Marjorie as Dance Partner

Very interesting, never knew that.

I'll have to watch more closely those dancing scenes. I guess Reynolds did do the simpler stuff and then long shots showed June Chapman. No wonder Marjorie Reynolds never became one of Paramount's musical stars after HOLIDAY INN. I always thought she was the weakest link in the whole film.

Years ago when I did the musical "Purlie" in California, our costume mistress was an ex-chorus dancer from the '40's. She spoke of a good many films in which some actors were made to seem to dance, and and how some dancers cheated in terms of their camera "footwork". Although, she never spoke of Marjorie
Reynolds specifically, she did tell me of how many dancers ( Gene Kelly, Cyd Charisse, and Rita Hayworth as examples) didn't perform some routines in long shot, or how often their "taps" were dubbed by someone else. So, I think it's entirely reasonable to believe that June Chapman may have performed some parts of Miss Reynolds dancing in "Holiday Inn". Stranger things have been known to happen in Hollywood, after all it's the place where professional singers sometimes get dubbed by non professionals!!

I found June Chapman listed as an uncredited dancer for Holiday Inn on the IMDB website:

Other crew
Daniel Dare .... stager: dance ensembles (as Danny Dare)
Bob Crosby Orchestra .... specialty accompaniments (as Bob Crosby's Band)
Jean Bosquet .... publicist (uncredited)
June Chapman .... dancer (uncredited)
Bob Crosby .... specialty accompaniments band director (uncredited)


http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0034862/combined


Now, what type of dancing she did, I don't know. She could have rehearsed with Fred, or danced in the line when Bing was singing his 4th of July number, or was a stand-in for Marjorie or Virginia. Whatever it was, she was there.

So the person who posted about June was telling the truth about her being on the set of the movie and a dancer.

I emailed TCM to see if they had any info on whether she did her own dancing, but they couldn't find "any evidence" of her having a dance double. They suggested trying SAG or the Oscars, which I haven't done yet. Hilarygordon, can you give us any more or more specific info about your grandmother or her experiences with the movie? I'm really interested to find out if what you posted was true--no offense meant. And was she in any more films? She doesn't have an IMDb listing. If she did dance for Marjorie, there has to be a record of it somewhere. They used to keep very detailed records of the making of films.

Many years after the original posts on the topic of Marjorie Reynolds's dancing in "Holiday Inn", I have to concede that Hillary Gordon may be right: her claim here that at least some of Reynolds's dancing was doubled is credible. In "Swinging on a Star: The War Years 1940-1946", volume two of his definitive Bing Crosby biography, Gary Giddins writes that Astaire requested dancer June Chapman (Hillary Gordon's grandmother), a "look-alike", to double for Reynolds in some of the long shots during the dances. The only source Giddins cites for this information is Hillary Gordon's IMDB post (above); however, the fact that he considered her claim plausible enough to include in his book supports its credibility. Chapman must have indeed been a remarkable look-alike, because the substitution is impossible to spot in the finished film.