Posted on 12 November 2007 by tomatocasual.com
You Say Tomato, I Say YouTube
By Michelle Fabio
“You say tomayto, I say tomahto….”
It’s one of the most popular phrases in the English language, but do you know where it comes from?
Give yourself an heirloom if you recognize it from the 1937 Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers’ classic film “Shall We Dance,” the seventh movie that the dancing pair filmed together.
The timeless “tomato” phrase comes from “Let’s Call the Whole Thing Off,” a clever song written specially for the movie by Ira and George Gershwin; recently the American Film Institute named the catchy tune #34 on its 100 years…100 songs list.
You can get more information on this enjoyable film on, where else, Rotten Tomatoes, and watch a clip of the famous tomato scene here:
November 12th, 2007 at 3:14 pm
Growing up we had Louis Armstrong and Ella Fitzgerald CD that we listened to all the time. “Let’s call the whole thing off” was one of my favorites. So yes, I did know where the phrase came from.
Fun Blog.
November 13th, 2007 at 9:56 am
Kudos to you French for a While! Glad you’re enjoying your time at TC
January 14th, 2008 at 11:31 am
[...] watching the classic “You Say Tomayto, I Say Tomahto” scene? I wrote about it over at Tomato CasualTomato Casual and discovered lots of interesting tidbits about that [...]