Accomplished dancers have training and practice routines just like athletes do. That’s because they are athletes! For proof, look no further than the great dancer Ginger Rogers.
Ginger Rogers was a triple threat during Hollywood’s Golden Age: actress, singer, and dancer, best known for her movie musicals, where she paired up with Fred Astaire.
Ginger! (photo courtesy of The Telegraph)
Rogers also enjoyed a variety of sports, including one she took very seriously: tennis. Rogers won the Texas State Charleston Championship in 1926, then competed in the 1950 U.S. Open in Queens, New York, where she played mixed doubles with tennis star Frank Shields, the grandfather of actress Brooke Shields.
Rogers enjoyed tennis so much she owned a rare “en-tout-cas” tennis court (French, trans., “in any case”) at her luxurious home in Southern California. It’s an artificial clay court that tennis players use during the French Open. Rogers frequently hosted and played against some tennis legends like Pancho Gonzales, Gussie Moran, and Billie Jean King.
While Rogers loved tennis, it wasn’t her only sporting pursuit. Rogers was an avid and accomplished swimmer and played golf, as well as volleyball, softball, and skeet shooting.
Rogers wrote in her 1991 autobiography, Ginger: My Story, that she saw herself as a natural athlete and that playing multiple sports gave her stamina to support her strenuous dancing schedule.
Ginger with Fred Astaire (photo from Instagram courtesy of Vintagehollywoodstars)
Of course, the public knows Ginger Rogers best for her 50-year-long stage and screen presence. A staple in Hollywood musicals, her credits include 42nd Street (1933), Gold Diggers of 1933 (1933), Flying Down to Rio (1933), The Gay Divorcee (1934), Roberta (1935), Top Hat (1935), Follow the Fleet (1936), Swing Time (1936), Shall We Dance (1937), Carefree (1938), The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle (1939), and The Barkley’s of Broadway (1949).
Rogers also appeared frequently in Broadway stage productions during the last twenty years of her career. She starred in Annie Get Your Gun (1960), Calamity Jane (1961), The Unsinkable Molly Brown (1963), Hello, Dolly! (1965), Mame (1969), No, No, Nanette (1974), and Anything Goes (1980).
Ginger Rogers lived a remarkable life. She died in 1995 at the age of 83.
