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Donald O’Connor, dancing up a storm — 20 Comments

  1. That performance by O’Connor makes clear just how underappreciated he was and remains. How many of today’s millennials could recognize and identify the name Donald O’Conner? How many of today’s stars could duplicate O’Connor’s performance? 40 years from now, how many will remember today’s stars?

    Fame, it is a fleeting thing. Especially in a society that worships youth.

  2. “Did he, like Lotte Lenya in “Goldfinger,” From Russia With Love have a knife hidden in his shoe?”

    A small thing, but fixed it for you.

  3. Bravissimo. More!

    …always loved watching the sure stylistic fluidity of his dance movements. It was always deeper than just the choreography with Donald (not too obscure for this crowd lol).

    You may enjoy watching this, too, for the “Donald History” component (it includes his tap teacher) Applied Mathematics (an early career, b/w clip).

  4. Rehearsals must have been expensive. Those props had to break just right, or not at all.

  5. Oh, he was awful. I couldn’t stand seeing him when I was a child. Too swish? Effeminate? Can those words still be used?

  6. miklos:

    I didn’t like him either. I thought he was wimpy. That’s why I started by saying I was never a big fan of his.

    But I think this dance sequence is very, very impressive. And the song suits him–it plays off his wimpiness.

    He has a tiny bit of a Danny Kaye vibe.

  7. This reminds me of radio legend Chuck Cecil who had a show called “The Swingin’ Years” interview Harry James who grew up with the carnival and who as soon as he could walk became an acrobat and contortionist but had to take up the trumpet because of some fall or accident. “…So there I was a ten year old out-of-work contortionist…”

  8. It always seemed to me that Donald O’Connor was a very acrobatic dancer. His circus background certainly explains it. Here he is in Make Em Laugh from Singin in the Rain, one of my favorite O’Connor performances. See if you can watch this without smiling:

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=SND3v0i9uhE

    Also, somewhat related, it looks like Ringling Bros. circus is shutting down after nearly 150 years. PETA partly to blame:

    http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_RINGLING_BROS_CLOSING?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2017-01-14-22-14-17

  9. The man could MOVE !

    (also BTW : if Rosa Kleb could use her feet like that, the whole Bond series would have ended after From Russia with Love).

  10. He has a tiny bit of a Danny Kaye vibe.

    neo: Indeed! I was surprised to see in the video above that O’Connor had brown hair. In my memory his hair is red. I’m sure that’s the Danny Kaye vibe.

    I even went back to the “Make’em Laugh” bit from “Singin’ in the Rain” and Donald O’Connor’s hair is still brown.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QTkKLWW_myw

  11. Funny, I always pictured him as a redhead also. He was given second banana roles. He definitely didn’t have the “leading man” chops.

  12. Comparing photos of Kaye and O’Connor now, I see they have similar fox-like faces — high foreheads, strong cheekbones, pointed chins and beak-like noses.

    Unless I put in some study time, I’m not sure I could reliably pick one from the other in a group of small b&w photos.

  13. In re “Make ‘Em Laugh” — I read somewhere once that the scene took three days to film, and Donald O’Connor was utterly, physically exhausted afterwards (i.e. bedridden for a couple of days).

    Then the film negatives were somehow damaged… and somebody had to go to Donald and ask him to do it all over again. So he swallowed hard and said “Sure”.

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