Gene Kelly’s Cold War mission for JFK revealed
PARIS: He starred in one of the most iconic musical moments in film history, but
his wife said that Gene Kelly also had a cameo in the Cold War.
Patricia Kelly was just 26 when she was sent to make a documentary about the
legendary dancer, then 73. She soon became his biographer, and his third and final wife.
Among the surprising tales she gathered about Kelly´s eventful life was his time
as a cultural ambassador to Africa at the peak of the Cold War.
Kelly was close to US president John F Kennedy. "They were buddies," Patricia
told AFP. "Gene used to sing Irish rebel songs with him in the White House."
After performing at Kennedy´s inauguration in 1964, he fell into conversation in