I was saddened to learn of the death of the great dancer, choreographer, sometime director and occasional actor Michael Kidd Sunday at the age of 92. That sadness boiled over to anger as I heard the brief, patronizing obit read by smarmy host Steve Inskeep on National Public Radio's Morning Edition.
He referred to Kidd as the man who "guided Marlon Brando's feet" in the film version of Guys And Dolls (of course, Kidd's dances for that show's original Broadway production are landmarks of the form, but hey, why mention that?) and condescendingly referred to another highlight of Kidd's career, the astonishingly athletic choreography for Stanley Donen's Seven Brides For Seven Brothers as "featuring dancing lumberjacks."
There was a time when NPR's programming respected artists. Ten years ago, Kidd's passing would surely have been commented on by a colleague or dance critic, who could have put Kidd's career in some sort of context, from his days as a bright potential star of the ballet world to his groundbreaking choreography on stage (Finian's Rainbow) and film (Vincente Minnelli's The Band Wagon, Stanley Donen's amazingly underrated Movie, Movie), perhaps even mentioned his fine work as an actor (best scene in Michael Ritchie's classic Smile.)
These days, sadly, Inskeep's featherweight, borderline reactionary approach signifies the prevailing attitude at NPR, and its arts coverage as well as its news coverage features all the depth you'd expect from network TV. Ugh.
Anyway, here's the "dancing lumberjacks" scene Inskeep sneered about. More perceptive eyes than his would recognize this as much an antecedent of Hong Kong-style action as a standard Hollywood dance sequence:
