Biography

Eleanor Powell

Jump to

Eleanor Powell was born in 1912 in Springfield, Massachussetts, and got her professional start in Atlantic City clubs, from where she moved into in revue in New York at the Ritz Grill and Casino de Paris at the age of sixteen. She started her career on Broadway in 1929, where her machine-gun foot work gained her the title of world champion in tapping. In 1935 she came to Hollywood where she starred in the great MGM musicals in the late 1930s, establishing herself as a Queen of Ra-Ta-Taps. In spite of the fact that she was primarily a solo performer she also danced with Fred Astaire and George Murphy. After her marriage she wasn't seen on the screen, except for a short number in the Duchess of Idaho (1950). After her divorce she started a short but successful night-club career.
- IMDb mini biography by: Stephan Eichenberg <eichenbe@fak-cbg.tu-muenchen.de>

Became the first specialty tapper to ever appear at Carnegie Hall.
Unlike most other film dancers of her day, Powell did not use a choreographer but devised all her own numbers. Consequently, although she danced with some of the best dancers of her era, her most memorable performances were in solos.
Her parents separated when she was 11 months and divorced when she was two. Her mother told Eleanor as a child that her father had died to protect them from outside scandal, but Eleanor's father reintroduced himself to Eleanor in 1935 during the Boston run of "At Home Abroad".
In 1954, following a period of retirement, she was asked to host The Faith of Our Children (1955), a non-denominational religious program which featured appearances from film and sports stars. The show lasted three seasons and Eleanor received a regional Emmy Award for children's programming.
Inducted into the International Tap Dance Hall of Fame in 2002 (inaugural class).

A tap dancer is really a frustrated drummer.
I'd rather dance than eat.
On her later years as an ordained minister: I was married to Glenn Ford. But now I feel as though I'm married to God, and in the nicest, purest sense.
Whenever you hear the beat of my feet, it is really the beat of my heart saying, "Thank You and God Bless You!".
Commenting on her marriage to Glenn Ford: I filed on the grounds of mental cruelty and that's exactly what he gave me.