Sunday, 11 February 2018

75 Years Ago, One of the Best Dance Routines Ever Was Filmed, Unrehearsed on the First Take

quote [ Fred Astaire said it was ‘the greatest dancing he had ever seen on film’. In a dance performance for the ages, the Nicholas Brothers, Fayard (1914–2006) and Harold (1921–2000), dazzled audiences with their acrobatic routine to Cab Calloway’s hit song, Jumpin’ Jive. ]

Tagged as “uplifting”.

[SFW] [music] [+10 Classy Pr0n]
[by Paracetamol@8:23pmGMT]

Comments

backSLIDER said @ 8:35pm GMT on 11th Feb [Score:1 Funsightful]
I mean that is ok but have you seen Gangnam Style?
EvilNinjaX24 said @ 8:36pm GMT on 11th Feb
Saw this for the first time sometime last year, I believe. It's simply stunning, but that's what the Nicholas Brothers did.
midden said @ 8:53pm GMT on 11th Feb
"Filmed unrehearsed on the first take." I don't believe it. The fact that the camera work fits so well with the dance moves alone tells you that there was an awful lot of planning and rehearsal that went into it. At the very least, the entire sequence was carefully blocked out and rehearsed with the Fayards, the DP, camera man, and crane operator. While the Fayards might be able to perform seamlessly and spontaneously together after decades of being partners, there's no way in Hell that even the most skilled camera man and crane operator could have followed that on the first try. There are eleven cuts in that dance sequence, and it's extremely unlikely that it was a multi-camera shoot. It probably took at least full day on set.

That's not to say it isn't a freaking awesome routine.
Hugh E. said[1] @ 9:34pm GMT on 11th Feb [Score:2 Informative]
While "unrehearsed" certainly needs clarification in this story and is surely a bit of exaggeration, it is not unusual to do blocking without the principals. And I'm not sure why you think "it's extremely unlikely that it was a multi-camera shoot." Multi-cam filming was common even back then.

Also, Fayard is just one of the Nicholas brothers.
4321 said @ 11:49pm GMT on 11th Feb

"There are eleven cuts in that dance sequence, and it's extremely unlikely that it was a multi-camera shoot."

If you have a cut there is, by definition, more than one camera or more than one take. With a single camera and a single take, there's nothing to cut to.

This is a multi-camera shoot. The action is sufficiently chaotic and organic that cutting between different takes would be easily detected in the final edit. It's not. Even the position of the dancer's tails, moving in mid-air, has continuity across/between camera angles. The bulk of the action has the continuity of a single take (maybe not the first take) shot with at least two cameras.

And it is, as you say, a freaking awesome routine.
damnit said[1] @ 4:22pm GMT on 12th Feb
If you really think this was rehearsed, they probably would have been a little more orderly in their performance.

The Nicholas Brothers knew the setup and blocking for the shot (how they’d end it and where to go.) They knew what dance routine segment to incorporate for the performance. It’s unrehearsed in that they were essentially feeding off each other’s performance, free styling. That lives on today with pop locking dance competition.
foobar said @ 9:42pm GMT on 11th Feb
captainstubing said @ 10:37am GMT on 12th Feb
Hell yeah!

(I would be put out if someone stood on my tablecloth at a restaurant, no matter how good the dancing was. Obviously I'm excluding pole dancers who look like Selma Hayek.)
HoZay said @ 4:28pm GMT on 12th Feb
Obviously.
Hugh E. said @ 5:20pm GMT on 12th Feb
So you'll be having the shrimp, sir?
Space_1889 said @ 7:09am GMT on 13th Feb
After watching this video, I spent more than an hour viewing other clips of the pair on YouTube. So worth it!

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