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Invitation to the Dance Overview:

Invitation to the Dance (1956) was a Animation - Fantasy Film directed by Gene Kelly and produced by Arthur Freed.

Invitation to the Dance BlogHub Articles:

Invitation to the Dance ( 1956 )

Most fans of MGM musicals of the 1950s can rattle off the titles of Gene Kelly's pictures when called upon, but I bet you 23-80 that the majority of these musical aficionados will forget to include Invitation to the Dance among those titles. This 1956 dance extravaganza features Kelly in not one, ... Read full article


Invitation to the Dance (1956)

(Image via Doctor Macro) Gene Kelly directs, choreographs and stars in 1956′s dialogue-free technicolor film Invitation to the Dance. The film tells three short stories, all featuring different styles of dance. Gene lets himself “Be a Clown” again in the first segment, “Circu... Read full article


Invitation to the Dance

54 years ago tonight, this handsome couple went for a spin at a little party after the Oscars. Aren't they perfect? Don't you wish they were your parents? I once saw this self-same couple, a few decades later; they were crossing the Plaza at Lincoln Center, on their way to a show at the Vivian Be... Read full article


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Invitation to the Dance Quotes:

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Invitation to the Dance Facts
Gene Kelly's original intention was to make a film that would educate mainstream audiences about professional dancing in the world. To this end, he wanted to cast the greatest dancers in Europe for the four segments in leading roles. He himself would only appear in one - the Popular Song sequence, which ended up being cut. But MGM refused to allow the picture unless he appeared in all of them. Many of the professionals who worked in the film agreed that this was one of the film's great weaknesses.

Queen Elizabeth II, Prince Phillip and Princess Margaret attended a screening of the film at their first visit to the Edinburgh International Film Festival in 1957.

Filmed between late August 1952 and early February 1953 at MGM's British studio in Boreham Wood, Elstree, with shooting continuing at Metro's Culver City, California studio between the third and thirteenth of October 1953, the movie's box-office appeal was doubted by MGM executives, who held back the film until a national release on May 15, 1956, followed on May 22 by a Manhattan opening at the Plaza Theatre. Indeed, this innovative, all-dancing project failed to make money.

Production on the film continued into mid-June 1954, with animation for the "Sinbad the Sailor" segment under the guidance of William Hanna, Joseph Barbera and Fred Quimby. During the live-action shooting, Carol Haney had "stood in" for the animated Scheherazade.

A fourth segment called "Dance Me a Song," comprised of popular tunes, was deleted.

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