The Academy Award-winning film, “The Artist,” closes with a hokey and just dreadfully performed dance number suggesting a resolution of the film’s conflict — the “artist” (I would also quibble with this label) has lost his career due to the onset of sound. So he reinvents as a dancer. The end.
An out-of-shape, lazy-bum drunkard of a character whom we watch deteriorate over an hour of film time just decides to dance. Because, as “So You Think You Can Dance,” instructs us, even in its title, just about anyone can be a dancer.
May I offer an alternative? The sequence below, choreographed by the great Jack Cole — he dances in it as well — closes Twentieth Century Fox’s “On the Riviera” (1951). Every element of “Happy Ending” rings true. Not a single step is wrong or jarring; on the contrary, all is balanced and golden and smart and right. It’s pure evidence of Cole’s magical ability to organize bodies in space, his stellar chains of movement invention, and his skill at highlighting a soloist with supporting dancers.
“Happy Ending” is a “how to” primer in choreography, dear dance makers. So study it well.
Significant here — with apologies for the muddying down of “On the Riviera””s spectacular Fox technicolor palette:
- Jack Cole dances. His magnificent spreading port-de-bras graces the number’s final frames. He had a huge wing span.
- Gwen Verdon beyond perfection at the center of the three women and then comes her masterful solo on the platform. Nothing Bob Fosse ever put on Gwen Verdon, in my humble opinion, compares to what Jack Cole did for her habitually. In my book Fosse scores in far second-place behind Jack Cole.
- In the foreground, and partnering Gwen, the wonderful George Martin, who died not one year ago, and whom we met at Jacob’s Pillow in the summer of 2010 along with his wife Ethel, also a killer Jack Cole dancer. These people practiced an art form that is now lost.
- Don’t get me started on those great costumes. The hats!
Like this? Read more:
- Jack Cole rocks Rita Hayworth’s world
- Ow! Betty Grable sizzles in Jack Cole choreography
- Mitzi Gaynor fabulous in Jack Cole’s “I Don’t Care”
- Jane Russell remembers gentleman Jack Cole
- Marilyn dances
