A Brief Tribute to a Dancin' Man
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The first time I met Fred Astaire, I hated him. Except I didn't know him as Fred Astaire, I knew him as Ted Hanover, the conceited hoofer who kept stealing the girlfriends of the man who was supposedly his best friend, Jim Hardy. My poor, six-year-old heart felt so sad for Jim every time trouble-making Ted appeared -- and yet I still found the man compelling. After all, while Jim could do beautiful things with his voice, he didn't do anything like what Ted did with his feet. As I grew up and revisited the classics like Holiday Inn that I had watched as a kid, I finally separated Fred from his character and it was like meeting him all over again. To say I was enchanted would be an understatement. Six-year-old Michaela would've felt so betrayed. I can't remember much else about my reintroduction to Fred. I don't know what my next films of his were, or even what my first Astaire & Rogers collaboration was. That initial rush of classic film discove