In my period of uselessness....

Some other wonderful people on facebook have tracked down some Ginger pics that I haven't seen before, so I thought I'd post em here for y'all to enjoy who don't have facebook!For whatever reason, the images wont shrink to fit, so click to see the whole picture!
Ginger and Deanna Durbin, looking lovely in black.
Ginger with Perry Como at a Radio recording, looking cute and '50s in an up-do and massive skirt!

And while this is a familiar set up, I just love the facial expressions from bothe her and Levant of the set of 'Barkleys'


And finally, a super cute shot of her being surprised by Jimmy Stewart with a camera, outside what is preumably the 'Ginger Rogers' dressing room on the RKO lot. They look so happy (I still secretly wish they'd got married!).

Keep it Gingery y'all.
XX

Mortality/Eternity

So there are 7 minutes of the anniversary of Ginger's death left here in the UK. I remembered her by watching for the first time 'Upperworld', the only film in which Ginger's character dies. I have been waiting for the appropriate time to watch this, and this seemed perfect.

I don't really want to add too much to this post, partially as there are only now 5 minutes remaining, but partially because while today is a celebration of the time Miss Rogers spent here, I feel it's a quieter occasion.

So this is what I've to say.

Thank you. For the moments of joy you afford each of us, for your legacy, for the sacrifice of much of your life to the service of others. But most of all, thank you for remaining true to yourself, there were those who hated you for it, there are those who never understood it, but for maintaining joy, integrity and pride in what you did, there is yet to be your equal.

On this day, know that we remember you.

And that we will keep on keeping it Gingery.

Beth XX

Older Ginger [5 a day]

Proving you can age gracefully in Hollywood!

Although even Ginger couldn't pull off the 1980s! Good lord, look at the sleeves!

XX

Miss Ginger the Fashionista [5 a day]

Because this lovely lady knew how to dress!

XX

5 a day!

To begin a candid publicity shot from 'Don't bet on Love' to set the mood!

Well if nothing else my current insomnia is getting my posting more frequent! As mentioned yesterday, I recently unearthed a stash of pics I found over the summer. Now this being a while back I can't remember what I posted. Also given my absence for a few months, others may have posted these already... so if they are duplicates, I hope you'll forgive me and enjoy the Ginger goddess nonetheless!

Format, I've decided to give y'all 5 a day, in the fashion of fruits and vegetables... a healthy serving of Gingery goodness to keep the blues away! They seem for the most part to fall in to sets, Ginger and sport, Ginger in fashion, beauty shots Ginger and friends, Ginger and pets, Ginger and food etc! So I'll post one at a time.... starting today with....

GINGER IN THE SUN... you see its the first sunny warm day of the year in England and I'm hoping the sun may be inspired to stay out!

And hell, I'll throw in a sixth which I'm sure y'all have seen but I love too much to miss!

Stay healthy!

Beth XX

So haven't posted in a while... [lent, flapperdoodles and Bones]

As I have been having a pretty uneventful life of late! When scouring my external hard drive I came across a folder of pictures of Ginger I found at the end of the summer, some of which I'm fairly sure I haven't shared, so shall be posting these as I find the time! Here's hoping I'm not just duplicating photos found in my absence. I love the one above!

But anyway, decided to regale you with a few tales of Beth which relate (somewhat vaguely) to Ginger.

To begin with... LENT! Taking inspiration from Ginger, have given up alcohol for let. NOwthis may seem a non-issue to many of you, but as a student, ye olde beer/vodka composes a large part of our diet here in the UK. So am thus far avoiding peer-pressure and following Gingers teetotality... if thats not already a word... I coin it!

Secondly, building on earlier figure skating post... those of you who haven't already should check out the original and free routines of the couples that finished first and second in the ice dance, Canadian, Moir and Virtue (specially their original) and that Phantom free routine of the americans... STUNNING!

Valentines was unremarkable except for some super cute Valentines I ordered from Kate Gabrielle's flapperdoodle site! If you haven't already head across and have a look at her art... she does theses adorable cartoon flappers, and also has a range of classic movie inspired stuff. As a young artist she needs all the help we can give and her work deserves to be seen, its all super quirky and to steal a word "spiffy"
http://flapperdoodle.blogspot.com/
There's the link... go on... you wont regret it!


And finally, somethng I'm suprised I haven't already bored you with. Since before Christmas I've been a little bit hooked on the TV show 'Bones'. Now I'm not exactly sure why I love it so much, I just adore the mix of characters, the way the leads (Emily Deschanel/David Boreanaz) have a chemistry that could burn down buildings, combined with some pretty excellent scripting, fun supporting cast and high levels of interest plotwise... you get the picture! Also, Bones is not about sex for the most part, which is something I find kinda wearing on TV, so its a nice change to see genuine loving relationships without having the physical thrust in our faces. Anyway... I LOVE IT, and I was struck today when rewatching an episode that Bones (Deschanel) may have the best eyes in the world since Ginger. Indeed, hers are the colour I imagine Ginger's to be when I see her in black and white (Though actually Ginger's are a wee bit darker). The physical resemblance goes no further, but of modern TV, she is certainly my favourite leading lady!

Not always obviously pretty, Emily has stunning bone structure, and is in my opinion quirkily very beautiful, not mentrion actually a normal dress size! Also, very driven and motivated to stand up for what she believes in (Vegan Animal rightsy stuff). In a Gingery fashion, she's pretty diversely talented good singer,sportsy ( no jokes has some mad trapeze skills!), not to mention a pretty spiffy dresser (with a deal of 30s/40s inspiration) so another Beth inspiration! Ginger does of course trump her, but having a living actress I enjoy watching does have it's perks!

Thats's pretty much it, and not really Ginger related but I figured I'd let you know whats happening in my life... any other Ginger and bones fans??

XX

Ginger Torvill and Fred Dean

So here's something you mayn't know about me... when I was a wee lass, I was OBSESSED with figure skating, I wanted to skate so badly. But the nearest rink was far far away and the whole thing was expensive. SO my mother sent me dancing instead as this was cheaper ( she also sent me to improve my spatial awareness... I was the clumsiest child ever, but thats a story for another day!). Anyway, I still like to watch figure skating, even though I've since forgiven my mother for this early travesty. SO Iwas youtubing some of the teams for the WInter Olympics (woop!!) and came upon this link.

I'm guessing some of you may have heard of Torvill and Dean, one of the most famous Ice Dance pairs ever, and pretty much the only famous British skaters! They won gold in the 1984 WInter Olympics with the first and only perfect score, 12 6.0s! (Their routine Bolero is worth a recce if you've a few minutes to spare, stunning!). But the point of this increasingly longwinded post is as follows.

After the '84 Olympics, Torvill and Dean went pro, and choreographed numerous fantastic ice dance shows. In one they paid tribute to our very own Fred and Ginger, which is the video I came across.

The quality is pretty awful, but I love the music combo they use (Change Partners eeee!) It lovely to see a tribute to the wonderful pair in a different genre, even if they don't entirely capture the essence, any exposure and worship of the classics is good in my book. They manage some on ice tapping which is pretty difficult, Also they do rather a simiilar thing to the lifts at the end of the Yam, towards the end, which I thought was nice! Amusingly, Torvill's feather dress can be seen to shed rather excessively during the Cheek to Cheek section

So here's the video...



Hope this was of interest to some of you! They also tried a second time with a "Putting on the Ritz number, in which I think they're actually more in the style of Fred and Ginger though it's up tempo and shorter.



I enjoyed writing this post, looking forward o the olympics!
Keep it Gingery

Beth XX

Photoshooting, vintage stylee (well partly!)

Last week I got the opportunity to go and have some professional photos shot for free (lucky me!). I got to shoot three outfits and wanted to show various sides of myself, so here's what's what!

Of course Ginger was gonna impact on my look, had a nice chat with the makeup lady about managing my curls, in to more of a thirties style, but keeping it me-ish. She said she was just relieved I didn't want Cheryl Cole hair, as she's already done that 5 times that morning!! Make-upwise I originally thought, I'll go all forties glamour, but then when I chose my outfits, it didnt seem right to wear such heavy make-up. In the end, I asked for, forties movie star on a day off, just to highlight my eyes rather than really make them up, and for a bolder than natural lip colour, but not a bright red, as being a pale skinned creature, this makes me look vampiric. Here's a resulting headshot.

Outfit wise, I went for one vintage look, with a dress I found in a charity shop, seamed stockings, red midheels which are modern but vintage in style and this cutesy necklace I got for christmas.

Then I went for a more eveningy look with a dress my mamma got me for Christmas, which I love, and some killer heels I found in the sales, I have a major shoe lust going on at the moment, and needed an excuse to break these babies out. In the end, I didn't like a lot of these pictures as the photographer made me pose in ways that weren't commfortable, and it showed in my face.

Lastly I wanted to do a more casual look, so I wore a chose a huge sweater from Topshop, Black tights, and some '40s kid style flats I picked up in a vintage shop in London, these are probably some of my favourite shots!
All of course topped with my signature hair ribbon! If anyone stuck with this rather epic post, then thanks for reading!

Hopefully shall be back soon with something exciting and Gingery to say...

Beth XX

Finding Beth...

Having read the responses to my prior post, I'm here to in form all y'all who read, or have at one point read my Gingerised blog adventure, that things are going to change a bit.

I started this blog because I wanted to share my hunt for Ginger with others who love her as I do, and for the most part, we succeeded in finding her. BUt you can't search for ever, so this blog is going to have to take a new direction.

You see, I can tell you what I think of Ginger, which can pretty much be summed up in the word 'swell', and I can tell you all about her films and facts and the whole wonderful shebang, but to be honest, you can read/watch the latter yourself, and the first is a limited field. So from now onwards, I'm going to post more broadly, and talk about myself more; the things that Ginger has taught me, other films, other aspects of life, etc. If that's not what you signed on for, then I hope you find something that is, and thanks for reading. But I have faith in the blogging community, that your interest in what I have to say is more than just looking for another source of Ginger worship.

My blog will remain dedicated to Miss Ginger Rogers, as she remains my inspiration, and I shall post as much of her as I can. But wonderful as she is, I can't let Ginger, or anyone else limit me, and Finding Ginger, should never get in the way of Ffinding myself. My blog will remain vintage in spirit, Gingerish all over, but from this moment, will be Beth at heart.

XX

The only way to enjoy anything in life is to earn it first

It's been a very long time since I posted anything and I decided the time had come to face the fact. This is and isn't about Ginger so apologies for the large injection of Beth in this post.

Since I've been at university, a lot has changed, my expectations of other people, what I do with my time and how I view the world. I really don't like this change, because of all the things that have been lost, the things which made me me, my dancing, my friends, my family have all very much changed roles or vanished altogether. Over christmas, I realised how much I'd changed, and how little I liked who I had become, I stopped watching Ginger films because I had noone to watch with, and people found it strange, also because it was unbearable to see someone so happy, dancing when it had all been taken from me.

So this new year, 2010, 99 years since Virginia Katherine McMath arrived, I decided to turn things about. Now I can't promise to blog with the regularity that my empty summer allowed, but I'm promising this, to anyone who cares, from now onwards, I'll post as often as I have something to say.... and hopefully this will help in my personal remodelling!

SO I shall begin in week one of 2010, by saying this

OBSERVATION - In Bachelor mother, Ginger has normal eyebrows. Now I know this sounds highly bizarre but rather than the pencilled on ones of the Fred and Ginger, early ginger etc, she has fairly natural blonde eyebrows. I noticed this on watching on NYE, and believe it to be a rare if not unique phenomenon! SO on that bizarre note, I shall be off. XX