Terry Teachout on the arts in New York City
George Raft and Carole Lombard dance a duet in Rumba, a 1935 film directed by Marion Gering. The song to which they are dancing is Ralph Rainger’s “The Magic of You”:
(This is the latest in a series of arts- and history-related videos that appear in this space each Monday, Wednesday, and Friday)
“We look at the dance to impart the sensation of living in an affirmation of life, to energize the spectator into keener awareness of the vigor, the mystery, the humor, the variety, and the wonder of life. This is the function of the American dance.”
Martha Graham, “The American Dance”