There is a certain amount of pornography that exists throughout Purple Rain, but the appeal is obvious. You can really pick that picture apart and see where "A" fits into "B" and so on. It was very wisely done.

Like an athlete, [dance] is an everyday job. You have to stay in shape - unless you just want to loaf through a couple of hoofing routines. But that just didn't satisfy me.

I don't understand the whole concept of doubles. They used to do that in the early sound films in Hollywood, but I thought we had gotten rid of that. Now not only do you have doubles, but as in Flashdance, you have triples, quadruples. From my point of view it is bad for the art.

I'd studied dance in Chicago every summer and taught it all winter, and I was well-rounded. I wasn't worried about getting a job on Broadway. In fact, I got one the first week.

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

I wanted to do new things with dance, adapt it to the motion picture medium.

The only thing is that ordinarily when I do dance with [women] they think I am suddenly going to throw them over a table or twist them all around. All I want to do is one-two, one-two-three - a simple fox trot. But they're shaking with anticipation at the thought that I'm about to whip them around and then toss them on the roof.