Shall We Dance (1937 film) their musicals since "The Gay Divorcee" (1934) – contributed to their least profitable picture to date. Astaire was no stranger to the Gershwins, having headlined, with his sister Adele, two Gershwin Broadway shows: "Lady Be Good!" in 1924 and "Funny Face" in 1927. George Gershwin also accompanied the pair on piano in a set of recordings in 1926. Rogers first came to Hollywood's attention when she appeared in the Gershwins' 1930 stage musical "Girl Crazy". "Shall We Dance" was named at the suggestion of Vincente Minnelli, who was a friend of the Gershwins. Minnelli originally suggested "Shall We Dance?" with
Tchaikovsky (song) Stanisław Moniuszko, Witold Maliszewski and Leopold Godowsky are actually Polish, not Russian, but all three were born in what was then part of the Russian Empire. Ira Gershwin began his career writing lyrics for his brother George Gershwin. Ira, the more self-effacing of the Gershwin brothers, was concerned that music publishers might think that George had chosen him as lyricist on the basis of nepotism rather than talent, so Ira originally chose to write lyrics under the pseudonym "Arthur Francis" (derived from the names of his other brother Arthur and his sister Frances). The song was originally a nonsense poem