Eleanor Powell: Born to Dance
When we think of great dancers from Hollywood’s golden age, Gene Kelly leaps to mind alongside Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. And what of Eleanor Powell? The authors of Eleanor Powell: Born to Dance are correct to declare that she is “all but ignored by film and dance historians.” One reason, they assert, is that her life was never “steeped in scandal.” They also offer her ultimately unsuccessful marriage to Glen Ford to explain her early retirement from the screen.
However, another obstacle to her recognition was the movies in which she was cast: Broadway Melody of 1936, Broadway Melody of 1938, Honolulu … Box office successes in their day but none of them classics in the overused word’s strict definition.
The story behind the writing of Born to Dance is worth hearing. According to the authors, it was a 40-year labor of love with long gap following Powell’s death in 1982. They met Powell in 1974 as teenage fans and their book was finally completed—like many long gestating projects—during the Covid lockdown.
Their research shows that Powell was Born to Dance. Her mother, Blanche, enrolled her in dance classes at age six; at age 13 mom chaperoned her into the dance clubs of Atlantic City; By 15, “beckoned by the allure of the Broadway stage,” she found small roles in New York. In 1934 Blanche accompanied her daughter on the famed 20th Century Limited, the transcontinental passenger train that ferried them to Hollywood.
Powell’s career at MGM was almost thwarted by a makeup mistake. Sent to the wrong department for her screen test, she was daubed with dark “Egyptian makeup.” MGM’s Louis B. Mayer was impressed by Powell’s dancing but thought she was Black and unsuitable for the film in mind. Mayer relented after an actor who knew her from New York convinced the mogul that Powell was white.
Although Powell’s marriage to Ford sidelined her movie career, she remained in demand as a nightclub performer and toured internationally in the late ‘40s. She was eclipsed by the stars in her final screen role, a cameo in The Duchess of Idaho (1950), a movie starring Esther Williams and Van Johnson. But she left an impression. Williams recalled Powell’s dedication to perfection, rehearsing “to the point that her feet bled.” Adamant that “two ongoing film careers would not make a successful marriage,” Powell declined studio offers—despite ongoing rumors of her husband’s infidelities. By the time they divorced in 1959, the old Hollywood was fading fast, but she found work in the last decades of life in Las Vegas.
Eleanor Powell: Born to Dance is a positive biography of a woman who lived by her values, committed to her chosen art. It’s published by University Press of Kentucky.
Get Eleanor Powell: Born to Dance at Amazon here.
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