Ruby Keeler, Carole Cook, Nana Visitor, 42nd Street, 1984 TV

Ruby Keeler is interviewed about her classic role in the film "42nd Street" in this rare 1984 TV appearance and is joined by cast members of the stage musical, headed by Carole Cook and Nana Visitor," for a performance of "Go Into Your Dance".

[@karlmahlmann]

Her tap dance and song on 42nd st was one of those amazing things captured on film that you can't look away from. Very few times in show biz has anything worked so well.

[@danawinsor1380]

I agree. Ruby Keeler had a "look" that worked so well on the screen.

[@cpklapper]

The great Ruby Keeler was modest to a fault. Thankfully, she was spared the talentless, tasteless, ignorant arrogance of social media.

[@edharbur698]

I remember watching this when it was first aired - I just adore Ruby Keeler. Thank you so much for sharing this!

[@vertxxgg]

oh lovely Ruby Keeler i love all Busby Berkeley stage movies

[@queer_raktajino6560]

The only reason I got here was because of Nana Visitor and I did not expect this, but frankly it's a pleasant surprise XD

[@roderickfernandez5382]

I saw 42nd Street on Broadway when it opened and I kept thinking it's not the movie it's not the movie. It was the first 1930s musical I ever saw as a teenager and I loved it and I seen it hundreds of times and I just didn't like to see it on stage it didn't have what I thought it should. I do realize that that's totally me it was a great show just my own personal experience

[@truzzio]

Nana has such the perfect little ingenue face, I knew from the moment I saw her on DS9 (with nothing in the way of actual evidence to back it up yet) that she was a Broadway baby.

[@giselle2222]

She had the most beautiful eyes!

[@annmarie6985]

Nana is just spellbinding!!

[@roderickfernandez5382]

Who in Heaven's name is Nana? This posting is so old I know I'll never get an answer but I put it down anyway

[@TheLocoUnion]

@@roderickfernandez5382 Major Kira from Star Trek Deep Space 9

[@lauralutz4538]

I saw the production of, “No No Nanette,” That, Miss Keeler was referring to. It was wonderful!

[@retire14pattaya9]

Saw her in No No Nannette. March 1971.

[@djsokra]

Didn´t know Major Kira could do this :-)

[@Stevebaby123]

Great clip.

[@leemclaury6251]

An American treasure

[@johnmiller9302]

Wow!!

[@pm0501again]

One thing that always bothers me about the stage productions of 42nd Street is the songs don't match the original movie score. After watching the original 1933 film 500 times and you know it by heart, this is kind of like nails across a chalkboard.

[@vertxxgg]

Golden Days of American Musicals...Ruby looks an Irish monk...in Spain in 30s Jimmy Cagney and Joan Blondel were very popular during war in Madrid soldiers and Brigadists croop cinemas seeing Warner moovies

[@jrbaskind]

Nana Visitor sure looks different in blonde hair! Good, but different!

[@thegreatdominion949]

I don't recall that number from the movie.

[@gerrynightingale9045]

*Why is all the women look like Tony Curtis in "Some Like It Hot"*

[@frankgunold268]

1933 !

[@Diaredd59]

I hate how when they "revive" shows or movies, they take out the soul of the thing and make it so hokey. They dumb down the tap steps and make it modern Broadway. They simplify the arrangements, making them corny and erasing what made them so enjoyable and special in their day. I sat with a bunch of old Broadway hoofers in 1984 watching "42nd St." and they were disappointed, displeased and unentertained.

[@nathanielcraig3588]

I felt the same way watching it on stage at 5 years old. I always felt that there was so much wasted potential adapting 42nd street to the stage, I've always been very underwhelmed.

[@JoMarieM]

I loved the interview with Ruby. . .but what was up with the "entertainment segment"? I've seen 42nd Street twice, and that song clearly did NOT come from there! In fact, this little scenario doesn't even closely resemblance anything in the movie! It was awful! Couldn't they have done something a little bit closer to the original film?

[@destineydevereux4722]

I highly doubt Miss Keeler was entertained by the dance number,,, I'm sure it was as foreign to her as it was to me!!!

[@trilbyoferal3705]

I the same thought.

[@layla693]

That sure is some heavy-footed tapping,compare this to the sublime Eleanor Powell

[@layla693]

you may well be right dancebandfan at least Ruby's dancing was better than her singing.

[@bambitirone2514]

layla693 she was actually a clog dancer......the reason she was dancing so hard was bc she didnt have any metal plates on her shoes!!! :-)

[@layla693]

Thankyou Bunny Presley I did not realise that x

[@drsunshine1959]

Ruby Keeler or Eleanor Powell or Ann (or Marilyn) Miller cannot be compared because each her own different style. Ruby was primarily a buck and wing dancer, Marilyn combined buck dancing with ballet as did Eleanor with classic tap, and Ann was a whirling dervish who moved around more than any of them. Would you compare Shakira to Doris Day? Or Lady Gaga to Jeanette MacDonald? They're all singers, right? Maybe you would.

[@alexmckenna1171]

Great seeing the interview, but that modern stuff was beyond hideous! So trashy. Nothing like the style of the genuine 30s film.. what WERE they thinking of? Hadn't they seen the 42nd Street film???

[@tessasweet5792]

True!!!

[@kabardinka1]

42nd Street, the Broadway show, was awful-a milquetoast, mediocre interpretation of great Harry Warren songs... unlike the film with Ruby, which was a classic. But the film also had great performances by Bebe Daniels and Warner Baxter whereas the Broadway show was done as 'camp.'

[@laddiemeadows6180]

If 19-year-old Ruby Keeler not married 40-year-old Al Jolson, she would have never been much more than a nightclub chorus girl.

[@aeichler]

Not true. She was already starring on Broadway in Gershwin's "Show Girl".

[@Muirmaiden]

In some ways, her marriage to Jolson actually hurt her career. He was very jealous and couldn't deal with her success. He insisted that she leave Warner Brothers with him in 1937 and her career never fully recovered. Maybe that was just as well, since after two more films she retired to focus on her second marriage. They married in 1928 and Keeler didn't make her film debut until 1933.

[@drsunshine1959]

@@aeichler Thank you, Alan. She already had four Broadway shows under her belt and had also appeared in the pre-New York tour of "Whoopie" with Eddie Cantor before starring in the title role of Ziegfeld's "Show Girl". And her reviews were consistantly good.

[@drsunshine1959]

@Chris Liberty More BS. Nobody refered to her in such unflattering terms at the time. She was considered one of the best dancers on stage and film - her style was recognized as buck and wing, which is considerably different from tap. She was proficient in both styles, as can be seen in "Colleen", "Ready, Willing and Able", "Sweetheart of the Campus" (bet you've never seen one of them) and in her triumphant performance in "No No Nanette" on Broadway (which you never saw either because I'm sure you weren't alive then). Her acting also improved greatly after her Busby Berkeley movies when she began to get roles of greater substance. But of course you know nothing of this. You're content rehashing the same crap you've only read about and making your own half baked conclusions. Latter day criticisms have been made by increasingly clueless people who have no idea of the public tastes during her early stage and screen careers.

[@donnaaveni]

@@drsunshine1959 happens a lot these days?