Journal Article

Sex and the Storyworld: Narrativizing Desirability in the Early Films of Fred Astaire

Gilbert, Nora

2018

Overview

Narrative was, in other words, used as a marketing tool, too. [...]while the goal of most of the films' narrative choices was to market Astaire in conventionally heteronormative ways, such goals did not always match up with results. [...]because I consider the Astaire films that do privilege \"narrativity\" over a \"continuous deployment of spectacle,\" to use Cohan's terminology, I am more interested than he is in the multifarious sexualizing narrative elements that do not stem from or relate to spectacality. Historical Backdrop: The \"In Spite Of\" Star By the time Fred Astaire arrived in Hollywood in 1933, he had already achieved a certain degree of stardom. Since the age of six, he had worked to build up a luminous stage career with his sister Adele, beginning on the vaudeville circuit and winding up as the toast of Broadway and London's West End. Since Astaire got married two days before flying to Los Angeles to begin his film career-and stayed happily married until his wife's death twenty-one years later-his agents and publicists could not exploit or concoct titillating tales of his romantic adventures to enhance his sexual reputation.

• Publisher: Eastern Michigan University,Eastern Michigan University, Department of English Language and Literature
• Subject: Actors / Aesthetics / African American literature / Allusion / Analysis / Astaire, Fred / Astaire, Fred (Frederick Austerlitz) (1899-1987) / Audiences / Biographies / Collaboration / Criticism and interpretation / Dance / Death & dying / Epic literature / Film musicals / Gender / Hepburn, Katharine / Heroism & heroes / Intersectionality / Literary characters / Literary devices / Motion pictures / Movie sex / Narrative structure / Narrative techniques / Narratives / Narratology / Plot (Narrative) / Rogers, Ginger / Romances / Set design / Terminology / Time