One of my favorite rants
Anne Richards died yesterday, and I am sorry. Any woman who gives that much grief to the Bushes is a hero to me. However, she is also at least the attributed author of one of the quotes that drives me up the wall.
Come on, you know it, let’s say it together:
“Ginger Rogers did everything Fred Astaire did–but she did it backwards and in high heels!”
Yeah, that one. T-shirts, bumper stickers, you name it, it’s the clarion call for many a young feminist.
Only one problem. It ain’t true.
As anyone who has ever actually done a partner dance will tell you (even, perhaps, the recently ousted Tucker Carlson), one person leads, the other follows. You don’t have two leaders; that’s called wrestling. You don’t have two followers; that’s called watching TV.
It’s not dictatorial by any means. As my tango teacher explained to my wife and me, “The leader makes a suggestion. The follower then makes a choice to go along with it.” But they are separate skills. Good leaders do not necessarily make good followers–and vice versa.
Nor do good dancers make good choreographers. In most of the movies (and it’s so clear, I gotta wonder if the Honorable Ms. Richards ever watched one) there are dance numbers where they dance together for a while, then Fred Astaire does some of his magic in a solo, then they dance together again. Rarely did Ginger do a solo; in fact, she was one of the least talented dancers who ever performed with Fred.
But that didn’t matter. It was said that the reason we remember the pair is because she was one of the few actresses who “remembered that the acting didn’t stop when the dancing began.” Technique? Not that great. Presence, charm, grace? Outstanding, unbelievable, stellar, the woman was a STAR.
Fred Astaire and Hermes Pan, who choreographed most of the numbers, acknowledged her input–but it was never suggested she was a choreographer. And would anyone suggest, since they sang duets, that she “sang every note that he did, but backwards and in high heels!”
No. The problem I have with that slogan is that it actually demeans what she did accomplish, on her own. Why compare her to something that was totally different (Fred) when she is an incredible woman on her own?
I know, I know. It made a good sound bite. But I prefer the truth, that people rest on their own accomplishments and skills without having to compare them to others. Like Anne Richards, who did everything that…eh, never mind.
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