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An aspirant (Fred Astaire) travels to New York City to become a successful dancer to prove himself to his fiance (Betty Furness), but ends up falling in love with his dancing partner (Ginger Rogers)
- Plot
- Cast
- Production
- Musical Numbers
- Reception
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John "Lucky" Garnett is a gambler and dancer who is ready to marry Margaret Watson. Not wanting him to retire, the other members of his dance act deliberately sabotage the event. "Pop" Cardetti takes Lucky's trousers to be altered by sewing cuffs, while the others begin a crap game. After the tailor refuses to modify the pants, Pop returns with the...
Initially, the working titles for the film were I Won't Dance and Never Gonna Dance, but studio executives worried that no one would come see a musical in which no one danced, so the title was changed. Pick Yourself Upwas also considered as a title, as were 15 other possibilities. Erwin Gelsey's original screen story was purchased by RKO and, in No...
"Pick Yourself Up": The first of Jerome Kern and Dorothy Fields's standards is a polka sung and danced by Astaire and Rogers. It is also a technical tour-de-force, with the basic polka embellished..."The Way You Look Tonight": Kern and Fields's Oscar-winning foxtrot is sung by Astaire, seated at a piano, while Ginger is busy washing her hair in a side room. Astaire conveys a sunny yet nostalgi..."Waltz in Swing Time": Described by one critic as "the finest piece of pure dance music ever written for Astaire", this is the most virtuosic partnered romantic duet Astaire ever committed to film...."A Fine Romance": Kern and Fields's third standard, a quickstep to Fields's bittersweet lyrics, is sung alternately by Rogers and Astaire, with Rogers providing an object lesson in acting while a b...Box office
According to RKO records, the film made $1,624,000 in the U.S. and Canada, and $994,000 elsewhere, resulting in a profit of $830,000. It was the 15th most popular film at the British box office in 1935–1936.
Critical response
On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 97%, based on 29 reviews, with an average rating of 8.58/10. The site's critical consensus reads: "Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire are brilliant in Swing Time, one of the duo's most charming and wonderfully choreographed films." On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 91 out of 100, based on 16 critics, indicating "universal acclaim". 1. American Dancer, November 1936: "Astaire's dancing can...
Awards and honors
At the 1937 Academy Awards, Jerome Kern and Dorothy Fields won the award for Best Music, Original Song, and Hermes Pan was nominated but did not win for his choreography for "Bojangles of Harlem". In 1999, Entertainment Weekly named Swing Time as one of the top 100 films, and in 2004, the film was included in the United States National Film Registry for being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". In 2007, the American Film Institute ranked Swing Time at No. 90 on their 10t...
A Broadway musical based on the film, Never Gonna Dance, used much of Kern and Fields's original score. The show, which had a book by Jeffrey Hatcher, began performances on October 27, 2003, running for 44 previews and 84 performances. It opened on December 4, 2003, and closed on February 15, 2004. It was directed by Michael Greif and choreographed...
The film lends its title to Zadie Smith's 2016 novel Swing Time, in which it is a recurring plot device.
Region 1 In 2005, a digitally restored version of Swing Time was released, available both separately (in Region 1) and as part of The Astaire & Rogers Collection, Vol.1 from Warner Home Video. These releases feature a commentary by John Mueller, author of Astaire Dancing – The Musical Films. On June 11, 2019, The Criterion Collection released the m...
Bibliography 1. Croce, Arlene (1972). The Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers Book. London: W.H. Allen. ISBN 0-491-00159-2. 2. Green, Stanley (1999) Hollywood Musicals Year by Year (2nd ed.), pub. Hal Leonard Corporation ISBN 0-634-00765-3pages 60–61 3. Mueller, John (1986). Astaire Dancing – The Musical Films. London: Hamish Hamilton. ISBN 0-241-11749-...
Swing Time at the American Film Institute CatalogSwing Time at IMDbSwing Time at AllMovieSwing Time at the TCM Movie DatabaseJan 18, 2024 · Fred Astaire & Ginger Rogers - Swing Time
Swing Time: Directed by George Stevens. With Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, Victor Moore, Helen Broderick. Roguish gambler/dancer "Lucky" Garnett is challenged by his fiance's father to come up with $25,000 to prove he's worthy of her hand.
- (15K)
- Comedy, Musical, Romance
- George Stevens
- 1936-10-12
In this irresistible musical, the legendary dancing duo Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers are at the pinnacle of their art as a feckless gambler and the shrewd dancing instructor in whom he more than meets his match.
Feb 15, 1998 · The best of the Astaire-Rogers films is their fifth, “Swing Time” (1936), directed by George Stevens at a time when he was a king at RKO Radio Pictures (his other credits in that period included “Alice Adams” and “Gunga Din”). The plot, with its sly drolleries, is based like “Top Hat” on mistaken identities, but it's wittier and ...
