The Hollywood Dance-In: Abstract and Material Relations of Corporeal Reproduction

Abstract

This essay asks what the figure of the Hollywood dance-in—a dancer who performed in place of a star prior to filming and who assisted the choreographer in the creation of dance numbers—can reveal about the reproduction of corporeality as an operation that is both abstract and material. Focusing on the white film star Gene Kelly and his Mexican-born dance-in Alex Romero, the essay shows how the men functioned as literal and virtual doubles for one another in the rehearsal process and argues for an understanding of their relations of reproduction as queer and racially charged.