Last Dance: The Song That Won Donna Summer Her First Grammy
Last Dance is the song that turned a disco movie nobody remembers into an Oscar winner.
Paul Jabara wrote it for the 1978 film Thank God It's Friday.
He reportedly locked Donna Summer in a Puerto Rico hotel bathroom just to get her to listen to it.
She recorded it anyway, and it became the biggest thing to come out of that film by far.
Last Dance reached number 3 on the Billboard Hot 100 and won the Academy Award for Best Original Song.
It also handed Donna Summer her first Grammy.
That came at the end of a year that already had plenty of hits in it.
This is the chart-verified story.
It's built from this site's own year-end Billboard data and cross-checked against independently published chart and award records.
Donna Summer in an October 1980 Geffen Records publicity portrait.
Image credit: Geffen Records publicity photo, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
The Puerto Rico Bathroom Where Last Dance Was Born
Paul Jabara Wouldn't Let Her Say No
Paul Jabara was a songwriter and actor who wrote Last Dance and desperately wanted Donna Summer to record it.
According to the song's arranger, Bob Esty, Jabara cornered Summer in a hotel bathroom.
The two were in Puerto Rico at the time.
He locked the door and played her a cassette of himself singing a rough version of the song.
Summer liked what she heard and agreed to record it.
Jabara then brought Esty in to help build a real arrangement out of that cassette demo.
The Donna Summer profile on this site covers the rest of the run this single kicked off.
Giorgio Moroder and Pete Bellotte Turned the Demo Into a Record
Summer's regular production team, Giorgio Moroder and Pete Bellotte, produced the finished track.
Stephen Short mixed it.
She recorded her vocal in 1977, the same year she was also working on other tracks for her Casablanca catalog.
The song opens as a slow torch number before the tempo doubles into a full disco arrangement.
That structure, a ballad that turns into a dance track mid-song, was unusual for a single built around a single hook.
| Detail | Fact |
|---|---|
| Written by | Paul Jabara |
| Produced by | Giorgio Moroder and Pete Bellotte |
| Mixed by | Stephen Short |
| Recorded | 1977 |
| Released | July 2, 1978, Casablanca Records |
| Full length | 8:11 (single edit 3:21) |
Donna Summer in the recording studio, September 1977.
Image credit: Casablanca Records publicity photo, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
Last Dance Was Written for a Movie Critics Still Mock
Nicole Sims Gets Her Big Moment
Thank God It's Friday premiered on May 19, 1978.
The film follows several characters through one Friday night at a fictional Los Angeles disco called The Zoo.
Donna Summer played Nicole Sims, an aspiring singer who sneaks up onto the club's stage uninvited.
Her character wins the crowd over on the spot.
She performs the same song that would go on to win an Oscar in real life.
The ensemble cast around her included performers early in their own careers:
- Jeff Goldblum, playing club owner Tony Di Marco, years before his breakout film roles.
- Debra Winger, playing Jennifer, in what's considered her first major screen appearance.
- Terri Nunn, in her only film role before she went on to front the band Berlin.
Even Leonard Maltin Couldn't Take the Film Seriously
Thank God It's Friday was produced by Casablanca FilmWorks and Motown Productions and distributed by Columbia Pictures.
Critic Leonard Maltin later called it "perhaps the worst film ever to have won some kind of Academy Award."
The film itself has mostly been forgotten.
Last Dance is the reason anyone still talks about it at all.
That same gap between a forgettable film and an unforgettable single shows up again elsewhere in this catalog.
The story behind Donna Summer Hot Stuff is built around proving a point rather than fitting a script.
Where Last Dance Actually Landed on the Charts
The Random 70s Song Generator pulls from the same year-end pool this single climbed.
Last Dance entered the charts in the early summer of 1978.
It reached its Hot 100 peak of number 3 during the week of August 12, 1978.
Billboard's Dance Club Songs chart was a much better fit for a song built around a tempo change.
There, it spent six weeks at number one.
A Bigger Dance Hit Than a Pop One
| Chart | Peak Position |
|---|---|
| Billboard Hot 100 | #3 |
| Hot Soul Singles | #5 |
| Dance Club Songs | #1 (six weeks) |
| Cash Box Top 100 | #2 |
| UK Singles Chart | #51 |
| This site's 1978 year-end Hot 100 | #34 |
That six-week run at number one on the dance chart outlasted its time anywhere on the pop side.
The single also earned a gold certification in the United States.
Prefer to hear it before reading the awards it collected? Stream Last Dance on Listen Now.
An Oscar, a Golden Globe and a First Grammy in One Season
Three Different Trophies From Three Different Rooms
The song won the Grammy Award for Best R&B Vocal Performance, Female.
That came at the 21st Annual Grammy Awards, held February 15, 1979.
Paul Jabara separately won the Grammy for Best Rhythm & Blues Song that same night, for writing it.
Few songs anywhere in the Music of the 70s catalog manage recognition from three different industries in one season.
This one won from the film industry, the record industry and the Hollywood Foreign Press all at once.
The Academy Award for Best Original Song came at the 51st Academy Awards.
The Golden Globe for Best Original Song came at the 36th Golden Globe Awards that same season.
The First of Five Grammys From Seventeen Nominations
Donna Summer already had major hits behind her by 1979, including Love to Love You Baby and I Feel Love.
Neither of those had won her a Grammy.
Last Dance was the one that finally did.
She went on to win five Grammys total from seventeen nominations across her career.
Bad Girls, released the following year, was nominated for the Grammy for Best Disco Recording.
It lost to Gloria Gaynor's "I Will Survive," a story told in the Bad Girls post on this site.
This one got there first, sweeping three award shows instead of settling for a nomination at one.
Curious how this song's energy stacks up against other dance floor staples from the decade?
The Mood Song Matcher sorts songs by feel instead of chart position.
Frequently Asked Questions
Who wrote Donna Summer's Last Dance?
Paul Jabara wrote Last Dance for the 1978 film Thank God It's Friday.
He reportedly locked Donna Summer in a Puerto Rico hotel bathroom to make her listen to his demo of the song.
Giorgio Moroder and Pete Bellotte produced Summer's recording, and Stephen Short mixed it.
She recorded her version in 1977, a year before its release.
What movie is Last Dance from?
Last Dance comes from the 1978 disco comedy Thank God It's Friday, set over one night at a fictional Los Angeles club called The Zoo.
Donna Summer played Nicole Sims, an aspiring singer who sneaks onto the club's stage and wins the crowd over.
The film also gave early roles to Jeff Goldblum and Debra Winger.
How high did Last Dance chart?
Last Dance peaked at number 3 on the Billboard Hot 100 the week of August 12, 1978.
It also reached number 5 on the Hot Soul Singles chart and spent six weeks at number one on Billboard's Dance Club Songs chart.
This site's own year-end tally ranked it 34th among 1978's biggest hits.
Did Last Dance win a Grammy?
Last Dance won the Grammy for Best R&B Vocal Performance, Female, at the 21st Annual Grammy Awards on February 15, 1979.
Songwriter Paul Jabara separately won Best Rhythm & Blues Song for writing it.
The award was Donna Summer's first Grammy win, despite several major hits already behind her by that point.
Did Last Dance win an Oscar?
Last Dance won the Academy Award for Best Original Song at the 51st Academy Awards.
It also won the Golden Globe for Best Original Song that same season.
Those two wins, plus the Grammy for Best R&B Vocal Performance, Female, gave the song a rare sweep across three separate award shows.
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