In Remembrance: Fayard Nicholas

     Fayard Nicholas, one-half of the athletic tap dancing duo The Nicholas Brothers who were featured in numerous films in the 1930s and 40s and inspired dancers from Fred Astaire to Savion Glover, has passed away on January 24, 2006 in Los Angeles. He was 91.

     Born on October 20, 1914 in Mobile, Alabama, Fayard was the son of vaudeville musicians – his mother played piano and his father played drums. The family relocated to Philadelphia where Nicholas spent much of his time at the theatre where his parents worked, watching the various acts, especially the dancers. Later he would recreate the routines he saw for his friends. His younger brother Harold soon began imitating him. The pair soon began developing themselves as an act. By 1928 the Brothers were playing Vaudeville theaters in Philadelphia and New York City.

     The Brothers moved to Harlem’s Cotton Club where they astonished audiences with their routines that combined tap dancing with acrobatic flips and twists. They also made their film debut the same year in the musical short Pie, Pie Blackbird with Eubie Blake and his orchestra. Fayard was 18 at the time and his brother just 11 years old. While performing at the Cotton Club, they were spotted by movie producer Samuel Goldwyn, who cast them in the Eddie Cantor musical Kid Millions (1934).

The Nicholas Brothers with Dorothy Dandridge in a publicity photo for Sun Valley Serenade.

     When not touring or appearing in Broadway reviews, the Brothers continued to appear in movie musicals, almost always as featured performers. Their more notable appearances were in the films The Big Broadcast Of 1936 (1935), Down Argentina Way (1940), Sun Valley Serenade (1941) and Orchestra Wives (1942). Fred Astaire reportedly told the Brothers that the routine they performed in the musical Stormy Weather (1943) – in which they tapped and leapt up and down an ornate staircase and across the music stands of Cab Calloway’s orchestra – was the greatest movie musical number he had ever seen.

     Unfortunately, segregation kept the Brothers from performing with white entertainers in their film appearances. However, in what would be their final film appearance as a duo, the Brothers danced with Gene Kelly in the “Be A Clown” number in The Pirate (1948) at Kelly’s insistence. Still, the number was often cut from theatrical showings in the South.

     Nicholas shared a Tony Award in 1989 for Best Choreography for the Broadway hit Black and Blue with Cholly Atkins, Henry LeTang and Frankie Manning.

     The Nicholas Brothers have a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 7083 Hollywood Blvd and have been inducted into the Apollo Theater’s Hall of Fame and the Black Filmmaker’s Hall Of Fame.

     Nicholas made three film appearances later in his career. In 1970 he took a dramatic turn in The Liberation Of L. B. Jones. For the 2002 independent feature Night At The Golden Eagle, Nicholas played an aging, former vaudeville tap dancer living in a squalid residence hotel. The pictures and mementos in his character’s room were all taken from Nicholas’ own career. He also had a small part in the 2005 comedy Hard Four.