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This search for what you want is like tracking something that doesn't want to be tracked. It takes time to get a dance right, to create something memorable.”
-- Fred Astaire
Easter Parade , which began its run nationally on July 8, 1948, was the second-biggest moneymaking film of the year, directly after the Crosby-Hope-Lamour Road to Rio (1947), which was launched nationally on Christmas Day of 1947. The critical and financial success of the Garland-Astaire pairing chiefly "made up" for the mixed reviews and poor box office (except in a few large cities) of Judy Garland's prior musical, The Pirate (1948), which had opened nationally on June 11, only a month before her frolic with Mr. Astaire was seen by moviegoers.
Easter Parade
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8 July 1948
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Easter Parade is a 1948 American musical film starring Judy Garland and Fred Astaire, featuring music by Irving Berlin, including some of Astaire and Garland's best-known songs, such as "Steppin' Out With My Baby" and "We're a Couple of Swells."
The film won the 1948 Academy Award for Best Scoring of a Musical Picture. It also received the Writers Guild of America Award for Best Written American Musical. It was the most financially successful picture for both Garland and Astaire as well as the highest-grossing musical of the year.
Broadway star Don Hewes (Fred Astaire) is out buying Easter presents for his sweetheart, starting with a hat and some flowers ("Happy Easter"). Then he goes into a toy shop, and buys a cuddly Easter rabbit, after persuading a young boy to part with it and buy a set of drums instead ("Drum Crazy"). He takes the gifts to his dancing partner, Nadine Hale (Ann Miller). She explains that she has had an offer for a show, which would feature her as a solo star. Don tries to change her mind, and it looks as if he has succeeded ("It Only Happens When I Dance With You"), until Don's best friend, Johnny (Peter Lawford), turns up. Nadine reveals that she and Don are no longer a team, and it becomes obvious that Nadine is attracted to Johnny.
Angry, Don leaves to drown his sorrows at a bar. Johnny follows him and tries to persuade him to talk to Nadine but to no avail; Don brags that he does not need Nadine and that he can make a star of the next dancer he meets. After Johnny leaves, he picks out one of girls dancing on the stage, Hannah Brown (Judy Garland), and tells her to meet him for rehearsal the next day. Hannah then performs a duet, singing a musical number with a member of the band (Norman S. Barker) on trombone, "I Want to Go Back to Michigan." The next morning, Don tries to turn Hannah into a copy of Nadine, teaching her to dance the same way, buying her dresses in a similar style, and giving her an "exotic" stage name, Juanita. However, Hannah makes several mistakes at their first performance and the show is a fiasco.
Hannah meets Johnny, who is instantly attracted to her and sings "A Fella With An Umbrella" while walking her to her rehearsal with Don. At the rehearsal, Don realizing his mistake, decides to start over from scratch by creating routines more suited to Hannah's personality. Hannah sings "I Love A Piano", and she and Don work out a dance routine that proves much more successful than their earlier performance. The duo, now known as "Hannah & Hewes", are shown to be performing "Snookie-Ookums", "The Ragtime Violin", and "When That Midnight Choo-Choo Leaves For Alabam" in a montage of their performances.
At an audition for Ziegfeld Follies, where they perform "Midnight Choo-Choo", they meet Nadine who is starring in the show. Hannah realises Nadine was Don's former dancing partner, and demands to know if they were in love. Don hesitates, and Hannah runs out of the rehearsal where she encounters Johnny. Later, Don meets Hannah back at the hotel and reveals that he turned down the Ziegfeld offer, believing that Hannah and Nadine do not belong in the same show. Johnny soon arrives and takes Hannah out for dinner at which, after a comical routine by the waiter, Johnny reveals that he has fallen in love with Hannah. While Hannah does like Johnny she admits she is actually in love with Don; she also admits to deliberately making mistakes when they rehearse so that she can be with him longer. She and Johnny continue to have a close friendship.
Meanwhile, Nadine's show opens, and Don goes to see it ("Shakin' The Blues Away"). He is the only member of the audience who seems unimpressed. Later on, Don goes to see Hannah and tell her they will be starring in another show and invites her to dinner to celebrate. Hannah goes to dinner at Don's, only to have him suggest a dance rehearsal. She is immediately upset and turns to walk out, telling him that he's "nothing but a pair of dancing shoes" and that he doesn't see her as a woman, but as a dancing aid. Hannah is particularly annoyed that Don doesn't notice her new clothes and all the effort she has made for him. She tries to leave, but Don stops her and kisses her. Hannah then plays on the piano and sings "It Only Happens When I Dance With You", after which Don realises he is in love with Hannah, and they embrace.
The couple take part in a variety show, with a solo by Don ("Steppin' Out With My Baby"), and then the most famous number in the film ("A Couple of Swells"), in which Don and Hannah play a pair of street urchins with vivid imaginations. Don and Hannah go out to celebrate after the show, and end up watching Nadine perform. Nadine is mad with jealousy when the audience gives Don and Hannah a round of applause as they come in. Nadine is the star dancer in "The Girl On The Magazine Cover". The song features an ingenious stage act, in which women appear against backdrops that look like the covers of contemporary magazines. Nadine herself appears on the cover of Harper's Bazaar. Afterwards, she insists that Don perform one of their old numbers with her for old times sake - "It Only Happens When I Dance With You (Reprise)". When Don reluctantly agrees, Hannah becomes upset and runs out.
She ends up at the bar where she and Don first met. There she pours out her troubles to Mike the bartender ("Better Luck Next Time"). Later when Hannah returns to her apartment she finds Don waiting for her. Don tries to explain that he was forced to dance with Nadine, but Hannah thinks Don used her to make Nadine jealous and win her back. Don tells her that he'll wait all night for her to forgive him, but just before Hannah opens the door, Don is kicked out of her building by the house detective. The next morning Hannah is telling Johnny about her and Don's misunderstanding. Johnny tells her that if he loved someone he would let her know it, implying that Hannah should forget about their argument and go be with Don. Hannah realizes that he is right and goes to meet Don for their date for the Easter Parade.
Meanwhile, Don has been receiving various gifts at his apartment that morning, such as a rabbit and a new top hat, unaware that they are from Hannah. She then arrives unexpectedly at his house, as if the argument had never happened. Don is a little confused by this turn of events, but is persuaded by his valet that he should just listen to Hannah and go out. As they walk in the Easter parade, photographers, echoing a scene with Nadine from the beginning of the film, take their pictures and Don proposes to Hannah ("Easter Parade").
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The shedding feathered gown worn by Judy Garland when she dances with Fred Astaire in one number is an inside joke reference to Ginger Rogers' problematic gown dancing with Fred Astaire in Top Hat (1935). An ostrich feather broke loose from Ginger Rogers' elaborate gown and stubbornly floated in mid air around Astaire's face.
This is the second time that a character says to Judy Garland: "Why didn't you tell me I was in love with you?" in a film. The first was Gene Kelly in For Me and My Gal (1942).
The dye from the feather on Judy Garland's hat in "Fella with an Umbrella" song, ran all over her face and jacket, so they coated it with vaseline. The feather looks different in two different shots.
Jules Munshin's film debut. He plays the comic waiter who gives very entertaining descriptions of the menu items. The next year, he would play one of the three sailors on leave in New York City in On the Town (1949) with Gene Kelly and Frank Sinatra.
Judy Garland's husband, Vincente Minnelli, was originally slated to direct, but her psychiatrist advised them not to work together.
The film deleted a musical number, "Mr. Monotony," in which Judy Garland wears the same costume she would immortalize two years later in Summer Stock (1950) in the number "Get Happy"; the costume was a man's tuxedo coat and hat. For years, there were rumors that "Get Happy" was cut from another film and inserted into Summer Stock (1950). It is believed that this song being removed from "Easter Parade" is the origin of that rumor. An abbreviated version of the "Mr. Monotony" number was included in That's Entertainment! III (1994), and the complete number is included as an extra on the Warner Home Video Easter Parade (1948) DVD.
Gene Kelly was originally scheduled to play Don, but he broke his ankle when he stamped his foot in anger after losing a volleyball game. It was at his suggestion that he be replaced by Fred Astaire. Cyd Charisse was up for the role of Nadine, but a torn ligament in either one or both of her knees forced her to drop out. She was replaced by Ann Miller. Although she had been a star for years, Judy Garland had never met Astaire before, and was afraid to speak to him until they were properly introduced.
Ann Miller danced with pinched nerves in her back. She was also taller than Fred Astaire, so she had to wear flats in her scenes with him. This can be seen towards the end of the movie. When she finishes the number "The Girl I Love" she goes behind the curtain wearing red high heels; when she comes back out in front of the audience to entice Astaire to dance with her to their old song "It Only Happens When I Dance With You", she's wearing red flats.
As Hannah indicates, Easter Sunday did, in fact, fall on April 7 during 1912, the year this movie is set (according to the marquee for the Ziegfeld Follies of 1912).
Sidney Sheldon revealed this in an interview decades after the film came out: On the first day of filming, before the first scene, Sidney Sheldon was telling Judy Garland a story. Though it was time to shoot, Judy pressed him to continue on, ignoring the calls. When Sidney jokingly asked if she wanted to do the scene, Judy said no because the first scene was a kissing scene with Fred Astaire and she had never met him before, though it was assumed that they had since Astaire and Garland were both already big stars at the time. Sidney introduced Judy to Fred, and they all went on to filming the movie.
Ann Miller had to perform her biggest numbers in a back brace. In an interview with Robert Osborne, she revealed that she had been thrown down the stairs by her then husband. She was also pregnant at the time and was in a lot of pain.
This was MGM's highest grossing film of 1948.
The song "Easter Parade" that the movie was based upon was first sung in Irving Berlin's 1933 Broadway revue "As Thousands Cheer" by Marilyn Miller and Clifton Webb and was inspired by the annual event in New York City where people stroll down Fifth Avenue displaying their new hats (some very outrageous) and their Easter finery. The song also appeared in the Irving Berlin movie Holiday Inn (1942).
"The Screen Guild Theater" broadcast a 60 minute radio adaptation of the movie on March 22, 1951 with Judy Garland and Fred Astaire reprising their film roles.
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