I certainly agree that skirts don’t work for tap dancing. That’s why Ginger isn’t wearing them. But in half those clips of her that I recommended, she’s wearing heels with the slacks, and she certainly looks (and dances) in a feminine rather than a masculine way. She’s a very successful and feminine tap dancer, and in heels at times, too.

Not to mention roller skates and a skirt.

Long skirt and heels here. She manages the skirt by flirtatiously picking it up a lot, so that it becomes part of the dance.

You may change your mind about tap and women if you look at Ginger Rogers in this clip (the dancing starts at 1:38) or this one (starting around minute 5). Or start this one at 3:25. Or this one starting at minute 1.
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Well, looking at the alternative facts 😉 you actually proved my point for me: “girls in heels and skirts just look awkward”.
Ginger is wearing long pants in all of those clips. Eleanor’s awkward look is due to the gawky appearance of her bare legs, which don’t have any “flow” like the slacks on men OR women.

I’d had no idea there was such a building, and it’s worth having a look:

https://www.pragueexperience.com/places.asp?PlaceID=651

When I was younger I didn’t see what was so special about Fred Astaire, but now I find I can’t take my eyes off him when he dances. Or at all, actually, when he’s on screen. And I agree–Ginger was his best partner.

Ginger’s gown for Face the Music is perfect. I wonder who designed it?

Very well put, I think.

There really is something transcendent about it. It becomes more than dancing. Or maybe just all that dancing can be.

betty: from Draper’s LA Times obit: “Draper said he was a supporter of several organizations that had been called subversive by the U.S. attorney general’s office”. It is not clear to me to whom or what body that was said. He moved to Switzerland for three years thereafter.