Opening Remarks from Dr Kathleen Riley
Fred Astaire: The Conference
Opening Remarks: Sunday 22 June 2008
Good morning ladies and gentlemen and welcome to Oxford and to the
first international conference on Fred Astaire. I wish particularly
to extend a warm welcome to our special guests, Ava Astaire Mckenzie
and her husband Richard. On behalf of us all, Ava and Richard, may I
express our enormous gratitude to you for being here and for taking
part so graciously in this celebration of Fred’s artistry. Thank you
also for what you have done, and continue to do, to keep alive and
share with us so generously Fred’s memory.
Before we begin proceedings, allow me to tell you briefly about the
conception and purpose of this gathering. The idea was to create a
unique forum for serious Astaire researchers and enthusiasts from
around the world and from a variety of disciplines, as well as a
unique creative interchange between scholars, writers, and
performers. It was also intended to afford a rare opportunity to
evaluate Fred’s remarkable achievements well beyond the usual
parameters of popular entertainment. The conference has been
designed to promote a deeper understanding of Fred’s legacy not only
within his own field and on subsequent generations of dancers and
choreographers, but also on contemporary scholarship and the history
of ideas.
When I first proposed the idea of staging an Astaire conference in
Oxford, I’m sure it had the same ring of naïve fervour one
associates with Mickey and Judy’s perpetual battle cry: ‘Let’s put
on a show’. Early on I enlisted the help of Chris Bamberger, who, as
many of you know, moderates the largest and longest-lived discussion
list on Fred Astaire in the history of the Internet. It says a lot
for her commitment to the subject that she gamely took this leap of
faith with me. For both of us the organization of the conference has
been very much a labour of love. I must confess that, as pressure
mounted in the last few weeks, I began to regret embarking on this
enterprise. But then I was watching a draft version of the Astaire-Rogers
compilation we commissioned for the panel discussion tomorrow
afternoon and suddenly any doubts evaporated. I rediscovered the
excitement with which I first approached the task. For, as noted in
your programme, Fred has left us not only a legacy of supreme
artistry, invention and dedication, but also a great legacy of joy.
The conference was not planned to coincide with any specific
anniversary but, as it happens, 2008 marks 75 years since the
beginning of Fred’s film career and 50 years since his first
groundbreaking television special, both events having revolutionized
the presentation and promotion of dance within these media. Today,
the 22nd of June, marks the twenty-first anniversary of Fred’s
death. It is a fitting occasion, therefore, on which to commemorate,
but more importantly to celebrate, an extraordinary life and legacy.
It is, of course, a huge sadness that Fred is no longer with us, but
we are fortunate that so much of his life’s work has been captured
and preserved on film. Moreover, we are fortunate that his legacy is
something more profound than the immortality conferred by this
medium. As Jerome Robbins once said: ‘He infused our souls with the
visions that he made.’
I remain in two minds as to whether Fred himself would have approved
of this conference and the scholarly scrutiny to which his
achievements are being subjected. In view of his well-known
self-deprecatory instincts, his aversion to artistic pretension, and
his reluctance – or indeed genuine inability – to analyse his work,
perhaps he would have been appalled at our efforts. I hope, however,
he would at least have been pleased to know we were acknowledging a
great deal of hard work and conducting our analysis, not with grim
academic resolve, but rather with the joy, passion, and sense of
wonder that are the essential foundations of true scholarship.
Respectfully, then, I ignore Fred’s likely protestations and
misgivings, and declare unreservedly – and I suspect without too
much dissent from those present – that what Fred Astaire produced
was great art, and that the achievements we have come together to
celebrate are more than worthy of recognition in these ancient and
hallowed halls of learning.
© Kathleen Riley, 2008
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