Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers Fred Astaire (May 10, 1899 – June 22, 1987) and Ginger Rogers (July 16, 1911 – April 25, 1995) were iconic dance partners who made motion pictures together from 1933 to 1949. They made a total of 10 films, nine of them with RKO Radio Pictures from 1933 to 1939, and one, "The Barkleys of Broadway", with M-G-M in 1949, their only color (Technicolor) film. Many years later, they became known by the portmanteau nickname of "Fringer", popularised by Australian entertainer Dave Gorr. Astaire started dancing in the early 1900s as a child on stage
Ginger Rogers Rogers also made television acting appearances until 1987. In 1992, Rogers was recognized at the Kennedy Center Honors. She died of a heart attack in 1995, at the age of 83. Rogers is associated with the phrase "backwards and in high heels", the title of her memoir, attributed to Bob Thaves' "Frank and Ernest" 1982 cartoon with the caption "Sure he [Astaire] was great, but don't forget that Ginger Rogers did everything he did... backwards and in high heels". This phrase is sometimes incorrectly attributed to Ann Richards, who used it in her keynote address to the 1988 Democratic National