweight musical vehicles–are now mostly unwatchable. (I hate it when that happens). One of them, ‘Ship Ahoy’ (1942),
What exactly is the ‘Foxtrot’? It’s the dance you see couples doing in movies of the 30s/40s/50s when they’re on the dance floor of a nightclub or restaurant and talking to each other and not really dancing. In other words, its the faceless and pointless ‘wallpaper’ of dancing, the blandly
This is a real curio. It’s clips and coverage of a concert that the Jackson 5 did in 1971 at–get this–West Side High School in Gary, Indiana. Imagine that? The Jackson’s coming to your auditorium for a little after school concert? (When I went to High School we once had
Given that Spotify reports that Earth Wind & Fire’s immortal ‘September’ has been played on its platform 1.18 BILLION times, I’m hardly breaking new ground by posting the above clip. However I just read the NY TIMES Obit of drummer Fred White–half brother of EWF founder and all-around auteur Maurice
Here are two incredibly badass appearances by the Jackson Five on ‘The Flip Wilson Show’. The first, from April 11,1971, is a medley of ‘I Want You Back’, ‘ABC and ‘The Love You Save’ (the transition between the first and second songs–at the one minute mark–is impressively seamless). The second
YouTube mash-ups are generally not my thing but this exceptionally well crafted combo of Ann-Margret dancing from three different movies to ‘Shot Gun’ by Junior Walker and The All-Stars is a major exception. The clips are from ‘The Swinger’, ‘Bye Bye Birdie’ and ‘Viva Las Vegas’. As this video amply
Here’s a smoking hot duet with Ann-Margret and Tina Turner doing a medley of songs from a 1975 television special called ‘Ann-Margret Olsson’. The show was filmed in London while both promoted the movie ‘Tommy’. There’s a little intro which shows us the two women hanging out as friends dressed
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E81cTpcmkYohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=op0NY8Fc5GY ‘Love Is All Around’, the much loved theme from ‘The Mary Tyler Moore Show’, was written by Sonny Curtis who also wrote ‘I Fought The Law’, made famous by Bobby Fuller. If the difference between Mary and Bobby Fuller seems like a stark one then try this on for
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6GmXsUfgA4https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CWojcHWdDAg&t=0s The justifiably famous and much admired theme music for Billy Wilder and I.A.L. Diamond’s ‘The Apartment’ began life as a 1949 ‘mood music’ instrumental titled ‘Jealous Lover’, written by an English composer named Charles Williams. He composed many orchestral pieces and marches for his ensembles, which were recorded in