Great Tap Dance Number 1936 (Eleanore Whitney & Louis Da Pron)

From the movie: THREE CHEERS FOR LOVE 1936
The picture quality is poor but the dancing's great. The great Eleanore Whitney is joined by a young Louis Da Pron who is probably best remembered as the choreographer for many of the Universal Studios "Teenage Musicals" of the WWII era, but he was also an excellent dancer. This is a great number that just keeps getting better as it goes along.

[sixpackstevens]

Great to see Mr. DaPron again. He was my tap instructor way back in the day. At the time, around 1952 or 3, he owned the "Red Shoes Dance Academy" located in Hollywood near Western Ave if I remember correctly, I was only 4 and a half years old at the time. After only around 1or 2 years of lessons, he asked my parents if it would be all right to send me on a casting call at Paramount (the picture was Anything Goes) and I got the part. That was my start in the entertainment industry. I worked pretty steady for the next 10 years or so before entering the music industry. I have Louis DaPron to thank for everything I have today. What a wonderful talented man. Miss you and love you Mr. DapPron.

[sixpackstevens]

I took lessons from Mr. DaPron from 1951-52 at the Red Shoes Dance Academy in Hollywood and later from his studio on La Cienega Blvd. 5 years total which got me into the movies and a 12 year run as a child actor. He was a great dancer and a wonderful man as was his assistant Dee Blacker. This clip brought back some wonderful memories...thank you.

[claudiamielke]

Thank you so much for posting this ! Louis DaPron was my tap dancing teacher in Canoga Park, California! It was from 1962-65. I loved him & admired him so much! During my time with him he had me do a solo performance at the Sportsmen’s Lodge with other talented dancers from our studio The Little Red Dance School. It was so fun!

[songplugger]

WOW! What a great number! From 1:07 on it is one uninterrupted take. No 'breaks'!
Did Mr. da Pron make any other dancing appearances? Even though he isn't dancing I was surprised and delighted to see that he appears as a choreographer in FUNNY LADY (1975).

[esmeephillips]

'Swing-Tap' might have been sweeping the world, but this soundtrack is not swing... it's the same thin, pit-orchestra sound you could hear in any canned talkie revue from a few years before, the sort of stagy production that had a big final scene in two-strip Technicolor.

The tune unobtrusively accompanies a tap duet that might have been seen in a Broadway musical comedy of the Twenties, complete with painted backcloths and warbling chorines.

Eleanore Whitney never bust out of these fun but modestly conceived movies. She was full of vim, pretty and a fast hoofer, but the bosses at Paramount, the least musical of the five big studios, did not think she could do more than help fill a line-up of moderately famous names. Either she became frustrated or agreed with their assessment, because she gave the biz up when barely adult.