A Tribute to the Nicholas Brothers

This dazzling program pays tribute to two of the 20th century’s greatest dancers and entertainers: the fabulous and impossible to categorize Nicholas Brothers, Fayard (1914–2006) and Harold (1921–2000).

Overcoming racial hurdles to headline on Broadway, radio, and television—as well as in vaudeville and nightclubs—the self-taught dancers were beloved for show-stopping numbers, performed with consummate grace and a sly sense of humor, in such movies as Down Argentine Way, Sun Valley Serenade, and Stormy Weather. Their effortless balletic moves, elegant tap dancing, and jaw-dropping leaps, flips, and splits garnered them innumerable fans and collaborators from Bob Fosse and Fred Astaire (who called their famous staircase number in Stormy Weather the greatest of all musical sequences) to Michael Jackson and Mikhail Baryshnikov.

Bruce Goldstein, who compiled and introduces this event, is the repertory program director at New York's Film Forum and the founder of Rialto Pictures. He wrote and coproduced the documentary The Nicholas Brothers: We Sing and We Dance (1992). (app. 105 mins., video)