Sonja Henie

EARLY LIFE

Sonja Henie was born in Kristiania, current Oslo, the only daughter of Wilhelm Henie , a prosperous Norwegian furrier, and his wife Selma Lochmann-Nielsen..

Wilhelm Henie had been a one-time World Cycling Champion and the Henie children were encouraged to take up a variety of sports at a young age. Sonja  initially showed talent at skiing, and then followed her older brother Leif to take up figure skating. Her father hired the best experts in the world, including the famous Russian ballerina Tamara Karsavina, to transform his daughter into a sporting celebrity.

COMPETITIVE CAREER 

Henie won her first major competition, the senior Norwegian championships, at the age of 10. She then placed eighth in a field of eight at the 1924 Winter Olympics, at the age of eleven.

She won the first of an unprecedented ten consecutive World Figure Skating Championships in 1927 at the age of fourteen.

Henie went on to win first of her three Olympic gold medals in 1928.  The "Norwegian doll" defended her Olympic titles in 1932 and in 1936. Her unprecedented three Olympic gold medals haven't been matched by any ladies' single skater since.

Sonja Henie at the 1936 Olympics

Sonja Henie was the first to introduce the mini-skirt. She did this in 1924 for professional reasons. In the beginning people were shocked, but soon other skaters copied her, realizing the freedom of movement the abbreviated skirt gave.

She is credited with introducing music and dance-based movements into free-skating and thus greatly broadening the public for what had been a previously technical event.  Henie's innovative skating techniques and glamorous demeanor transformed the sport permanently and confirmed its acceptance as a legitimate sport in the Winter Olympics.

PROFESSIONAL CAREER 

After the 1936 World Figure Skating Championships, Henie gave up her amateur status and took up a career as a professional performer in acting and live shows. Her supreme art on the ice captured the public's imagination and drew enormous crowds. "To skate like Sonja Henie" became a world-wide endeavor.

Following a successful ice show in Los Angeles orchestrated by her father to launch her film career, Hollywood studio chief Darryl Zanuck signed Henie to a long term contract at Twentieth Century Fox, which made her one of the highest-paid actresses of the time. After the success of her first film, One in a Million, Henie's position was assured

At the height of her fame, Heine's shows and touring activities brought her as much as $2 million per year. She also had numerous lucrative endorsement contracts, and deals to market skates, clothing, jewelry, dolls, and other merchandise branded with her name. These activities made her one of the wealthiest women in the world in her time.

Sonja Henie CINEGRAF magazine Wikipedia

Sonja Henie died of leukemia at the age of 57 on October 12, 1969 during a flight from Paris to Oslo. She is buried with Onstad in Oslo on the hilltop overlooking the Henie-Onstad Art Centre.

Sources Wikipedia, Europress Family Encyclopedia 1999. 

Rita Hayworth

Rita Hayworth was born Margarita Cansino on October 17, 1918 in Brooklyn, New York, the oldest child of two dancers. Her father, Eduardo Cansino, Sr., was from Castilleja de la Cuesta, a little town near Seville, Spain. Her mother, Volga Hayworth, was an American of Irish-English descent who had performed with the Ziegfeld Follies.

In 1927, Eduardo Cansino, Sr. took the family to Hollywood, where he established his own dance studio,. He taught dance there such stars as James Cagney and Jean Harlow.

In 1931, the 12-year-old Margarita Cansino partnered with her father for an act called the Dancing Cansinos.

Photograph of Margarita Cansino age 12 The American Magazine

The satin nightgown with lace bodice which Rita Hayworth wore in 1941 on the cover of Life magazine, made her a forces favourite. It was sold in 2002 for $27,000.

Fred Astaire, who starred with Hayworth in You’ll Never Get Rich, said she was his favorite dance partner

Iconic photograph of Rita Hayworth for Life (August 11, 1941)

Rita Hayworth flew into a rage when she learned that a photo of her had been glued onto the atomic bomb that was dropped on Bikini Atoll doing a test in 1946.

Hayworth packed a real punch: she knocked out two of co-star Glenn Ford's teeth during a fight scene in the film noir Gilda.

Hayworth married Orson Welles on September 7, 1943, during the run of The Mercury Wonder Show. They struggled in their marriage. Hayworth said that Welles did not want to be tied down and on November 10, 1947, she was granted a divorce that became final the following year.

In 1948, Rita Hayworth left her movie career to marry Prince Aly Khan. Prince Aly Khan was the son of Sultan Mahommed Shah, Aga Khan III, the leader of the Ismaili Muslims. Rita Hayworth and Prince Aly Khan got married on May 27, 1949, in Cannes, France. 

Their wedding was an extravagant affair, with the swimming pool at the chateau where they were staying perfumed with eau de Cologne and decorated with flowers. The event garnered significant media attention due to the high-profile status of both Hayworth and Prince Aly Khan. However, their marriage ultimately ended in divorce in 1953.

Rita Hayworth's song and dance performance in Gilda helped demonstrate the stability of the newly invented strapless dress.

Her famous red hair was not her natural color (which was black). When Rita Hayworth was signed, studio heads decided that her hairline was too low on her forehead, and she underwent years of painful electrolysis to make it higher.

Original publicity portrait of Rita Hayworth from the film Down to Earth (1947)

The popular tequila-based cocktail called the Margarita was named after Hayworth. (The film star's real name was Margarita Carmen Cansino.)

Rita Hayworth began showing signs of Alzheimer's during her 40s. Even as it worsened, people blamed her behaviour on her heavy drinking. She never got a proper diagnosis until 1979 and upon her death in 1987 at just 68, she would become a major public face for Alzheimer's Awareness.

Rita Hayworth died at her home from complications associated with Alzheimer's on May 14, 1987, at the age of 68.

Dancer

Among the most beloved dancers in Europe during the first half of the 18th century was Marie Anne de Dupis, called Camargo, who was brilliant technically and daring; she is credited with shortening her skirt a few inches to allow audience members to better see and appreciate her intricate footwork. Marie Salle was also a great favorite and brought a new freedom to the dance through her expressive use of costume and masterful use of gestures.

Although theatrical dancing was occasionally imported from Europe to entertain the citizens of the colonies, no native-born dancer of note emerged in America until the late 18th century. The best known of these early American artists was John Durang, who made his debut in Philadelphia in 1785 and went on to found America's first dynasty of dancers.

Vernon (1887-1918) and Irene Castle (1893-1969) were a husband-and-wife team of ballroom dancers of the early 20th century. They were famous for developing and promoting dancing in the period of the First World War.

The Castles' greatest success was on Broadway, in Irving Berlin's debut musical Watch Your Step (1914). In this extravaganza, the couple refined and popularized the Foxtrot, which vaudeville comedian Harry Fox invented.

The Castles helped remove the stigma of vulgarity from close dancing. The Castles’ performances, often set to ragtime and jazz rhythms, also popularized African-American music among well-heeled whites.

The Bluebell Girls are a troupe of high-kicking girls in the Folies-Bergère tradition, established in the 1930s by an Anglo-Irish dancer, Margaret Kelly, who was herself known as Miss Bluebell (apparently from the color of her eyes). They began at the Folies-Bergère and still perform mainly in Paris, though many of the girls are British.

Gregory Hines was a highly acclaimed American tap dancer, actor, and choreographer, born on February 14, 1946, in New York City. He started his career in entertainment at a young age. Alongside his brother Maurice, he performed as a tap dancing duo called "The Hines Kids." As he grew older, Hines became known for his solo performances, showcasing his exceptional skill, rhythm, and innovative approach to tap dance.

In addition to his success as a tap dancer, Gregory Hines also made a name for himself in the worlds of film and television. He appeared in a variety of movies, including The Cotton Club (1984), White Nights (1985), and Tap (1989), where he co-starred with fellow tap dancer Sammy Davis Jr. Hines earned critical acclaim for his performances, demonstrating not only his dancing prowess but also his acting abilities.

British dancer Benedict Devlin holds the record for the most heel clicks in 30 seconds in the traditional Irish dance style. He performed 191 on the set of Guinness World Records, in London, UK, on April 23, 2009. He was able to perform up to four clicks with his heels while both feet were midair.

Nepalese dance artiste, Bandana Nepal set a world record by dancing continuously for 126 hours in Kathmandu, Nepal. She started her effort on November 23, 2018 and reached the milestone over five days later on November 28.

Her record was broken by a 16-year-old Indian girl, Vatsala Akka, who danced non-stop  for 127 hours at Dayanand College, Latur, India from May 29 to June 3, 2023.

Nevada state in the USA has the most out of work dancers.

Sources Compton's Interactive Encyclopedia © 1998 The Learning Company, Inc, Wikipedia

Ballet Dancer

Italian dancer and choreographer Carlo Blasis (1797 – 1878) is regarded as the founder of classical ballet, since he defined the standard conventional steps and accompanying gestures. He is well known for his very rigorous dance classes, sometimes lasting four hours long.

Austrian dancer Fanny Elssler (1810-1884) was the first ballet celebrity to be embraced by American audiences. With a glorious European career behind her,  Elssler made her New York City debut in 1840 and for the next two years toured the United States. So popular was she that when she visited Washington, D.C., she was feted by the entire United States Congress. Elssler's visit stimulated a keen interest in classical dance.

After gas lighting became popular in 19th-century theaters, scores of ballet dancers died after their tutus caught on fire.

Vaslav Nijinsky (March 12, 1889 – April 8, 1950). was a Russian ballet dancer and choreographer of Polish descent who was regarded as the greatest male dancer of the 20th century.  He could dance en pointe, a rare skill among male dancers at the time and was admired for his seemingly gravity-defying leaps. Nijinsky's last public performance was in 1917 and he spent the final three decades of his life in and out of psychiatric hospitals before dying in London. 

 Vaslav Nijinsky costumed as the God Vayou in the ballet Le Talisman.

Legendary Russian ballet dancer Rudolf Nureyev (March 17, 1938 – January 6, 1993) was a star of the Kirov Ballet in the Soviet Union before defecting to the West while on tour in Paris in 1961. He then became the most prominent ballet dancer in the world before dying of Aids, aged 54.

Nureyev in his dressing room c. 1974, By Allan Aarren - Wikipedia Commons

Dame Margot Fonteyn (May 18, 1919 – February 21, 1991), was born on May 18, 1919, in Reigate, Surrey, England. Fonteyn had a natural talent for ballet and began dancing at a young age. She joined the Vic-Wells Ballet School in 1933 and made her professional debut with the Royal Ballet (formerly the Sadler's Wells Theatre Company) in 1934. She quickly rose through the ranks and was promoted to principal dancer in 1938.

Fonteyn was a versatile dancer and excelled in a wide range of roles. She was particularly known for her interpretations of classical ballets such as Swan Lake, Giselle, and The Sleeping Beauty. She also starred in many modern ballets, including Frederick Ashton's Façade and The Two Pigeons.

Fonteyn was the Royal Ballet's prima ballerina for 45 years, before retiring to become a cattle rancher in Panama. At one time, Dame Fonteyn was considering retirement when Rudolf Nureyev defected. At first she was reluctant to partner him because of their 19-year old age gap but they became an iconic partnership. It helped pay for looking after her Panamanian politician husband, Roberto Arias, who was shot in an argument in the street and became a quadriplegic.

The late rapper Tupac Shakur was a ballet dancer in high school and ended up portraying the Mouse King in a production of The Nutcracker. Later, he was a member of the 127th street ensemble, which is a Harlem based theater company.

Mick Jagger is a skilled ballet dancer, and still does ballet as part of his daily work outs. 

The world's tallest ballet dancer is Frenchman Fabrice Calmels who stands at 199.73cm (6 ft 6.63 in) .

Professional ballerinas use about twelve pairs of toe shoes per week.

Source Compton's Interactive Encyclopedia © 1998 The Learning Company, Inc

Josephine Baker

Josephine Baker was born Freda Josephine Macdonald in St. Louis, Missouri, on June 3, 1906. She was nicknamed "Trumpy" as a child.

Baker dropped out of school at the age of 12 and lived as a street child in the slums of St. Louis; by the age of fifteen she was playing vaudeville.

She danced in the 1921 black revue Shuffle Along and at the Cotton Club in Harlem, New York City.  

Josephine Baker settled in Paris in 1925. That same year she first performed her famous banana dance at the Folies Bergere. Baker quickly became a favorite of the French, and her fame grew.

Josephine Baker dancing the Charleston, 1926

The first black superstar, Baker was the first African American female to star in a major motion picture, and to integrate an American concert hall.

Josephine Baker once had a rejected (and dejected) suitor kill himself at her feet. 

Pablo Picasso said of her: "Tall, coffee skin, ebony eyes, legs of paradise, a smile to end all smiles."

Georges Simenon, the Belgian author and inventor of Inspector "Maigret," had a short relationship with Josephine Baker in 1925. He couldn't stand it however that she was more in the spotlight then him, and called himself "Mr. Josephine".

Baker had 12 children through adoption. She bore only one child herself, stillborn in 1941, an incident which precipitated an emergency hysterectomy.

Baker’s affection for France was so great that when World War II broke out, she volunteered to spy for her adopted country. She assisted the French Resistance during the war, and became the first American-born woman to receive the French military honor, the Croix de guerre.

After retiring in 1956, Baker supported the orphanage she had established. 

Baker was noted for her contributions to the Civil Rights Movement in the United States (she was offered the unofficial leadership of the movement by Coretta Scott King in 1968 following Martin Luther King, Jr.'s assassination, but turned it down).

Baker had a veritable menagerie of animals at her Paris home including a snake (which she wore like a necklace) and a cheetah named Chiquita, which accompanied Josephine on walks down the Champs-Elysees, on a lead with a diamond-studded collar.

Among her nicknames were Bronze Venus", the "Black Pearl", and the "Créole Goddess."

Josephine Baker in Havana, Cuba, 1950

Josephine Baker died in Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital, aged 68, on April 12, 1975 after suffering a cerebral hemorrhage. She received a full Roman Catholic funeral which was held at L'Église de la Madeleine and was the only American-born woman to receive full French military honors at her funeral, After a family service at Saint-Charles Church in Monte Carlo, Baker was interred at Monaco's Cimetière de Monaco.

On August 23, 2021, it was announced that in November 2021 Baker would be interred in the Panthéon in Paris, the first black woman to receive one of the highest honors in France.

Here are two songs about Josephine Baker:

Josephine Baker by Al Stewart

Josephine Baker by Sailor

Source Wikipedia

Fred Astaire

Fred Astaire was born in Omaha, Nebraska on May 10, 1899. Fred began dancing at the age of four.

Fred formed a child act with his sister, Adele, that became popular at the time. Their first act was called "Juvenile Artists Presenting an Electric Musical Toe-Dancing Novelty."  Adele eventually married, leaving Astaire to begin his solo career.

He had very large hands, which Astaire disguised by curling his middle two fingers while dancing.

Fred and Adele Astaire in 1921

"Can't sing. Can't act. Slightly balding. Can dance a little." Fittingly, the studio toad who wrote that screen-test evaluation of a young Fred Astaire is long forgotten, but the greatest dancer in movie history is not.

Astaire famously wore a necktie around his waist instead of a belt, an affectation he picked up from his friendship with actor Douglas Fairbanks but often mistakenly attributed to Astaire alone.

He always wore a toupee unless he was wearing a hat, which is why he so often wore hats in his films.

Astaire was 5 foot 7 and wore 2-inch heels to heighten him to 5 foot 9. 

Studio publicity portrait for film You'll Never Get Rich (1941).

Fred Astaire had his first big screen dance with Ginger Rogers on December 22, 1933 when Flying Down to Rio opened. The pair made nine films together at RKO, including Roberta (1935), in which Astaire also demonstrates his oft-overlooked piano skills with a spirited solo on "I Won't Dance".

Fred Astaire's 1935 song "Cheek To Cheek" spent 11 weeks at #1 in the US, a record for the 1930s.

For the 'drunk' dance in Holiday Inn in 1942, Fred Astaire had two drinks of bourbon before the first take and one before each succeeding take. The seventh and last take was used in the film. He really was drunk!

Fred Astaire's legs were insured for one million dollars.

After a temporary retirement in 1945-7, during which he opened Fred Astaire Dance Studios, Astaire returned to Hollywood to star in more musicals including Easter Parade (1948), The Band Wagon (1953) and Funny Face (1957). 

Astaire was a lifelong golf and Thoroughbred horse racing enthusiast. In 1946 his horse Triplicate won the prestigious Hollywood Gold Cup and San Juan Capistrano Handicap.

He married New York socialite Phyllis Potter in 1933. Phyllis's death from lung cancer, at the age of 46, ended twenty-one years of marriage and left Astaire devastated.

His second wife, jockey Robyn Smith, was forty-five years his junior. He first saw Robyn Smith when she was riding in a horse race. Astaire was 81 when they married on June 24, 1980.

Smith was a successful jockey in her own right, and she was the first woman to win a stakes race in the United States. She retired from racing in 1975, and she and Astaire lived together in Beverly Hills until his death.

After Astaire's death, Smith became a fierce protector of his legacy. She filed numerous lawsuits to prevent any unauthorized uses of his likeness or name. She also wrote a book about their marriage, titled "Fred Astaire: A Remembrance."

Astaire took up skateboarding in his late seventies and at age seventy-eight, he broke his left wrist while riding his grandson's skateboard. He remained physically active well into his eighties.

Fred Astaire died from pneumonia on June 22, 1987, at the age of 88. He is interred at Oakwood Memorial Park, Chatsworth, California, the same cemetery where long-time dancing partner, Ginger Rogers, is located.

After Astaire's death, Robyn Smith became a fierce protector of his legacy. She filed numerous lawsuits to prevent any unauthorized uses of his likeness or name. She also wrote a book about their marriage, titled Fred Astaire: A Remembrance.

There has never been a movie about Fred Astaire and there never will be. Astaire's will included a clause requesting that no such portrayal ever take place.

Source About.com