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TIME: Almanac of the 20th Century
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TIME, Almanac of the 20th Century.ISO
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1930
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30hat
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1994-02-27
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<text>
<title>
(1930s) Top Hat
</title>
<history>
TIME--The Weekly Newsmagazine--1930s Highlights
Movies
</history>
<article>
<source>Time Magazine</source>
<hdr>
Top Hat
</hdr>
<body>
<p>(September 9, 1935)
</p>
<p> In Top Hat, Dancer Fred Astaire obligingly continues to offer
cinema-addicts an inventory of the proficiencies which made him
a stage star for ten years before civilized dancing reached the
cinema. The picture contains a dance on a sanded rug, designed
as a lullaby for the lady (Ginger Rogers) who lives on the floor
below and who has gone upstairs to complain about the tap-dance
that preceded it; an elaborate routine with male chorus, copied
from one Astaire did in Smiles in 1930; a pretentious "Picolino,"
which may or may not turn out to be the "Continental" of 1935-36.
Possibly more ingratiating than any of these is an informal scene
reminiscent of their best, in Roberta, showing Rogers & Astaire
caught in a thunderstorm, arguing with each other by dancing.
</p>
<p> The music which accompanies these exercises, all by Irving
Berlin, contain such likely hits as Top Hat, White Tie and
Tails; Cheek to Cheek and Isn't This a Lovely Day. The story
shows Astaire as the U.S. star of a London revue trying hard to
further a romance which begins when he keeps Miss Rogers awake
and which is impeded only by her stubborn and illogical belief
that he is her best friend's husband. Otherwise pleasantly
negligible, the narrative has at least the merit of giving a
cast of skilled comedians (Edward Everett Horton, Helen
Broderick, Erik Rhodes and Eric Blore) a chance to be amusing
when Astaire & Rogers are out of breath.</p>
</body>
</article>
</text>