About one take/no rehearsals: Notice the ten cuts in that sequence? Then there’s the usual practice of filming to a pre-recorded music track, which allows precise camera-dancer synchronization–and, if necessary, retakes.
It’s not taking anything away from the Nicholas Brothers to say that this routine was almost certainly not shot in a single, unrehearsed take. Unless, of course, the scene was set up with multiple cameras–and even then, the positioning of the cameras would require knowledge of what part of the set the dancers would be moving to, which suggests at least some planning. (And while I don’t have time for a deep research dive, I suspect that I would find that this big sequence is made up from pieces of the Brothers’ repertory of moves and routines.)
However, Fayard did tell an interviewer that the finale–each jumping over the other’s head down the staircase–was done in a single take.
This one-take/no-rehearsal factoid, by the way, seems to originate with a year-2000 book review of Constance Valis Hill’s Brotherhood in Rhythm, and it shows up all over the internet.
