Gene Kelly

Eugene Curran Kelly (August 23, 1912 – February 2, 1996) was an American dancer, actor, singer, director and choreographer. He was known for his energetic and athletic dancing style and sought to create a new form of American dance accessible to the general public, which he called "dance for the common man". He starred in, choreographed, and, with Stanley Donen, co-directed some of the most well-regarded musical films of the 1940s and 1950s.

Kelly is known for his performances in '' An American in Paris'' (1951), which won the Academy Award for Best Picture, '' Singin' in the Rain'' (1952), which he and Donen directed and choreographed, and other musical films of that era such as '' Cover Girl'' (1944) and '' Anchors Aweigh'' (1945), for which he was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor. '' On the Town'' (1949), which he co-directed with Donen, was his directorial debut. Later in the 1950s, as musicals waned in popularity, he starred in '' Brigadoon'' (1954) and ''It's Always Fair Weather'' (1955), the last film he directed with Donen. His solo directorial debut was '' Invitation to the Dance'' (1956), one of the last MGM musicals, which was a commercial failure.

Kelly made his film debut in '' For Me and My Gal'' (1942) with Judy Garland, with whom he also appeared in '' The Pirate'' (1948) and '' Summer Stock'' (1950). He also appeared in the dramas '' Black Hand'' (1950) and '' Inherit the Wind'' (1960), for which he received critical praise.

He continued as a director in the 1960s, with his credits including '' A Guide for the Married Man'' (1967) and '' Hello, Dolly!'' (1969), which received an Oscar nomination for Best Picture. He co-hosted and appeared in '' Ziegfeld Follies'' (1946), ''That's Entertainment!'' (1974), ''That's Entertainment, Part II'' (1976), ''That's Dancing!'' (1985), and '' That's Entertainment, Part III'' (1994).

His innovations transformed the Hollywood musical, and he is credited with almost single-handedly making the ballet form commercially acceptable to film audiences. According to dance and art historian Beth Genné, working with his co-director Donen in ''Singin' in the Rain'' and in films with director Vincente Minnelli, "Kelly ... fundamentally affected the way movies are made and the way we look at them. And he did it with a dancer's eye and from a dancer's perspective." Kelly received an Academy Honorary Award in 1952 for his career achievements; the same year, ''An American in Paris'' won six Academy Awards, including Best Picture. He later received lifetime achievement awards in the Kennedy Center Honors (1982) and from the Screen Actors Guild and American Film Institute. In 1999, the American Film Institute also ranked him as the 15th greatest male screen legend of Classic Hollywood Cinema.

Early life

Kelly was born in the East Liberty neighborhood of Pittsburgh. He was middle of 5 children of James Patrick Joseph Kelly, a phonograph salesman, and his wife, Harriet Catherine Curran. His father was born in Peterborough, Ontario, Canada, to an Irish Canadian family. His maternal grandfather was an immigrant from Derry, Ireland, and his maternal grandmother was of German ancestry. When he was eight, Kelly's mother enrolled him and his brother James in dance classes, along with their sisters. As Kelly recalled, they both rebelled: "We didn't like it much and were continually involved in fistfights with the neighborhood boys who called us sissies  ... I didn't dance again until I was 15." At one time, his childhood dream was to play shortstop for the hometown Pittsburgh Pirates.

By the time he decided to dance, he was an accomplished sportsman and able to defend himself. He attended St. Raphael Elementary School in the Morningside neighborhood of Pittsburgh and graduated from Peabody High School at age 16. He entered the Pennsylvania State College as a journalism major, but after the 1929 crash he left school and found work in order to help his family financially. He created dance routines with his younger brother Fred to earn prize money in local talent contests. They also performed in local nightclubs.

In 1931, Kelly enrolled at the University of Pittsburgh to study economics, joining the Theta Kappa Phi fraternity (later known as Phi Kappa Theta after merging with Phi Kappa). He became involved in the university's Cap and Gown Club, which staged original musical productions. After graduating in 1933, he continued to be active with the Cap and Gown Club, serving as the director from 1934 to 1938. Kelly was admitted to the University of Pittsburgh Law School.

His family opened a dance studio in the Squirrel Hill neighborhood of Pittsburgh. In 1932, they renamed it the Gene Kelly Studio of the Dance and opened a second location in Johnstown, Pennsylvania in 1933. Kelly served as a teacher at the studio during his undergraduate and law-student years at Pitt. In 1931, he was approached by the Beth Shalom Synagogue in Pittsburgh to teach dance, and to stage the annual Kermesse. The venture proved a success, Kelly being retained for seven years until his departure for New York.

Kelly eventually decided to pursue a career as a dance teacher and full-time entertainer, so he dropped out of law school after two months. He increased his focus on performing and later said: "With time I became disenchanted with teaching because the ratio of girls to boys was more than ten to one, and once the girls reached 16, the dropout rate was very high." In 1937, having successfully managed and developed the family's dance-school business, he moved to New York City in search of work as a choreographer. Kelly returned to Pittsburgh, to his family home at 7514 Kensington Street, in 1940, and worked as a theatrical actor.

Stage career

After a fruitless search for work in New York, Kelly returned to Pittsburgh to his first position as a choreographer with the Charles Gaynor musical revue ''Hold Your Hats'' at the Pittsburgh Playhouse in April 1938. Kelly appeared in six of the sketches, one of which, '' La cumparsita'', became the basis of an extended Spanish number in the film '' Anchors Aweigh'' eight years later.

His first Broadway assignment, in November 1938, was as a dancer in Cole Porter's '' Leave It to Me!''—as the American ambassador's secretary who supports Mary Martin while she sings " My Heart Belongs to Daddy". He had been hired by Robert Alton, who had staged a show at the Pittsburgh Playhouse where he was impressed by Kelly's teaching skills. When Alton moved on to choreograph the musical ''One for the Money'', he hired Kelly to act, sing, and dance in eight routines. In 1939, he was selected for a musical revue, ''One for the Money'', produced by the actress Katharine Cornell, who was known for finding and hiring talented young actors.

Kelly's first big breakthrough was in the Pulitzer Prize–winning '' The Time of Your Life'', which opened on October 25, 1939—in which, for the first time on Broadway, he danced to his own choreography. In 1939, he received his first assignment as a Broadway choreographer, for '' Billy Rose's Diamond Horseshoe''. He began dating a cast member, Betsy Blair, and they got married on October 16, 1941.

In 1940, he got the lead role in Rodgers and Hart's '' Pal Joey'', again choreographed by Robert Alton. This role propelled him to stardom. During its run, he told reporters: "I don't believe in conformity to any school of dancing. I create what the drama and the music demand. While I am a hundred percent for ballet technique, I use only what I can adapt to my own use. I never let technique get in the way of mood or continuity." His colleagues at this time noticed his great commitment to rehearsal and hard work. Van Johnson—who also appeared in ''Pal Joey''—recalled: "I watched him rehearsing, and it seemed to me that there was no possible room for improvement. Yet he wasn't satisfied. It was midnight and we had been rehearsing since 8 in the morning. I was making my way sleepily down the long flight of stairs when I heard staccato steps coming from the stage ... I could see just a single lamp burning. Under it, a figure was dancing ... Gene."

Offers from Hollywood began to arrive, but Kelly was in no hurry to leave New York. Eventually, he signed with David O. Selznick, agreeing to go to Hollywood at the end of his commitment to ''Pal Joey'', in October 1941. Prior to his contract, he also managed to fit in choreographing the stage production of '' Best Foot Forward''.

Film career

1941–1945: Becoming established in Hollywood

Selznick sold half of Kelly's contract to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer for his first motion picture: '' For Me and My Gal'' (1942) starring Judy Garland. Kelly said he was "appalled at the sight of myself blown up 20 times. I had an awful feeling that I was a tremendous flop." ''For Me and My Gal'' performed very well, and in the face of much internal resistance, Arthur Freed of MGM picked up the other half of Kelly's contract. After appearing in a B movie drama, '' Pilot No. 5'' (1943) and in '' Christmas Holiday'' (1944), he took the male lead in Cole Porter's '' Du Barry Was a Lady'' (1943) with Lucille Ball, in a part originally intended for Ann Sothern. His first opportunity to dance to his own choreography came in his next picture, '' Thousands Cheer'' (1943), in which he performed a mock-love dance with a mop. Unusually, in ''Pilot No. 5'', Kelly played the antagonist

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