It fit into my scheme of things for many reasons. At the time it was true that male dancers were looked down upon, and it was true that a lot of the male dancers were effeminate. But what I was really trying to do was develop something that would be American.

When Ginger Rogers danced with Astaire, it was the only time in the movies when you looked at the man, not the woman.

Things danced on the screen do not look the way they do on the stage. On the stage, dancing is three-dimensional, but a motion picture is two-dimensional.

Any man who looks like a sissy while dancing is just a lousy dancer.

I don't even want to discuss Flashdance. I'm no critic, but that's an interesting phenomenon, that picture.

In fact, I wasn't going to dance in Xanadu, but several journalists told me that Olivia Newton-John kept saying how sad she was that she wouldn't get the chance to dance with me. So I finally said, "All right, throw in a number." But I'm through with dancing.

First of all, break-dancing has been done for years, though not all of it put together the way it is now. But, actually, the distinctions have been blurring since the 1950s.