| Quotations/Quotes |
| "He had plenty of ginger but no Ginger; although he danced affectingly with Leslie Caron, snappily with Judy Garland, bouncingly with Rita Hayworth, broodly with Vera-Ellen and respectfully with statuesque, stoney-faced Cyd Charisse, we still think of Gene Kelly as a guy in loafers and a tight T-shirt, tap-dancing up a storm all by his lonesome."--John Updike "His fierce urge for perfection, his almost fanatical need for success, have always been matched by his need for justice for the less gifted, or less advantaged, whose paths crossed his. Gene climed to the top but he didn't step on any hearts on teh way up." --Frank Sinatra "When the definitive history of the Hollywood musical comes to be written, Gene Kelly will be seen as one of its heroes."--David Shipman "This was a boy from Pittsburgh who turned his face up to the street light and taught us what it meant to sing and dance for sheer joy fo ignoring the elements. He wasn't a legend, he was Gene Kelly."--Sheridan Morley, Ruth Leon "He's just the best."--Fred Astaire "Gene was among the wonders of the 20th century."--Stanly Donen "He could do anything...and did everything."--Debbie Reynolds "I arrived in Hollywood twenty pounds overweight and as strong as an ox. But if I put on a white tie and tails like Astaire, I still looked like a truck driver"--Gene Kelly "If Fred Astaire is the Cary Grant of dance, I'm the Marlon Brando."--Gene Kelly "The way I look at a musical, you are commenting on the human condition no matter what you do. A musical may be light and frivolous, but by its very nature it makes some kind of social comment."--Gene Kelly "Any man who looks like a sissy while dancing is just a lousy dancer."--Gene Kelly "I wasn't nice to Debbie. It's a wonder she still speaks to me."--Gene Kelly on set of Singing in the rain. "There was a model for what I tried to do with dancing... And the thing Fred and I used to bitch about was that critics didn't know how to categorize us. They called us tap dancers because that was conciderd the American style. But neither of us were basically tap dancer."--Gene Kelly "The contract at Hollywood studios like MGM was very efficient system in that because we were at the studio all the time we could rehearse a lot. But it also repressed people. There were no union regulations yet and we were all indentured servants--you can call on us slaves if you want-- like ball players before agency. We had seven year contracts but every six months the studio could decide to fire you if your picture wasn't a hit. And if you turned down a role, they cut your salary and simply added the time to your contract."--Gene Kelly "Kids talk to me and say they want to do musicals again because they've studied the tapes of old films. We didn't have that. We thought once we made it, even on film, it was gone except for the archives."--Gene Kelly "I never wanted to dance. It's true! I wanted to be a shortstop for the Pittsburgh Pirates."--Gene Kelly (Thank You to imdb.com and Aubrey for these.) |