Astaire sings to Rogers ' back, but the audience can see that Rogers ' attitude towards him softens during the song, and the purpose of the ensuing dance is for her to communicate this change to her partner.

They make way for Astaire who strides confidently to the front of the stage and delivers the song, which features the famous line: " I'm stepping out, my dear, to breathe an atmosphere that simply reeks with class ," trading the occasional tap barrage with the chorus as he sings. The dance begins with Astaire and chorus moving in step.

" It is a song about a song and Rogers sings it to Astaire after which an off-camera chorus repeats it while the dance ensemble is photographed, Busby Berkeley-style, from above.

Film in which Fred Astaire sings " Top Hat, White Tie and Tails "

* " Never Gonna Dance ": After Astaire sings Field's memorable closing line: " la belle, la perfectly swell romance " of Kern's haunting ballad, they begin the acknowledgement phase of the dance-possibly their greatest-replete with a poignant nostalgia for their now-doomed affair, where music changes to " The Way You Look Tonight " and they dance slowly in a manner reminiscent of the opening part of " Let's Face The Music And Dance " from Follow the Fleet.

* " Things Are Looking Up ": Astaire sings one of Gershwin's " most beautiful, yet underappreciated ballads ", followed by a romantic dance through the woods with Fontaine, where George Stevens artfully uses trees to hide Fontaine's terpsichorean shortcomings.

* This Heart of Mine: Classic standard by Harry Warren and Arthur Freed and written specially for Astaire who sings it to Bremer and then leads her in an extravagantly romantic dance of seduction and power-play.

* " Dearly Beloved ": Kern ’ s ballad became a major hit for Astaire – who sings it here – and it was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Song.

* " The Happiest Days Of My Life ": Powell sings this ballad to Peter Lawford, with Astaire sitting at the piano.

In any case, the test was clearly disappointing, and David O. Selznick, who had signed Astaire to RKO and commissioned the test, stated in a memo, " I am uncertain about the man, but I feel, in spite of his enormous ears and bad chin line, that his charm is so tremendous that it comes through even on this wretched test.

In one of these, a succession of men ( ranging from Lennon and Ono's assistants to celebrities including Fred Astaire, Jack Palance, Dick Cavett, and even George Harrison ) escort Ono over and over through a doorway ; in another, John and Yoko lose each other on the Tittenhurst grounds, and go looking.

* " Stiff Upper Lip ": sung by Gracie Allen and followed by an innovative extended comic dance by Astaire, Burns, and Allen through a fairground funhouse, complete with hall of mirrors.

* " A Foggy Day ( in London Town )": Astaire introduces what has become a standard in the Great American Songbook, sung while alternately walking and dancing solo through a wooded landscape.

* " Shootin ' the Works for Uncle Sam ": Song and dance number where Astaire and chorus march through a train station.

* " Ev ' ry Night At Seven ": A rather tired-looking Astaire ( pretending to be a bored king ) and a lively Powell sing and dance through this royal-themed number.

Matthew Bourne has twice been nominated as Best Director at the Olivier Awards, and his achievements in choreography have been recognised with over 30 international awards, including the Evening Standard Award, The South Bank Show Award, Time Out Award and the Astaire Award for Dance on Broadway.

Musical stars such as Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers were among the most popular and highly respected personalities in Hollywood during the classical era ; the Fred and Ginger pairing was particularly successful, resulting in a number of classic films, such as Top Hat ( 1935 ), Swing Time ( 1936 ) and Shall We Dance ( 1937 ).

Due to the enormous labour involved in sewing each ostrich feather to the dress, Astaire — who normally approved his partner's gowns and suggested modifications if necessary during rehearsals — saw the dress for the first time on the day of the shoot, and was horrified at the way it shed clouds of feathers at every twist and turn, recalling later: " It was like a chicken attacked by a coyote, I never saw so many feathers in my life.

As Horton leaves to investigate, Astaire continues to hammer his way around the suite, during which he feigns horror at seeing his image in a mirror – a reference to his belief that the camera was never kind to his face.

Dining together during carnival night in Venice, and to help assuage her guilt, Astaire declares: " Let's eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we have to face him ," which serves as the cue for the music of " The Piccolino ", the film's big production number.

Although the dance routines were choreographed by Astaire and his collaborator Hermes Pan, both have acknowledged Rogers's input and have also testified to her consummate professionalism, even during periods of intense strain, as she tried to juggle her many other contractual film commitments with the punishing rehearsal schedules of Astaire, who made at most two films in any one year.

In later life, Rogers remained on good terms with Astaire: she presented him with a special Academy Award in 1950, and they were co-presenters of individual Academy Awards in 1967, during which they elicited a standing ovation when they came on stage in an impromptu dance.

While Follies was a hit, Yolanda bombed at the box office and Astaire, ever insecure and believing his career was beginning to falter, surprised his audiences by announcing his retirement during the production of Blue Skies ( 1946 ), nominating " Puttin ' on the Ritz " as his farewell dance.

Astaire agonized during the entire process, frequently asking colleagues for acceptance for his work.

Le Mesurier became friends with Astaire during the filming and the two would dine together in a local cafe while watching the horse racing on television.

This is likely the only Astaire performance to have imperfections, as it was live, and Levant would repeatedly change the tempo of his accompaniment to Astaire's singing during the bridges between verses, which appeared to get him quite off balance at first.

This image is seen briefly in black-and-white at the very beginning of the opening title sequence, during the " Funny Face " musical number which takes place in a darkroom, and when Dick ( Astaire ) presents it to Maggie ( Thompson ).

Also during the third season, Fred Astaire played Alistair Mundy, Alexander's father, also a master gentleman-thief, who says bemusedly, at the start of each episode in which he appears, " I've heard of stealing from the government, but for the government?

RKO Publicity photo of Fred Astaire ( left, on chair ) and Hermes Pan ( kneeling ) during rehearsals c. 1937

) According to film historian Robert Osborne, in specially-filmed introductions produced for Turner Classic Movies, it was Astaire who suggested to Kelly that the two take advantage of this potentially last-in-a-lifetime opportunity to perform together, something Kelly had actually wished for out loud during his narration of the first That's Entertainment!

In it, Astaire parodies himself by dancing with a hatstand and appears to parody his rival and friend Gene Kelly by inserting a mock bodybuilding episode during which he kicks aside some Indian clubs in a reference to Kelly's routine with The Nicholas Brothers in The Pirate.

Until the last thirty seconds of this two and a half minute dance the pair appear to pull back from touching, then with a crook of her elbow Rogers invites Astaire in.

" Astaire maintained this policy from The Gay Divorcee ( 1934 ) onwards ( until overruled by Francis Ford Coppola, who directed Finian's Rainbow ( 1968 ), Astaire's last film musical ).

Her last big-screen appearance came in the spectacular disaster film The Towering Inferno ( 1974 ), in which she danced with Fred Astaire before a fire threatened partygoers in a new San Francisco skyscraper who were celebrating its official opening as tallest building in the world.

As the technological wonder of moving pictures grew in popularity in the 1920s, the Empire was acquired by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, who demolished the theatre in 1927 ( its last live theatre performance was Lady Be Good, starring Fred Astaire ) and rebuilt the Empire as a film theatre by architect Thomas Lamb, although it still had a large stage and often hosted ballet and dance performances.

Here the music switches again to a frantic, fast-paced, recapitulation of " Never Gonna Dance " as the pair dance a last, desperate, and virtuosic routine before Ginger flees and Astaire repeats his pose of dejection, in a final acceptance of the affair's end.

It was Fred Astaire's last Broadway show and featured the hit song " Night and Day " in which Astaire danced with co-star Claire Luce.

Pan continued to collaborate with Astaire right up until the latter's last musical picture, Finian's Rainbow ( 1968 ), which was a disaster on a number of fronts, not least for Pan himself.

( It was the last time 76-year-old Astaire danced on film.

Fred Astaire told the brothers that their dazzling footwork, leaps and splits in the Jumpin ’ Jive dance in Stormy Weather ( 1943 ) produced the greatest movie musical number he had ever seen.

It was a measure of his powers of persuasion that he managed to coax the 77-year-old Astaire – who had insisted that his contract rule out any dancing, having long since retired – into performing a series of song and dance duets, evoking a powerful nostalgia for the glory days of the American musical film.

" According to choreographer Hermes Pan, Astaire lost his temper and yelled at Rogers, who promptly burst into tears, whereupon her mother, Lela, " came charging at him like a mother rhinoceros protecting her young.

Astaire incorporates this into his routine, first startling him with a tap burst then escorting him ostentatiously to the telephone.

In the first part of the solo which follows, Astaire embarks on a circular tap movement, embellished with cane taps into which he mixes a series of unpredictable pauses.

The first backbends occur at the end of a sequence where Astaire sends Rogers into a spin, collects her upstage and maneuvers her into a linked-arm stroll forward, repeats the spin but this time encircles her while she turns and then takes her in his arms.

" The Piccolino ( reprise )": After the various parties confront each other in the bridal suite with Rogers ' marriage to Rhodes revealed as a fake, the scene is set for Astaire and Rogers to dance into the sunset, which they duly do, in this fragment of a much longer duet – the original was cut after the July 1935 previews – but not before they parade across the Venetian set and reprise the Piccolino step.

The career of the Astaire siblings resumed with mixed fortunes, though with increasing skill and polish, as they began to incorporate tap dancing into their routines.

Second, Astaire was adamant that all song and dance routines be seamlessly integrated into the plotlines of the film.

He made two pictures with Rita Hayworth, the daughter of his former vaudeville dance idols, the Cansinos: the first You'll Never Get Rich ( 1941 ) catapulted Hayworth to stardom and provided Astaire with his first opportunity to integrate Latin American dance idioms into his style, taking advantage of Hayworth's professional Latin dance pedigree.

Astaire continued to act into the 1970s, appearing on television as the father of Robert Wagner's character of Alexander Mundy in It Takes a Thief and in films such as The Towering Inferno ( 1974 ), in which he danced with Jennifer Jones and for which he received his only Academy Award nomination, in the category of Best Supporting Actor.

Astaire remained a male fashion icon even into his later years, eschewing his trademark top hat, white tie and tails ( for which he never really cared ) in favor of a breezy casual style of tailored sports jackets, colored shirts, cravats and slacks — the latter usually held up by the idiosyncratic use of an old tie in place of a belt.

It has had four major revivals ( 1955, 1960 and 1967, 2009 ), and was also made into a film starring Fred Astaire and Petula Clark, directed by Francis Ford Coppola, in 1968.

In 1939, the Castles ' life was turned into a movie, The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle, produced by RKO and starring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers.

Her previous dance training is also called into play, not only in the two dance numbers she performs with Astaire but also for a Bohemian-style solo dance in a nightclub, which has since often been replayed in retrospectives of her career.

Finian's Rainbow has had four major revivals ( 1955, 1960, 1967, and 2009 ), and was also made into a film starring Fred Astaire and Petula Clark, directed by Francis Ford Coppola, in 1968.

The play was made into a 1935 film by RKO starring Irene Dunne, Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, and Randolph Scott.

Astaire introduces two new elements into his approach to filmed song and dance, both of which represent the abandonment of theatrical staging conventions.

It was made into a musical film by RKO Radio Pictures in 1934, starring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers, and renamed The Gay Divorcee.

" That same night, Bubbles mentioned that Astaire had brought him into the rehearsal hall to work on " Bojangles of Harlem " and John's chops are right there in the number.

The picture was very successful at the box office, turning Hayworth into a major star, and provided a welcome boost to Astaire who felt his career had flagged since breaking with Ginger Rogers.

Dance director was Val Raset, the only time he collaborated with Astaire, and his choreographic input into the film is unclear.

What is not unusual is the selection of dance routines, which is the standard Astaire formula of a comic partnered routine, a romantic partnered routine and a " sock " solo, each of which is seamlessly integrated into the plot.