These last years, several persons have asked me why am I always blogging about my sister’s affections and the things she most liked (which is not strictly true, but quite so); and my answer has been, each time, “because she liked them”; so simple and complex as this…

So here I am again posting some more pictures and comments about Rita Hayworth. Also, faithful to my sister’s platonic love toward her (in fact a kind of “crush” with her, despite Rita was older than our own grandma, and in fact –if I do not recall wrongly– died before my sister had ever seen any film of her), I will use my sister’s words in a post of hers, years ago, to summarily tell Ms. Hayworth’s family background:

Rita Hayworth was born in Brooklyn, New York, in 1918 as Margarita Carmen Cansino, the oldest child of two dancers. Her father, Eduardo Cansino, Sr., was a Spanish Rrom from Castilleja de la Cuesta, a little town near Sevilla, Spain. Her mother, Volga Hayworth, was an American of Irish-English descent who had performed with the Ziegfeld Follies.

Margarita’s father wanted her to become a professional dancer, while her mother hoped she would become an actress. Her paternal grandfather, Antonio Cansino, was renowned as a Spanish classical and flamenco dancer. He popularized the bolero and his dancing school in Madrid was world famous.

Margarita achieved fame during the 1940s as one of the era’s top stars, appearing in a total of 61 films over 37 years. The press coined the term “love goddess” to describe Hayworth after she had become the most glamorous screen idol of the 1940s. She was, as well, the top pin-up girl for GIs during World War II.

I don’t know if she felt proud of her Romani descent – as her father and grandfather surely did—, or if she ever acknowledged it publicly, but I consider her as a ‘phej’: one of my folk, and a referent as a dancer; and I feel very proud of her prominence and accomplishment.

[Ari Fontrodona, 2015]

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Now, about these handful of pictures below, they were taken in 1941 on the rooftop of Columbia Studios, with Rita rehearsing a dance rutine from the film “You’ll Never Get Rich” (1941) — Needless to say that she got very rich indeed! (She even became an actual Princess through her marriage with Ali Salman Aga Khan in 1949).

(A personal reference: I just love the shoes Rita wore in that session! Not only I am a fan of flat, low-heeled and mid-heeled ‘maryjanes’, but a pair of pearl grey ones with low heels, very much alike those in the pics, were the first pair of clearly feminine shoes I bought for myself (in Manchester) and dared to wear to go to the university –and this was much before I began to feel really girlish and dress girlishly…; I just liked those shoes and wore them with normal boy jeans (or ‘not-so-boyish’ shorts, in summertime 🙂 ) Most people understood I was just coming out as gay, and this was more or less what I was thinking as well. Maybe it was the truth back then, or part of the truth, and anyway, nobody ever told me those shoes were a bad choice for me; on the contrary… I think they helped me, because it was then than I was first suited by one or two fellow students.)

Well, now YES, here is our Lovely MargaRita at her loveliest :

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A final “mystery” photo that might belong to the same session, but not after –or before– a change of shoes (now they are dark), skirt (now it is tighter and has shorter sleeves) and belt, and having put on a waist watch… Anyway, whether it was taken the same day or any other, it is truly a good shot; it couldn’t be better, happier and merrier! ✨

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