{{Short description|American tap dancer and actor (1911–1997)}} {{Infobox dancer | honorific_prefix = | name = Georgie Tapps | honorific_suffix = | image = Georgie Tapps 1942.jpg | alt = | caption = Tapps in 1942 | birth_name = Mortimer Alphonse Becker | birth_date = November 6, 1911 | birth_place = New York, New York | death_date = {{death date and age|mf=y|1997|11|01|1911|11|06}} | death_place = Burbank, California | nationality = <!-- use only when necessary per WP:INFONAT --> | citizenship = <!-- use only when necessary per WP:INFONAT --> | education = | occupation = Tap dancer, actor | years_active = 1927–1979 | height = | spouse = | partner = | children = | website = <!-- {{URL|website}} --> | current_group = | former_groups = | dances = | module = }} '''Georgie Tapps''' (born '''Mortimer Alphonse Becker'''; 1911–1997) was an American tap dancer. He appeared in a number of films and Broadway productions. He was known for his repertoire of ballet-tap and toured the vaudeville circuit during the 1930s and 1940s, performing in many cabarets and nightclubs.
==Early life== Mortimer Alphonse Becker was born on November 6, 1911, in Washington Heights, New York.<ref>{{cite news |title=Georgie Tapps, Veteran dancer |url=https://variety.com/1997/scene/people-news/georgie-tapps-111637139/ |work=Variety |date=November 10, 1997}}</ref> At the age of seven, his dancing at a church benefit was noticed by a theatrical producer who offered him a scholarship to study ballet.<ref name="NYT"/> He received a three-year dance scholarship from choreographer Ned Wayburn. Upon its completion, Wayburn offered to sign the 10-year-old Becker to a twenty-year contract, but the offer was rejected by his parents.<ref name="WaPo">{{cite news |last1=Battiata |first1=Mary |title=Tales of a Tapping Trouper |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1981/05/02/tales-of-a-tapping-trouper/2713324e-9f24-46a7-97a9-92984705f2c3/ |newspaper=Washington Post |date=May 2, 1981 |access-date=December 19, 2022 |archive-date=August 27, 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170827125559/https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1981/05/02/tales-of-a-tapping-trouper/2713324e-9f24-46a7-97a9-92984705f2c3/ |url-status=live }}</ref>
When he was 16, he performed at a club in New York City. The club's owner called him "Georgie Tapps".<ref name="NYT"/> However, a 1945 article in ''Dance Magazine'' credits New York politician Sol Bloom with suggesting the nickname.<ref name="DanceMagazine"/>
==Career== Alongside Paul Draper, Tapps was among the first tap dancers to popularize dancing to classical music.<ref name="Brittanica">{{cite web |title=Nightclubs |url=https://www.britannica.com/art/tap-dance/Nightclubs |website=Britannica |access-date=10 June 2022 |language=en |archive-date=22 May 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220522225731/https://www.britannica.com/art/tap-dance/Nightclubs |url-status=live }}</ref> Tapps travelled the vaudeville circuit and performed in cabarets and nightclubs throughout the 1930s and 1940s.<ref name="NYT"/>
By the mid-1930s, vaudeville had become less popular,<ref name="Brittanica"/> and Tapps started taking roles in Broadway plays. His Broadway debut was in the revue ''Americana''<ref name="NYT"/> in 1932 where he performed the number "Brother, Can You Spare a Dime".<ref name="WaPo"/> Tapps was friends with Broadway producer George M. Cohan and danced in several of his productions. He danced and had a small speaking role in the 1937 musical ''I'd Rather Be Right''.<ref name="LATimes"/><ref name="NYT"/>
Beginning in 1935, Tapps also took film roles. He appeared in the December 4, 1935 film short ''Katz Pajamas'', part of the Broadway Brevities series produced by Warner Bros., and the 1937 musical comedy film ''Vogues of 1938''.<ref name="NYT"/> That same year Tapps debuted his routine to Maurice Ravel's ''Boléro'', fusing ballet with tap.<ref name="LATimes"/> He performed ''Bolero'' at the White House. Afterwards, his weekly salary went from $150 to $750.<ref name="WaPo"/>
Tapps was involved in a legal case by the labor union Actors Equity in 1939.<ref name="NYT"/>
In 1941 Tapps was cast in the musical ''Pal Joey'' by Rodgers and Hart as a replacement for Gene Kelly, who was leaving for Hollywood.<ref name="NYT"/>
During World War II, Tapps performed for American troops at the American Theatre Wing's Stage Door Canteen venue in New York City in 1943.<ref>{{cite journal|url=https://worldradiohistory.com/hd2/IDX-Business/Music/Billboard-Index/IDX/1944/Billboard-1944-02-19a-OCR-Page-0005.pdf|journal=The Billboard|page=5|date=February 19, 1944|title=American Theatre Wing advertisement|access-date=2022-12-19|archive-date=2022-11-26|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221126165032/https://worldradiohistory.com/hd2/IDX-Business/Music/Billboard-Index/IDX/1944/Billboard-1944-02-19a-OCR-Page-0005.pdf|url-status=live}}</ref> He was also part of a USO tour in 1945, performing for military personnel in Oahu, Guam, Tinian, and Saipan.<ref name="DanceMagazine">{{cite journal |title=Tapps on Tour |journal=Dance Magazine|date=December 1945 |volume=19 |issue=12 |page=10}}</ref>
In 1945 Tapps performed for the dinner show of the Persian Room nightclub in the Plaza Hotel. His opening night performance included five encores. Paul Ross, writing for ''The Billboard'', described Tapps routine in a review as including soft-shoe, a ballet-taps routine, a version of ''Ritual Fire Dance'' by Manuel de Falla, and a piece incorporating flamenco.<ref>{{cite magazine |first=Paul|last=Ross|magazine=The Billboard |title=Night Club Reviews|date=February 10, 1945 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=pREEAAAAMBAJ&dq=georgie+tapps&pg=PT25 |language=en|page=26|volume=27|issue=6}}</ref>
In September 1951 Tapps appeared as a guest on the variety television show ''This Is Show Business''. During the show, guests perform their acts and receive advice from a three-judge panel for show business-related problems. During the show, Tapps' "problem" was that he hadn't been considered for the remake of ''Pal Joey''. After performing his act, the panel informed him that the show's producers had been viewing the telecast and thought that he would be ideal for a role in the remake.<ref>{{cite journal |title=This Is Show Business |journal=The Billboard |date=September 22, 1951 |page=9|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_hkEAAAAMBAJ&dq=georgie+tapps&pg=PA9 |language=en}}</ref>
On March 9, 1952, Tapps was a guest on ''The Colgate Comedy Hour''. That year he also participated in a demonstration of the Eidophore, a new cinema video projector.<ref name="NYT"/> He made an appearance on ''The Ed Sullivan Show'' on May 18, 1958.<ref name="LATimes">{{cite news |title=George Tapps; Ballet and Tap Dancer |url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1997-nov-07-mn-51181-story.html |work=Los Angeles Times |date=November 7, 1997 |access-date=December 19, 2022 |archive-date=December 19, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221219021105/https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1997-nov-07-mn-51181-story.html |url-status=live }}</ref>
After the Soviet Union sent a ballet troupe to West Africa in 1959, Tapps was sent there by the United States Dance Panel in 1961. From December 1961 to April 1962 he performed tap routines in Ghana and other countries.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Mehta |first1=Anjali |title=The Dance Dilemma: The Importance of Dance for Diplomacy During the Cold War |journal=Proceedings of the National Conferences on Undergraduate Research |date=April 2014 |url=http://libjournals.unca.edu/ncur/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/930-Mehta.pdf |access-date=2022-12-19 |archive-date=2022-12-19 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221219021106/http://libjournals.unca.edu/ncur/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/930-Mehta.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref>
===Later career=== Audience interest in tap dancing had begun to decline by the 1950s,<ref name="Brittanica"/> and Tapps had difficulty finding employment. He moved to Los Angeles in 1967. There he gave singing and dancing classes and worked as a salesperson in a Beverly Hills clothing store.<ref name="NYT"/> He later scored a small musical burlesque number in Andy Griffith's 1969 big screen outing, Angel in My Pocket.
Tapps appeared alongside singer Maxine Sullivan in a cabaret program for the Lincoln Center Out-of-Doors Festival in August 1979.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Van Gelder |first1=Lawrence |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1979/08/17/archives/the-scene-at-lincoln-center-moves-outdoors.html |title=The Scene at Lincoln Center Moves Outdoors |work=The New York Times |date=August 17, 1979 |page=C8 |access-date=December 19, 2022 |archive-date=December 19, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221219221849/https://www.nytimes.com/1979/08/17/archives/the-scene-at-lincoln-center-moves-outdoors.html |url-status=live }}</ref> He also performed at the Smithsonian Institution in May 1981 as part of a Museum of American History festival.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Slide |first1=Anthony |title=The Encyclopedia of Vaudeville |date=2012 |publisher=Univ. Press of Mississippi |isbn=978-1-61703-250-9 |page=492 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Hu3nNSmRjZ0C&dq=%22Mortimer+Alphonse+Becker%22&pg=PA492 |language=en}}</ref>
In 1992 Tapps put on the one-man show ''Whatever Happened to Georgie Tapps?'' at the Westwood Playhouse.<ref name="LATimes"/>
Tapps died at St. Joseph's Center Hospital on November 1, 1997, in Burbank, California following a stroke.<ref name="NYT">{{cite news |last1=Dunning |first1=Jennifer |title=Georgie Tapps, 85, Tap Dancer; Performed Onstage and in Films |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1997/11/18/arts/georgie-tapps-85-tap-dancer-performed-onstage-and-in-films.html |work=The New York Times |date=November 18, 1997 |access-date=December 19, 2022 |archive-date=December 19, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221219021105/https://www.nytimes.com/1997/11/18/arts/georgie-tapps-85-tap-dancer-performed-onstage-and-in-films.html |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="LATimes"/>
Fellow tap dancer Bill Robinson called Tapps "tops in the field of straight tap."<ref name="NYT"/>
==References== {{reflist}}
{{Authority control}} {{DEFAULTSORT:Tapps, Georgie}} Category:1911 births Category:1997 deaths Category:American tap dancers Category:American male film actors Category:American male stage actors Category:Dancers from New York (state) Category:People from Washington Heights, Manhattan