That's Entertainment, Part II together for the first time since the 1946 film "Ziegfeld Follies", and for only the second time in their careers. (It was the last time 76-year-old Astaire danced on film, though the veteran actor continued to make film and TV appearances into the 1980s; Kelly would go on to appear in the 1980 musical "Xanadu".) According to film historian Robert Osborne, in specially-filmed introductions produced for Turner Classic Movies, it was Astaire who suggested to Kelly that the two take advantage of this potentially last-in-a-lifetime opportunity to perform together, something Kelly actually wishes for out loud during his narration of
Fred Astaire "dream ballets". Occasionally Astaire took joint screen credit for choreography or "dance direction" as it was known in the 1930s and 1940s but, as was the custom in musical films of the period, he generally left the screen credit to his collaborator. This can lead to the completely misleading impression that Astaire merely performed the choreography of others. Later in life he admitted: "I had to do most of it myself." Frequently, a dance sequence was built around two or three principal ideas, sometimes inspired by his own steps or by the music itself, suggesting a particular mood or action.