Gwen Verdon

Fosse's carrot-topped ladypal, nobody could dance his moves better than sexy, funny, infinitely lovable Gwen Verdon. Gwen's hot-cha figure naturally lent itself to precise interpretation of Fosse's choreography, whether she was slithering around with a derby, doing a pigeon-toed walk with stiff arms, or effortlessly dancing the mambo with a goofy smile on her face. She was a fabulous singer, too; expressive, unique, and specific. The daughter of a vaudeville dancer and an MGM Studios electrician, Verdon was, arguably, the best dancer on Broadway during the 1950s and 1960s, breaking out in Cole Porter's Can-Can, pulling off the dizzy waif-slut lead in Sweet Charity, cockney'ing it up in Redhead, stealing the show in Chicago, and originating the adorable vamp Lola in the Baseball/Satan musical comedy, Damn Yankees. The poster and album art for Damn Yankees features a still of Gwen with her hands on her hips, chest puffed out, belting the last verse of "Whatever Lola Wants" in a black halter and dance shorts. Only when you watch her dance that number in the film (thankfully, she got to play the role in the movie and was not replaced by some idiot) do you understand why they used that photo for the poster. The moves that lead up to that pose are so complex and ornery and funny and demanding—she slips under a bench, there's stripping, lots of shoulder isolations, and then, a phenomenal build-up during the instrumental part of the song, so that by the time she starts singing again—in a ridiculous Spanish accent, no less—she's earned that pose. Broadway dimmed its lights in 2000 on the night she passed away, of natural causes. Verdon is only included in this book because of a fluke, sort of, having to do with her hair color. If you Google "Gwen Verdon" and "fire," you get, like, a million hits. Seriously. The drawings were done before I realized that all of the references were just a way of saying she was a Redhead. Way to go, internet.