From Fred Astaire to Hugh Grant, five of cinema’s greatest dance scenes
Cheek to Cheek from Top Hat (1935)
Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers achieved immortality for blissful minutes here. The gliding finale of their romantic duet, as they cross a footbridge into an empty ballroom, has an angelic gracefulness, even though the level of difficulty was off the charts. Irving Berlin had written his longest song for it, and was awestruck by the ability of Astaire’s voice to climb ever higher.
The arching backbends for Rogers perfectly illustrate her character’s surrender to the story of her relentless wooing by Astaire. She chose her own dress – an ostrich feather gown – which caused nightmares as it shed through every twist and twirl. “It was like a chicken attacked by a coyote,” Astaire later recalled.
The Nicholas Brothers in Stormy Weather (1943)
Astaire’s own favourite dancers were Fayard and Harold Nicholas, African-American brothers born into the Philadelphia vaudeville scene, who became one of the mid 20th century’s most beloved double acts. Their astonishing charisma and athleticism saw them featured in a dozen Hollywood films – alas, never in leading roles.
In the black performance showcase Stormy Weather, they blew the roof off, in what Astaire called the greatest dance sequence in cinema. They tap, hoof and cavort with the most elastic legs you’ve ever seen, bounce across the set, and project pure elation.
The Broadway Melody ballet from Singin’ in the Rain (1952)
The budget for this rapt climax went up tenfold after An American in Paris, with its own lavishly stylised dream ballet, swept the Oscars in mid-production. It’s designed to encapsulate the whole story of the film, with secret weapon Cyd Charisse coming on twice for extended dances. First she’s an emerald vamp who leads Gene Kelly astray, then a demure angel in a long, white, updrafted veil, a stand-in for Debbie Reynolds as his true love.
For many audiences, their introduction to Charisse was the camera tracking all the way up her crossed legs from the straw hat on one foot. A whole seven seconds of her first routine got snipped by the censors as simply too raunchy.
The dance in the gym from West Side Story (1961)
“Mambo!” shout Jets and Sharks, punching the rhythms as they assemble for a scene of peacocking showmanship – exactly the kind of ensemble spectacle In the Heights revives with such verve. Before we know it, battle lines are being drawn up, with Leonard Bernstein’s score, at its most propulsively jazzy and trumpet-heavy, as a call to arms.
All the major cast members take their turn – it’s during this number that Maria and Tony fatefully spot each other, and have to be taken aside with a warning. If the blood-red walls of the set didn’t make it obvious, this is dance as a simmering prelude to violence, setting all the story’s conflicts in motion.
The end of Paddington 2 (2018)
What a supremely silly gift this was – a payoff for Hugh Grant’s vain thespian villain, Phoenix Buchanan, which sent happy families chortling into the foyer. The song is a bit of nonsense about rain on the roof which could hardly be less consequential.
It’s those pink striped prison outfits that joyfully pay off, along with Grant’s unrestrained mirth as he hogs the spotlight, twinkle-toeing his way down the Wormwood Scrubs staircase. There’s something so thoroughly unnecessary about it, which is exactly why this full-blown musical number – all lags twirling umbrellas, and lifting Grant like he’s Jane Russell – is such a fillip to its film.
