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 I'm not your sister, you know." The success of the stage play was credited to this number and, when recreated in "The Gay Divorcee" (1934), the film version of the play, it ushered in a new era in filmed dance. Recently, film footage taken by Fred Stone of Astaire performing in "Gay Divorce" with Luce's successor, Dorothy Stone, in New York in 1933 was uncovered by dancer and historian Betsy Baytos and now represents the earliest known performance footage of Astaire. According to Hollywood folklore, a screen test report on Astaire for RKO Radio Pictures, now lost along with the