Want to know the best Fred Astaire movies? How about the worst Fred Astaire movies? Curious about Fred Astaire box office grosses or which Fred Astaire movie picked up the most Oscar® nominations? Need to know which Fred Astaire movie got the best reviews from critics and audiences and which got the worst reviews? Well you have come to the right place….because we have all of that information.
A little while ago, I got the idea that I needed to have a page for the Top 25 Classic Actors and the Top 25 Classic Actresses according to the American Film Institute. A quick check of my existing pages found I had already done movie pages on 19 of the actors and 10 of the actresses. So now that I have 21 pages to write, I figure I should get started with the 5th highest rated actor, Fred Astaire.
Fred Astaire (1899-1987) was born Frederick Austerlitz in Omaha, Nebraska. Fred Astaire’s first dance partner was his older sister Adele. They became a very popular vaudeville dance act when Fred Astaire was only 7 years old. By 1917 the brother and sister dancing act was already appearing on Broadway. In 1932 Adele retired from dancing and Fred moved to Hollywood to appear in movies. In 1933 he appeared in Flying Down To Rio. Astaire got 5th billing in the movie and his dance partner in the movie, Ginger Rogers got 4th billing. Reviewers singled out their dancing and the pair would be matched up 9 more times in their career.
The Rogers-Astaire team owned the box office for the rest of the 1930s. The pinnacle of their collarboration was 1935’s Top Hat which has some of the best dancing ever filmed for motion pictures. Fred Astaire had many successes without Ginger Rogers, as he appeared in the box office hits, Holiday Inn, Blue Skies, Easter Parade, and The Towering Inferno. His last movie was 1981’s Ghost Story which was almost 50 years after his screen debut.
His IMDb page shows 50 acting credits from 1933-1981. This page will rank 39 Fred Astaire movies from Best to Worst in six different sortable columns of information. Television appearances, cameos and some of his movies made outside of the Hollywood system were not included in the rankings.
Fred Astaire Movies Ranked In Chronological Order With Ultimate Movie Rankings Score (1 to 5 UMR Tickets) *Best combo of box office, reviews and awards.
Fred Astaire Movies Can Be Ranked 6 Ways In This Table
The really cool thing about this table is that it is “user-sortable”. Rank the movies anyway you want.
- Sort Fred Astaire movies by co-stars of his movies.
- Sort Fred Astaire movies by adjusted domestic box office grosses using current movie ticket cost (in millions)
- Sort Fred Astaire movies by adjusted worldwide box office grosses using current movie ticket cost (in millions)
- Sort Fred Astaire movies how they were received by critics and audiences. 60% rating or higher should indicate a good movie.
- Sort by how many Oscar® nominations each Fred Astaire movie received and how many Oscar® wins each Fred Astaire movie won.
- Sort Fred Astaire movies by Ultimate Movie Rankings (UMR) Score. UMR Score puts box office, reviews and awards into a mathematical equation and gives each movie a score.
- Use the search and sort button to make this page very interactive.
- ### If worldwide box office is the same as domestic box office…then worldwide grosses were not available.
Stats and Possibly Interesting Things From The Above Fred Astaire Table
- Twenty-nine Fred Astaire movies crossed the magical $100 million domestic gross mark. That is a percentage of 74.35% of his movies listed. The Towering Inferno (1974) was his biggest box office hit.
- An average Fred Astaire movie grosses $147.70 million in adjusted box office gross.
- Using RottenTomatoes.com’s 60% fresh meter. 32 Fred Astaire movies are rated as good movies…or 82.05% of his movies. Top Hat (1935) is his highest rated movie while The Amazing Dobermans (1976) is his lowest rated movie.
- Twenty-four Fred Astaire movies received at least one Oscar® nomination in any category…..or 61.53% of his movies.
- Five Fred Astaire movies won at least one Oscar® in any category…..or 15.15% of his movies.
- A “good movie” Ultimate Movie Rankings (UMR) Score is 60.00. 33 Fred Astaire movies scored higher that average….or 84.16% of his movies. Top Hat (1935) got the the highest UMR Score while The Amazing Dobermans (1976) got the lowest UMR Score.
Possibly Interesting Facts About Fred Astaire
1. Fred Astaire survived a disastrous screen test. According to Astaire the result of the screen test was “He can’t act…his is going bald…also dances”. Others claim it said “Can’t act, can’t sing, going bald, can dance a little”….either way not a good screen test.
2. Between 1933 and 1939 Fred Astaire starred with Ginger Rogers in 9 movies. They would appear in their 10th and final film in 1949’s The Barkleys of Broadway. Their screen partnership is one of the greatest of all-time.
3. Fred Astaire was married twice in his life. He married Phyllis Potter in 1933 and they were married until 1954 when she passed away after a battle with cancer. Fred Astaire had three kids with Potter: step son Peter, son Fred Jr. and daughter Ava Astaire McKenzie. In 1980 he married Robyn Smith.
4. Fred Astaire received one Oscar® nomination for acting in his career. He was nominated but did not win Best Supporting Actor for 1974’s The Towering Inferno. He was given an Honorary Oscar® in 1950 “For unique artistry and his contributions to the technique of musical pictures”.
5. Fred Astaire received more love from the Golden Globe® voters as he received 5 Golden Globe® nominations. Those five movie were: The Towering Inferno, Finian’s Rainbow, The Pleasure of His Company, On The Beach and Three Little Words.
6. Fred Astaire became good friends with legendary music composer George Gershwin back in 1916 many years before they both would become famous.
7. Fred Astaire retired from movies after making 1946’s Blue Skies. He unretired as his fan support talked him back into making more movies….he returned in 1948 to replace an injured Gene Kelly in Easter Parade.
8. Fred Astaire insisted on a stationary camera rather than a moving camera to film dance numbers..it was a rule he stuck to over the years…always saying…..”Either I dance or the camera dances”.
9. Two famous roles Fred Astaire turned down…..the lead role in Yankee Doodle Dandy and the part of Bert on Mary Poppins.
10. Check out Fred Astaire‘ career compared to current and classic actors. Most 100 Million Dollar Movies of All-Time.
AFI’s Top 25 Screen Legend Actors….with links to my movie pages on the Screen Legend
If you do a comment….please ignore the email address and website section.
Very interesting! Thanks.
Thank you Cristina.
If The Amazing Dobermans adjustment is $4.90, then how much would its box office gross have been back in 1976?
Hey Maurice….back then Variety reported movies in box office rentals..the Amazing Dobermans came out in November of 1976…..it did not reach Variety’s list of box office hits for either year…which means it earned less than 1 million in box office rentals. Which would translate to about 1.5 million in box office grosses….that means a little less than a million people went and saw the Amazing Dobermans at the theater.
Funny thing. The person in charge of Astaire/Rodgers tweets and I are following each other on Twitter, so I thought to celebrate by tweeting this Astaire page.
Thank you doing that Flora…it is greatly appreciated…this page has been surprisingly popular….as it is my 12th most visited hub with almost 31700 views so far.
Have not seen many of his movies either. But I do know this, he’s a fantastic dancer!! Saw the Towering Inferno, one of my favorites. This was well researched and I am expecting Gene Kelly and Marilyn Monroe! Thanks for the write, the great statistical research and information!! Sharing!
Hey Michelle….thanks for the visit to my Fred Astaire hub. I wish they would have given him an Oscar for The Towering Inferno…..if only as a way to give him kudos for such a ground breaking career. During my Fred Astaire movie marathon …..I came to respect his comedic talents as well as his dancing talents….thanks for the share and the great comment.
The amount of research and information in your hubs is always astounding! This is a great subject…who doesn’t love Fred Astaire? Though Gene Kelly was also a great dancer, more athletic in his dance moves, Fred was poetry in motion. He made it look so easy and all of his dancer partners, especially Ginger, just melded with him when they danced.
Hey tillsontitan…..thanks for the visit to my Fred Astaire page…..I remember when I wrote this page ….I had only seen The Towering Inferno…..now months later….I have seen all the Astaire/Rogers movies…..and now over half of all his movies. So now I can say that I agree with your comment 100%……this comment also reminds me that I need to do a Gene Kelly page in the future. Thanks for the votes and the nice compliment.
I forgot to mention, my older brother was a big Fred Astaire, Bing Crosby and James Cagney fan and as a result I realized I saw every Fred Astaire movie you listed!
Looking forward to the Gene Kelly page.
Hey tillsontitan….very cool….it sounds like your big brother had excellent taste in older movies…..3 months later and I still have not done the Gene Kelly page….currently working on 6 hub subjects…but can not seem to get one published…..so who do you think should be next? Liam Neeson, Martin Scorsese, Lana Turner, Frank Sinatra, Elvis Presley or Ben Stiller….now that is a collection of 6 wide ranging performers…..thanks for the return visit.
Definitely Liam! You go boy, you’re certainly on a role!!
Hey tills…Liam is done and published now….although I am having a hard time finding it on my own profile page.