Tom Holland confirms he’s playing Fred Astaire in an upcoming biopic

Tom Holland has confirmed he is set to play Fred Astaire in an upcoming biopic, 13 years after landing his big break playing aspiring dancer Billy Elliot in the West End.

The actor, 25, confirmed the news to reporters on Sunday at a London screening of his new movie Spider-Man: No Way Home, which is hitting theaters later this month, as he divulged: ‘Oh I am playing Fred Astaire, yeah. The script came in a week ago. I haven’t read it yet. They haven’t given it to me.’

There is much to cover in a biopic of Hollywood legend Fred, who enjoyed a career spanning 76 years and a raft of box-office hits, many of them with his most famous dance partner Ginger Rogers. The movie will also delve into his personal life no doubt, including losing his first wife in 1954 and bringing up their kids.

Tom’s dance credentials line-up to take on the role, as the Kingston-born star has been taking classes in street dance and acrobatics since he was 10 before making his way to the stage to play Billy where he honed his skills.

Tom explained that he knows Spider-Man producer Amy Pascal, ‘has the script,’ adding: ‘She FaceTimed me earlier. I was in the bath. We has a lovely FaceTime, but I will be playing Fred Astaire’.

Sony Pictures confirmed to Variety that the Fred Astaire biopic is in ‘very early stages’ of development. No writer or director has been confirmed for the biopic, nor has the film’s title at this time.

It has long-been reported that there is a clause in Astaire’s will banning film portrayals of his life, after he said: ‘However much they offer me—and offers come in all the time—I shall not sell. It is there because I have no particular desire to have my life misinterpreted, which it would be’.

There was mixed reaction among fans of both Tom and Fred, with some lauding the decision and others panning the idea as Twitter users flooded the microblogging site to weigh in after Tom’s big reveal.

Critics penned: ‘There is no way Tom Holland can dance like Fred Astaire. Now I wanna know who will play Ginger Rogers… not sure how i feel about tom holland being fred astaire, but thank GOD its not [Timothée Chalamet]…

‘If Tom Holland is gonna play Fred Astaire, then boy does he have his work cut out for him… Tom Holland as Fred Astaire weird choice but okay whatever, the real question who’s going to be playing Ginger.’

Supporters meanwhile wrote: ‘I am so, so, so excited about this!… Tom Holland is playing Fred Astaire? Umm that’s perfect… When I tell you, I can’t WAIT for Tom Holland to play Fred Astaire!!! This is him at 12… How perfect is casting Tom Holland as Fred Astaire Smiling face with heart-shaped eyes well done to that casting panel.’

Astaire, born Frederick Austerlitz, enjoyed a career spanning 76 years and a slew of hits, many with dance partner Ginger. The son of a brewer from Nebraska, Fred was performing with his sister Adele from the age of five, before he headed to Hollywood in 1932 and formed one of Tinseltown’s great partnerships – Fred and Ginger.

They struck box-office gold with Flying Down To Rio in 1933, and nine more movies with Ginger including Top Hat, which won four Oscar nominations. At the height of his popularity in the late 30s, Fred was worth so much to the Hollywood studios he had his legs insured for $1 million.

After Flying Down to Rio, where they played second fiddle to Dolores del Rio and Gene Raymond, the following year they starred together in The Gay Divorcee.

Their subsequent films, including 1935’s Top Hat, 1936’s Follow the Fleet, 1936’s Swing Time and Shall We Dance in 1937. In his later years, he focused on dramatic acting, and won a Golden Globe nomination for his supporting turn in Stanley Kramer’s nuclear war drama On the Beach in 1959.

He earned his sole Oscar nomination as Best Supporting Actor for the disaster flick The Towering Inferno in 1974. The movie also brought him victories at the Golden Globes and BAFTA.

He won a Globe as Best Comedy/Musical Actor for Three Little Words in 1950, before being called up again for  The Pleasure of His Company in 1961 and Finian’s Rainbow in 1968. He received an Honorary Oscar in 1950, the Cecil B. DeMille prize in 1961 and the Kennedy Center Honors in 1978.

On the TV side, Astaire won Emmys for An Evening with Fred Astaire in 1959 and Astaire Time in 1961, and the TV movie A Family Upside Down in 1978.

He announced his retirement in 1946 and opened his own dance studio, but was soon back when he replaced the injured Gene Kelly in Easter Parade in 1948, and he continued to make films until 1957 when he announced another short-lived retirement.

A year later he was back in the spotlight with the first of four TV specials made over the next ten years that won multiple Emmys. He turned straight actor later in life, appearing in disaster movie The Towering Inferno in 1974 at the age of 75, in his last film, Ghost Story, in 1981.

Fred married Boston-born New York socialite and former wife of Eliphalet Nott Potter III, Phyllis Potter in 1933, when she was 25. His mother and sister objected to the union yet he determinedly pursued Phyllis for two years before she finally said yes.

Phyllis passed away after battling lung cancer in 1954. She was just 46. Her death left him to bring up their two children, Ava and Fred Junior, as well as Phyllis’s son from her former marriage, Peter.

He was left devastated by her passing and attempted to drop out of the 1955 film Daddy Long Legs – even offering to pay production, but he was then persuaded to stay.

On June 24, 1980, at the age of 81, he wed his second wife Robyn Smith, who was 45 years his junior and a jockey who rode for Alfred Gwynne Vanderbilt Jr. She appeared on the cover of Sports Illustrated on July 31, 1972.

 Ava previously revealed that Fred was a wonderful father, but had a bit of a temper. She said: ‘He had to take over my upbringing when I was 12 because we’d lost my mother and I became a companion to him as well as a daughter. But if somebody said something to upset me, he’d go out and try and kill them.’

Fred died of pneumonia on June 22, 1987, at the age of 88, after which body was buried at Oakwood Memorial Park Cemetery in Chatsworth, California. His last request was to thank his fans for their years of support.

In 2015, Strictly Come Dancing and Dancing With The Stars judge Len Goodman made a documentary about Astaire called For The Love of Fred Astaire.

In the show, Len managed to track down Fred’s dance partner for the TV specials, Barrie Chase. Barrie was a 24-year-old session dancer on TV shows when Fred, who was then 58, plucked her from obscurity.

The pair were seen out on dates and the rumour mill went into overdrive when they went to a party at Lauren Bacall and Humphrey Bogart’s house together. They became lovers, but split four years later.

Barrie paints a picture of a man who refused to accept second best when they performed. He recalled: ‘Just before we partnered each other for the first time, he took me aside when I was really nervous and said, ‘Don’t be nervous – just don’t make any mistakes,”.

‘But he was heavenly to dance with. There was eye contact, there was none of this ‘I’m doing my bit and you’re doing yours’, it was two people having an experience together, which happened to be dancing…

‘His supporting arm was always exactly where it was supposed to be. You were just transported, you didn’t feel the mechanics of it.’

Len also spoke to Vincent Paterson, choreographer on Michael Jackson’s video for Smooth Criminal. Playing that video with clips from Fred’s 1953 movie The Band Wagon showed just how much Jackson was inspired by Fred.

Len noted: ‘Even one of Michael’s signature moves, where he pushes his hat forward on his head during a routine, was pure Astaire’.

It was revealed that when Fred got to Hollywood, he was sent a note after his first movie audition reading: ‘Can’t sing, can’t act, going bald… but can dance a bit.’.

This is the second Fred Astaire biopic to be happening, with another project in the works at Amazon starring Jamie Bell and Margaret Qualley as Astaire and Rogers, with that project focusing on their successful partnership.

Holland is well versed in song-and-dance, having started his career on the London stage, playing the title character in Billy Elliot on the West End from 2008 to 2010.

Tom was scouted at his London dance school aged 10, when Billy Elliot producers went on scouting missions.  He had worked on street dance and acrobatics but producers suggested he take up ballet to hone his skills and make it possible to play Billy.

Eight auditions and two years later he was finally offered a role in the show – playing Billy’s best friend Michael. On June 28, 2008, he made his West End debut as Michael and it was not until September 8, 2008 that Tom finally debuted as Billy.

Tom was known for his agility and gravity-defying flips, including a forward flip with no hands and his signature backward flip executed while he was walking up a wall which ended Electricity – the show’s signature dance number.

When asked where he got his dance talents from, Tom said at the time: ‘My mum and dad joke about who I take after. I’ve seen them both dance and I have to say, there must have been a mix up at the hospital.’

He went viral in 2017, dancing to a mash-up of Singin’ In the Rain from Gene Kelly, and Rihanna’s Umbrella. He’ll next be seen in the highly-anticipated video game adaptation Uncharted, which hits theaters February 18.