I'd Like To Try This Thing Just Once

Let's start the year with a little magic.

Fred Astaire was a Broadway star who'd signed with RKO, but no one in 1933 knew if he had screen potential. Ginger Rogers had come to Hollywood a few years earlier--she and Fred had known each other in New York, even dated--and was appearing regularly in films, including, earlier that year, in 42nd Street as a chorine.

Flying Down To Rio, in fact, was RKO's attempt to make money in the genre that 42nd Street had revived. It was Fred's first big role, but only one of ten (!) films that Ginger appeared in that year. The duo was billed fourth and fifth, being comic relief behind the central love triangle. But after the film opened, everyone was talking about the King and Queen of the Carioca.

As opposed to most of their other films, Fred and Ginger know--and like--each other from the start. They work in a band that flies down to Rio (what did you expect?) where they meet the local competition. They think they're beat, but Fred wants to dance anyway.



They're on the floor for less than two minutes, but that was enough. Though Fred and Ginger only offered a glimpse of what they could do, the world was entranced

It's instructive to see how dance was filmed before Astaire took over. There are numerous cuts, reaction shots, and closeups that cut off their legs. The dance itself is a little weird, with the main point being the couple keep their foreheads together. But we still get the mix of tap and ballroom, with the dramatic pauses and touches of comedy, that made Fred and Ginger unique.

It was inevitable RKO would star them in more films. Fred wasn't thrilled being paired with a new partner, only recently having stepped out of the shadow of his sister Adele, but their films were huge hits, and have since become a glory of the cinema.

If Rogers hadn't been cast, and Fred hadn't said "come on, Honey" and led Ginger onto the dance floor, who knows what would have happened.