GEORGE RAFT...........TANGO - 'BOLERO'- and the MOVIE 'SOME LIKE IT HOT'!

 

Reprinted from DANCE DYNAMIC MAGAZINE

GEORGE RAFT - MOVIESTAR, MOBSTER, OR GIFTED MAN OF DANCE

HOLLYWOOD 1930’S

It was the 1930s, Hollywood, and those new ‘Movies’ were IN! Now there was sound, fully established,speech, music and singing - and dancing! Rudolf Valentino, dark, handsome, Latin, had set the style, and been the epitome of what every woman admired. Sadly he died at an early age. But there was Rudy Vallee with that new approach to singing - ‘Crooning’ - with Dick Powell and Bing Crosby on their way. In New York some 4000 miles away, a young George Raft was doing very well indeed. Also dark and handsome, and in looks at least, Latin personified, he was an accomplished dancer, and this was an era when wealthy Society ladies had no qualms about taking dance lessons, or paying for agreeable and able Valentino-type professional dance-partners, in the sophisticated realm of Nightclubs and Café Society which they regularly patronised. Raft was extremely successful, both as an Exhibition and Cabaret Dancer, and in this new world of ‘popular’ dance. He was young, attractive, an excellent dancer, and was doing exactly what he wanted.

Jazz was everywhere , but Latin had joined a currently elegant and smooth Ballroom style.

GANG BOSSES OF THE THIRTIES

For some years, for the professional Club/Casino type entrepreneurs, (and in fact Gang Bosses), fortunes were to be made. In the background, Prohibition (when alcohol was made a illegal commodity) came and went, accompanied by gang-wars, hijacking (of illegal liquor), running betting books, floating card and dice games, and gambling at casinos and drinking at ‘Speakeasies’ which constantly kept one step ahead of the law. Yes, gang money everywhere, particularly Chicago and New York now that the country, under President Roosevelt, was recovering from the disaster of the Wall Street Crash, when millions of dollars disappeared overnight as the U.S. Stock Market fell apart.

HOLLYWOOD BECKONS

And then the gang-bosses noticed something which attracted their profound attention. A whole new field of enterprise was opening. In the sunshine and nightlife of Southern California they saw a land and a new era of opportunity, not only relating to would-be movie-makers and artists, but a requirement for ‘entertainment’ for those of this ‘movie world’. The gang-bosses badly wanted ‘in’ and the area which held their interest was a smallish, hot and dusty town on the West coast, Los Angeles, and especially the area known as Hollywood..

THE GARMENT INDUSTRY TAKE AN INTEREST

On the East Coast, the biggest names in the garment industry had already got the message, and had put large sums of money into founding Film Studios which were in the not-too-distant future, to become world-famous.

The New York entrepreneurs of a tough and shady business decided that is was time they got into the act.

But what they required was a representative, agreeable, talented, able to make his mark and hopefully his name, and with the ability to place, on their behalf, a firm foot in this door of opportunity.

They looked about, and perhaps in New York at that time the answer was a foregone conclusion.

THE FILM CAPITAL - MOVIELAND

One evening George Raft was summoned to a meeting with his Club bosses and the proposition was put to him. Would he go to the West Coast, this new ‘Movieland’, reviewing possibilities, gathering information, and clearing and planning a way for a venture which they were convinced would pay off in a big way.

Raft did not think twice. He was a professional dancer. Apart from his Nightclub work, several excursions on to the Variety (Vaudeville) stage had paid off. He was making a success of his life; and he liked New York. There was no way he would go to the West Coast, whatever the potential. He made his decision quite clear.

HOLLYWOOD OR ELSE!

He duly danced his way through the rest of the evening and set off home, a single local apartment.

And eventually he reached there, but not before he had been waylaid and beaten up by the men who were waiting for him in the dark and empty street. He heard the instructions ‘Don’t touch the face or the legs!’ To him, a veiled, life-shattering threat.

During the four or five days it took him to recover, Raft lay wondering. Experiences as a youngster on the New York streets, and a brief period as a prize-fighter, had toughened him. He was well able to look after himself. But this was different. As they left him, their words were ominous. ‘Do as you are told - next time it will be the knees and the feet!’

HE KNEW HE HAD NO CHOICE.

Raft went to Los Angeles, to take up his new occupation. There is no doubt that he was a truly gifted natural actor. And also, he could ‘speak’; now a necessity, since during the past few years many ‘Stars’ of the Silent screen had tumbled because of unsuitable accents, or unrecordable voice tones..

BOLERO

Raft made several early successful films, but the one he made in 1934 fixed him firmly at the top. It was called ‘BOLERO’. The music was by Ravel, already established as an outstanding composer. The story was of mobsters, nightclubs, a love interest, music and dancing….and death! A screenplay which seemed to have everything! The character Raft played was that of a nightclub dancer, and he was called upon to choreograph the innovative dance 'Bolero' to accompany Ravel’s superb music… …. powerful, intense, and dramatic! And in achieving this Raft created a new approach to ballroom dancing - yes, powerful, intense, and dramatic! Nothing quite like it had ever been seen before.

TONE IT DOWN, GEORGE, THERE ARE CHILDREN PRESENT!

It put 'dramatic acting’ on to the ballroom floor perhaps for the first time, and with Raft, this had already meant a Tango so emotionally charged that his Stage Show Producer had once been led to advise ‘Tone it down for the Matinee, George - there are children present!’*

TANGO TODAY

This is undoubtedly an influence echoed today, especially in the Tango and the Rumba. Raft had made his mark. Female hearts at least were shattered when he danced the ‘Bolero’, as his character, despite threats, and warnings about his health, is determined to do, completing the final steps at the crescendo of that magnificent music - and falling dead at the floorside!

Yes, tears everywhere. And applause!

It would appear that two endings were offered - One, he dies due to medical reasons. Two, he is knifed by a jealous girl-friend.

FRONTMAN FOR LEGAL CASINO COMMUNITY

In later life, Raft certainly seemed to ‘front’ for the now legal Casino fraternity. In future movies, very little was seen of him specifically as a dancer. His starring parts were usually those of gangland type characters, and very well he did it too.

SOME LIKE IT HOT

Recently, in a survey to find the most popular film ever produced, the film named as the international favourite of all time was Billy Wilder's SOME LIKE IT HOT, with Marilyn Monroe, Tony Curtis, Jack Lemmon as stars, and featuring Joe.E.Brown (a world famous comic star of his day) and there, playing the part of the gangster who caused all the trouble, George Raft. Coolly and smoothly - with that undercurrent of menace - but somehow still proving that as a mobster he could laugh at himself.

INSTRUCTING IN TANGO

Off set, he instructed Joe E. Brown and Jack Lemmon (as a woman) in their celebrated Spoof” Tango.* ("You're leading again, Daphne"!)

ROMANCE ON A DANCE FLOOR

At a time when ballroom and cabaret dancing was poised, elegant, and sophisticated to the point of aloofness, perhaps what Raft added was the portrayal of powerful and intriguing ‘Romance’. Whatever……..but it was an influence which still remains, and adds to the appeal, the fascination, and to the visual enjoyment of dancing to this day.

George Raft, Movie Star. Maybe reluctant mobster. But definitely Man of Dance!

* ‘GEORGE RAFT’

by Lewis Yablonsky. 1974/5 W.H.Allen (Howard & Wyndham Ltd.)