Astaire
February 21, 2014
ALAN writes:
Do you and your readers ever wish for an alternative to the indescribable evil and ugliness that surround us daily? So do I, and so did Lawrence Auster:
“If you would like to leave the present state of things for a while and enter a world of sheer joy and delight,” he wrote in 2007, “I recommend seeing all of the Fred Astaire – Ginger Rogers movies… I consider Astaire one of the great geniuses of our civilization… See these movies and be lifted up by the happiness, joy, beauty, and perfection” that they convey. [ “Astaire and Rogers,” VFR, August 6, 2007]
Mike Royko said much the same thing twenty years earlier, shortly after Fred Astaire died. At some point in his life, he wrote, it dawned on him that Fred Astaire “was just about the sharpest guy in the world. …I saw every movie Astaire ever made. …What mattered was the music, written by the best composers, and Fred Astaire dancing and singing….” [“Fred Astaire Was A Class Act To End,” Chicago Tribune, June 23, 1987 ]
I would like to second those judgments most emphatically. Lawrence Auster had it precisely right, and he enjoyed those movies for the right reasons. I wonder whether he knew that Fred Astaire’s real name was “Austerlitz.”
“Swing Time” (1936) includes two of Fred and Ginger’s most memorable dances, to the songs “Pick Yourself Up” and “The Way You Look Tonight.”
That Fred Astaire was a master craftsman is evident in all his dances with Ginger Rogers as well as with other dance partners. The highlight in “The Sky’s The Limit” (1943) is his terrace dance with Joan Leslie to the beautiful song “My Shining Hour.”
Fred Astaire and Bing Crosby were two of my father’s favorite entertainers, and I can understand why. They can be seen at the height of their talent in the wonderful, romantic, patriotic “Holiday Inn” (1942). It is one of those movies notable for many reasons: Irving Berlin’s music, Bing Crosby singing “Easter Parade” and “White Christmas,” and two superbly executed dances by Fred Astaire with Virginia Dale (to the song “You’re Easy to Dance With,” in a nightclub setting) and Marjorie Reynolds (to the song “Be Careful, It’s My Heart,” at the Holiday Inn). Both actresses are excellent as his dancing partners.
“Holiday Inn” is the kind of classic motion picture that left viewers humming and singing the songs as they left the theater and for days afterward. One of my favorite scenes in “Holiday Inn” takes place in the spacious dining room on New Year’s Eve. All the tables are occupied and all the diners and guests are heard singing “Happy Holiday” as the camera pans slowly across the room. It is a brief but most impressive scene because it shows the simple decency and elegance of people attired respectably and acting properly on a festive occasion where everyone there understood the value of those things. They are having a good time and many are wearing party hats, but all the women wear dresses or ball gowns and all the men wear suits. The scene is an example of something good that was once more common in this nation than it is today: Grown-ups acting as grown-ups, with all the restraint and responsibility that implied.
The scene reminds me of a dear aunt and uncle of mine. They had no children. Instead, they had a parakeet. They were quite conservative and the wild life was never for them. But they enjoyed going out on the town on New Year’s Eve to celebrate with friends at parties, restaurants, or hotel ballrooms. Fred Astaire was their kind of entertainer. The singing and good cheer depicted in that scene remind me of my aunt’s cheerfulness and good taste.
My father enjoyed dancing to the kind of music heard in Fred Astaire’s movies. He knew he could never be Fred Astaire, but he also knew that Fred Astaire represented a moral ideal of chivalry, decency, optimism, cheerfulness, and good manners. He appreciated those things fully as much as he enjoyed Fred Astaire’s superlative dancing.
It is a standard cliché of Modernists and Leftists to dismiss movies like “Holiday Inn” as an “escape from reality”. As usual, they have it precisely backward: Such movies are an escape not from reality but from the cultural and moral rot that Modernists would foist upon all of us if they had the power. Such movies are an escape to the only reality worth living for: The reality of beauty, joy, happiness, gratitude, loyalty, and honor.
Was Fred Astaire “escaping from reality” when he invested countless hours and hard work in practicing and perfecting his dances? No. He was creating a moral and artistic reality that brought joy and beauty to millions of people.
To watch any of those five song-and-dance numbers by Fred Astaire and his dancing partners is sheer heaven. As Frank Sinatra said years afterward, the talent and discipline of entertainers like Fred Astaire are things the likes of which we will never see again.
If the day ever comes when Americans turn away from the moral rot of Modernism and Liberalism and back to virtues like those reflected in Fred Astaire’s movies, it will be a very good day for our nation.
— Comments —
Ian writes:
Alan asks whether Lawrence Auster knew that Fred Astaire’s real name was “Austerlitz.” Indeed, he did. In fact, that post of his is the reason I know that :).
Having come across some of Auster’s older entries from before I was introduced to VFR, I wish I could ask him questions about old movies and actors. For instance, in this entry, he says that he is not a fan of John Ford’s Westerns. Well, I’d like to know why!
David Martin writes:
I think I can guess why the late Mr. Auster might not have liked John Ford’s westerns. Despite the frequent presence of John Wayne, they pretty consistently present the settling of the west and the establishment of rule of law as being at best a mixed blessing, or at worst morally compromised and founded on lies. This revisionist (I could also say cynical) attitude is present in most of his sound era westerns regardless of who happened to be writing or producing them, and it stood Ford in good stead when universities began to teach “film studies” in the 60s and 70s.
Of course this is just one aspect of these movies and there’s still a lot for traditionalists to admire in them, especially the emphasis on familial and communal bonds often expressed in reverentially filmed social rituals like weddings, funerals, dances, etc.
