Tuesday, March 02, 2004

Ginger & Fred in the TLS
"Still holding her, but now with one hand moving surely to the back of her waist, Astaire leads Ginger into a walk. It's a don't-you-remember walk, until, at the end of the phrase, he arches right back, pulling her with him, so that they tip together, enough to make it a matter of risking her balance and his. From here on,though there remains a rich didn't-we-used-to-have-fun subtext, we're in the present tense, fast and funny. The stops and starts, the hesitations and sudden spurts, the fun of finding how well they work together again, the little mime/dance quarrel, a whole series of suddenly-tipping-over steps, the rapid side-by-side hops and tap phrases, the whirling spin-turns: the alchemy of dancing with a partner has never been made more immediate. "