When she gave it all up to marry Lord Cavendish and move to a Ireland to live in a castle, i went solo and tried out for a few parts and i was told i couldn't sing, i couldn't act but i could dance a bit so the studios hit upon a strategy, get proper actors like Gene Kelly and Ginger Rogers to do the proper talking and acting bits and get me to just dance everything.
I based my trademark onscreen look of top hat (to hide my bald spot), tails, and a white tie on Edward VIII of Britain and off i went to make films.
The early Hollywood dance films had a very different look than how dance is presented today, due to my dancing everything to make up for a lack of other required movie skills, dancing become part of the plot and the producers came up with a new way of filming dance sequences, which was to fit both dancers in the frame.
Ginger Rogers and i starred together in 10 films and became one of Hollywood’s most adored on-screen couples but funnily enough, i never wanted to work with her to start with but there was never any romance between us and i left our partnership to explore new film opportunities, forgetting that acting and i went together like whiskey and driving so actually retired at one point, then came back and danced some more and then after 30 musical films in 25 years, retired again saying i was fed up with dancing in movies.
So i began dancing on Television instead and even got a few straight acting jobs which didn't involve me doing soft shoe shuffle or a paso doble.
I died of pneumonia at the age of 88 and my body was buried at Oakwood Memorial Park Cemetery in Chatsworth, California and one of my last requests was that there should never be a film made about my life, because if it was my best acting bits, it could be shown in the adverts between films with proper actors in.
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