Boze Hadleigh - Scandals, Secrets and Swansongs: How Hollywood Stars Lived, Worked, and Died

It was said of movie dance partners Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers, She gave him sex and he gave her class. It was later said of Ginger that she did everything Fred did, matching him while dancing backward and in high heels.

Astaire began his career dancing with his sister Adele, starting in vaudeville and later graduating to Broadway. After Adele retired the act so she could get married, Fred was disconsolate, practically destroyed, said Hermes Pan, the choreographer and longtime friend of Fred Astaire (18991987). They were performance stars of the first order. Others added that the attractive Adele was the acts real draw and that Fred was unlikely ever to find another ideal dancing partner for the stage. He didnt.

Rather, the skinny, balding, non-sexy dancer born Fred Austerlitz sought work in motion picture musicals, a popular and uplifting genre during the Great Depression. He could hardly have imagined in a few years hed be en routewith the help of an expensive toupee and an ambitious, disciplined blonde dancing partnerto movie stardom.

Fred made his celluloid bow in a 1931 musical short, then went nowhere fast. But in 1933 he was hired for Dancing Lady, a Joan Crawford musicalshe too began as a dancer. Later that year he was paired with the former Virginia McMath (a cousin of future star Rita Hayworth), whod appeared in myriad throwaway screen parts as a young blonde (twelve years younger than Fred). Their film, Flying Down to Rio, was an exuberantly glamorous musical starring Mexican beauty Dolores Del Rio (whose cousin was silent star Ramon Novarro).

The picture was a hit, and audiences and critics singled out the dancing numbers of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. A dancing team was born. There would be eight more Astaire-Rogers musicals through 1939, the rest centering on Fred and Ginger. Again, it was the female half that broke up the act, but not for marital anonymityfor ambition. Rogerss star would continue to rise after she parted with Astaire. Federico Fellini, who directed the Italian film Ginger e Fred (Ginger and Fred, 1986), over which Rogers unsuccessfully sued, said, Until her looks went away, she could continue in the big movie roles.

The other, he was not in the movies for his looks. What he did was artistry, sadly not usually of much commercial value in the movies. British film historian David Quinlan referred to the innovative dancing star who made the grinding discipline of constant rehearsal come to the screen as pure poetry.

Post-Rogers, Hollywood fashioned romantic musical plots pairing Astaire with a variety of leading ladies, often too young for him (e.g., Rita Hayworth) and later, way too young (e.g., Audrey Hepburn), until finally, in Finians Rainbow (1968) he played the female leads (Petula Clark) father.

Fred also appeared in non-musical films but few dramas. His lightweight personality didnt lend itself to heavy emoting or villainy. He received a supporting-Oscar nomination for the all-star The Towering Inferno (1974) and in old age slipped comfortably into grandfatherly roles. He won an Emmy for a 1979 TV movie titled A Family Upside Down.

The ex-hoofers final performance was in Ghost Story (1981), a film equally costarring Melvyn Douglas, Douglas Fairbanks Jr., and John Houseman. Debbie Reynolds, who worked with Astaire in The Pleasure of His Company (1961) and owned a dance rehearsal studio, recalled, Im glad Mr. Astaire went out in a classy production... he was a class act. Im glad it wasnt a token part in some TV movie or something in a third-rate picture, maybe some horror thing.... I dont remember if Ghost Story came out at Halloween, but I saw it, it was kind of spooky and I relished the chance to see three grand old men of the cinema again. (She didnt refer to former producer John Houseman.)

Reynolds added, Some people become more likeable with age, less cocky. Mr. Astaire was one.... He still moved with grace but hed long since reconciled, without bitterness, to putting his dancing days behind him.

The quote about Astaire giving Ginger Rogers class implies she (19111995) didnt have that much to begin with. Understandable, in terms of her pre-Astaire characters. Not a natural blonde, Virginia McMath was pushed into show business by her fierce mother Lela Rogers. From the chorus line and movie bit parts, she moved into frequently brassy and/or loudmouthed roles. She got noticed in 42nd Street (1932) and Gold Diggers of 1933 but didnt gain serious attention until later that year in Flying Down to Rio.

Subsequent teamings with Fred Astaire were popular, but Ginger didnt experience a non-dancing hit until Stage Door (1937), top-billing Katharine Hepburn as the rich girl sparring with Rogers as a resentful working-class girl. Ginger was eager to prove herself without Fred. Rumors that they didnt get along werent yet common and there never was a feud, despite later pictures with other actors portraying dancing partners who couldnt stand each other. But she agreed to costar a tenth and final time in The Barkleys of Broadway (1949).

Rogers won an Oscar, which Astaire never did, for a dramatic role in Kitty Foyle (1940), and reached her apotheosis in Lady in the Dark (1944), a film of the Gertrude Lawrence stage hit. In it, Ginger wore one of the most expensive and publicized costumes yet seen on an actress, its capacious, wide-opening bejeweled skirt entirely lined with mink. Postwar, the actresss features were already hardening and the makeup getting thicker. The process accelerated in the 1950s, with movies that were mostly silly (Monkey Business), desperate (Forever Female), or saw her actually playing a villain, as in Black Widow (1954). In the 1970s Elizabeth Taylor stated that unlike actors, actresses often got cast unsympathetically due to advancing years and diminishing looks.

Carol Channing costarred with Rogers in The First Traveling Saleslady (1956). Well, it was so terribly underappreciated that Ginger Rogers and I were virtually responsible for closing down RKO Studios! (The cartoonish Carols somewhat intimidated love interest was a young Clint Eastwood.)

Rogerss final 50s picture was Oh, Men! Oh, Women! (1957), oh, brother, after which she was off the screen until 1964 in The Confession, not deemed worth releasing overseas (it aired on British TV as Quick! Lets Get Married). Gingers swan song found her portraying the mother of 1930s rival and fellow blonde Jean Harlow in Harlow (1965), one of two Harlow biopics that year. The more commercial Harlow, released to cinemas, starred Carroll Baker, with Angela Lansbury as the controlling Mama Jean. Rogerss Harlow, starring Carol Lynley (born Carolyn Lee) as the original platinum bombshell, aired on television.

Fred Astaires acclaim grew over the decades, he didnt have to play villains, and he wasnt exiled from film musicals, but Ginger Rogerss star dimmed. Loyal older fans usually sustained her stardom on the stage, including the musical Hello, Dolly!, post-Channing. Rogerss most enduring companion was mother Lela (Gingers five marriages produced no children).

Agnes Moorehead worked with Rogers during their latter years in an unsuccessful stage production which, however, earned excellent notices for the prominent character actress. She informed writer Doug McClelland, I dont give in to public negativity towards people I have worked with.... Without naming our collaboration or reviving any sordid details, a few already exposed by the press, I will only affirm that it was one of my least pleasant working experiences.

Miss Rogers felt everybody else in the show was less than secondary.... Had she cooperated with those in charge and in the know, our show could have been quite popular. Unhappily, and I would not describe her as a happy person, she preferred to play the star to the bitter end and take the entire ship down with her.