I have never had anything that I can remember in the business - and that includes all the movies and the stage shows and everything - that I didn't enjoy. I didn't like some of the small-time vaudeville, because we weren't going on and getting better. Aside from that, I didn't dislike anything.

I have no desire to prove anything by dancing ... I just dance.

There comes a day when people begin to say, 'Why doesn't that old duffer retire?' I want to get out while they're still saying Astaire is a hell of a dancer.

I often take a brand-new suit or hat and throw it up against the wall a few times to get that stiff, square newness out of it.

It's nice that all the composers have said that nobody interprets a lyric like Fred Astaire. But when it comes to selling records I was never worth anything particularly except as a collector's item.

Slippery stages were the terror of my life.

Either the camera will dance, or I will.