James Corden & Aaron Taylor-Johnson Learn From the Best as John Travolta Delivers a Playful Dance Lesson

Like all legends, John Travolta has absolutely aged like fine wine. The 65-year-old showed that he’s still got the moves when he gave a cheeky dance lesson to James Corden. Corden opened the segment by asking English power couple Aaron and Sam Taylor-Johnson about the time they dressed up as John Travolta and Uma Thurman’s Pulp Fiction characters for Halloween. Sam and Corden then raved about the classic movie, which features an iconic dance scene from Travolta and Thurman.

Corden proceeded to request a dance lesson from Travolta. During his prime, Travolta dominated the dance floors in films like Grease and Saturday Night Fever, and he demonstrated to all viewers that he still knew how to move effortlessly. Travolta instructed the other three in various dances, including the twist, the swim, the hip shaker, the mashed potatoes, and lastly, the Batman. Though the segment was straightforward, Travolta’s charm completely carried it, making it an entertaining watch.

Travolta conducted his dance class on The Late Late Show with James Corden in an episode that was released on December 5, 2019. The uplifting segment gained significant popularity on Corden’s YouTube channel, amassing 18.9 million views. Fans were thrilled to see Travolta return to the dance floor and left comments like “The man’s still got it – you never lose class” and “John Travolta should be declared as a national treasure. Love the guy, so nice, iconic, resilient and positive.”

The dance scene between Travolta and Thurman in Quentin Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction stands as one of the most iconic moments in cinema history. In the movie, Travolta portrays career criminal Vincent Vega, who is tasked with entertaining his boss’s wife Mia Wallace, portrayed by Thurman. The duo visit a venue where Mia insists on participating in a dance competition, and they dance to Chuck Berry’s “You Never Can Tell.” The dance moves Travolta demonstrates on Corden’s show are the same as those in the original scene.

The Corden segment uncovered some fascinating details about Travolta’s involvement in developing the dance scene in Pulp Fiction. The star explained, “Quentin was dead set on both of us doing the twist, which is a very fun dance, but it’s limited in how long one wants to watch someone doing the twist.”

Travolta went on to say, “So I said to Quentin, when I was growing up there were novelty dances, like the swim and the Batman. I said ‘maybe we should widen the spectrum on this.’” After witnessing Travolta’s novelty dances, the director was persuaded, and thus the classic dance scene was created.