(1936, b/w) Dancing feats! Romantic treats! Comic deceits! George Stevens directed this spectacle of footwork set to a score by Jerome Kern and Dorothy Fields, based on a story by Erwin Gelsey. The variety of styles of dancing were challenging choreography, requiring 350 hours of rehearsals under the supervision of Hermes Pan.

John "Lucky" Garnett (Fred Astaire), hoofer and gambler, arrives too late to wed Margaret Watson (Betty Furness), thanks to the mischief of his dance troupe. Before he can earn back Margaret's father's trust, he must prove he can be successful in New York City, plus pay back a $25,000 bet he'd lost to a pal. In formal attire he hops a freight train, accompanied by his accomplice Everett "Pop" Cardetti (Victor Moore).

Pursuing a young lady into a dance studio after an altercation with her over his lucky quarter, involving Pop ("Look out for the great big ditch") and a cop, Lucky takes dance instruction from the same pretty girl, Penelope Carrol (Ginger Rogers in her sixth film with Astaire in four years), petulant over the coin confusion: "No one could teach you to dance." They come to a better understanding performing "Pick Yourself Up."

Meanwhile, Pop and the no-nonsense Miss Mabel Anderson (Helen Broderick) make an odd couple.

Missing an audition with Penny, because he lost his only suit of clothes playing piquet, puts Lucky back in the dog house, which he tries to remedy by singing at the piano in her apartment "The Way You Look Tonight," while she shampoos her hair (which even in black-and-white appears almost red).

At the Silver Sandal café, when orchestra-leader Ricardo Romero (Georges Metaxa), Penny's swain, refuses to conduct his band for Lucky and Penny's dance number, Lucky and Pop swindle Ricky's contract from Dice Raymond.

Disappointed with his aloofness toward her - when not dancing but wearing a bowler and top coat, Astaire resembles Stan Laurel - Penny in the snow sings the ironically titled "A Fine Romance." Later "Waltz in Swing Time" gives expression to the spontaneity of their romance.

Displaying his physics of physicality during his cinematographic tap-dance tribute to Bill Robinson, "Bojangles of Harlem," Astaire in blackface, accompanied by three huge shadows of himself, becomes a jazz instrument in tap shoes.

About to lose his girl to Ricardo, Lucky's attempt to entice her back in their staircase number, "Never Gonna Dance," filmed without interruption, took 47 takes (according to Pan, by the end Rogers was bleeding through her shoes). But on the screen everything looks - la belle romance - effortless and magical.

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Copyright © 2009 Patrick Ivers. All rights reserved.
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