Yesterday we watched a deeply strange BDSM musical number from a 1933 Eddie Cantor vehicle, staged by Busby Berkeley. Twenty-years later, the same mind that brought us slavegirls-on-parade came up with a fascinating, nightmarish concept for an Ann Miller number in ‘Small Town Girl’ (1953) called ‘I Gotta Hear That
Here’s a production number from the 1933 Eddie Cantor vehicle “Roman Scandals” that will leave you…well…I don’t know…it kind of depends on your pre-code tolerance for things that one doesn’t expect to see even in pre-code movies. I’ll leave it at that. Though the movie was directed by the underrated
As this week drifts on, we’re gradually getting away from my initial theme which was period football games captured on film. (This may well be a relief to some of you). Today we fall off the map completely with a terrific production number from the 1947 MGM remake of ‘Good
It may seem odd that by far my favorite of Fred Astaire’s dance partners is, in fact, not a dancer at all. But the above clip of Paulette Goddard and Astaire performing “I Ain’t Hep To That Step But I’ll Dig It” from “Second Chorus” (1940) rocks me every time
Let’s close the week with the spectacular Fred Astaire & Eleanor Powell ‘Begin The Beguine’ dance routine from ‘Broadway Melody of 1940’. You need to sit through a minute of silly singing until the dancing begins (or you can fast-forward through it) but it’s well worth the wait. The whole
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uTkl_Nyzh90https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kXPr32BHmNAhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VTY6GpGdDF8 Above are three rare clips of George Raft dancing–one from the 1944 wartime propoganda musical ‘Follow The Boys’ (1944), another from one of his earliest films ‘Quick Millions’ (1931) and finally a duet with Alice Faye from ‘Every Night At Eight’ (1935). The quality of the second two clips
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IiWpmprZDrAhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ufop72Q74fA Here are two deleted scenes from ‘Cafe Metropole’, a 1937 20th Century Fox musical (sort of) starring Tyrone Power, Loretta Young and Adolphe Menjou. Both feature tap-dancing legend Bill Bojangles Robinson, who already had made screen history by dancing with Shirley Temple in another Fox movie ‘The Little Colonel’