Vera-Ellen Net Worth

Vera-Ellen's Quotes

• Fred Astaire will never say, though he's always asked, which of his dancing ladies was his favorite partner. If you ask me, he preferred the solo turns.
• I was called a bookish child. Mother sent me to a ballet teacher in Cincinnati when I was nine years old. I guess I was an awkward child and the family wanted me to be graceful. When I found out I liked to dance and people seemed to like to watch me, I was determined to go places.
• I don't remember if I liked [dancing] because I was good at it, or if I was good at it because I liked it. Maybe a little of both.
• The six boys who danced with me in this show escorted me to the depot and their farewell wish was to remember me dancing, so right there on the station platform we went into our routine as best we could under the circumstances. Naturally we attracted quite a crowd and we got so involved in our dancing, I almost missed the train but the boys managed to get me on just as the train pulled out.
• I'm a dancer and I can never really get away from my career. On the days when I don't dance at the studio, I have to practice for at least an hour in the evening to keep in shape. Dancing is like breathing -- missing a day doing either is very bad.

Interesting Facts about Vera-Ellen

1. Suffered from anorexia for years, which led to premature aging
2. Went to the same Cincinnati ballroom dance studio as a child as Doris Day. Their parents used to carpool together to the dance studio.
3. Was once a drum majorette in high school.
4. On March 3, 1963, she gave birth to a daughter named Victoria Ellen Rothschild, who died of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome on June 20th of that same year. All of this took place in Los Angeles County.
5. She was known to have the smallest waist in Hollywood from the mid 1940s through the 1960s.
6. One of the few actresses to have danced with both Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly in the movies, other actresses that have also done this includes Judy Garland, Cyd Charisse, Rita Hayworth, Debbie Reynolds, and Leslie Caron.
7. Fred Astaire said about her, "She was a real accomplished dancer, that girl. Ballet, tap dancing, anything you wanted to do.
8. Her first Broadway appearance was in "Very Warm for May", co-directed by future MGM filmmaker Vincente Minnelli and featuring future MGM co-worker June Allyson in the chorus.
9. In 1977 a gossip columnist reported that the baby Vera-Ellen lost in the 60s had died from SIDS.
10. She was a member of The Radio City Rockettes but was fired after two weeks because she showed too much individuality on stage.
11. It has been reported that she appeared in "Major Bowes' Amateur Theatre of the Air" in 1935, but that remains unconfirmed.
12. She was a lifelong Republican and a solid supporter of Ronald Reagan especially.
13. Her singing in Three Little Words (1950) was dubbed by Anita Ellis.
14. She was originally slated to star in Excuse My Dust (1951) with Red Skelton, however she had to be replaced as she was in London filming Happy Go Lovely (1951) and would not finish that film in time.
15. Married to millionaire oilman Andrew Rothschild he started a divorce suite against her in August 1966.