[REVIEW] ABC’s Adaption of Dirty Dancing is no Time of Your Life

ABC’s adaption of Dirty Dancing has no lift and falls flat on its face without a recovery, proving that if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

When you think of Dirty Dancing, you think Patrick Swayze and Jennifer Grey. You think of the first time they laid eyes on one another after Baby carried a watermelon for Johnny’s cousin or when Johnny taught Baby to dance for the first time set to Eric Carmen’s ‘Hungry Eyes’ how can you forget this: “Look, spaghetti arms. This is my dance space. This is your dance space. I don’t go into yours, you don’t go into mine. You gotta hold the frame.” And of course we can’t forget the epic, goosebump giving lift at the end? Even to this day that lift still makes us tear up!

What made the 1987 Dirty Dancing so iconic and timeless wasn’t just the cast or the music, but the dancing and the storytelling. The story was about forbidden love between a young girl and an older man who was deemed “not good enough.” Add a set of amazing actors – the late Patrick Swayze, Jennifer Grey, Kelly Bishop and Jerry Orbach and then finish it off with a stellar soundtrack full of hit songs that, to this day, take you back to that exact moment it played in the movie. With that all said and done, what the 1987 version had was a home run of a hit. The 2017 version? Well let’s just say it falls flat in every way possible and leaves the audience feeling like they were slapped in the face with a dead fish. So want to know where and how this one fell? Scroll down and find out what we thought of this…new take on a beloved classic!

Dirty Dancing… The Musical? Did we miss that in the original?

Everyone knows Dirty Dancing is a movie about just that, Dancing. Not Dancing and singing. Just. Dancing. So it was quite a surprise when we opened this movie with the Houseman’s traveling to Kellerman’s in their car and then suddenly bursting out into song. First thought was “Did we start the wrong movie?” quickly followed by a “Oh, maybe it’s just how this version of the Houseman’s travel?” and then we crossed our fingers and continued on. Fast forward to when Baby (Abigail Breslin) runs into cousin Billy (Beau “Casper” Smart), and helps him carry a watermelon up to the staff housing where…everyone was singing and dancing. Okay, don’t panic surely this is just a typical sing with the band as you dance, right? Wrong. Enter Johnny (Colt Prattes) and Penny (Nicole Scherzinger) and then starts “Do You Love Me” and Johnny, sweet bad boy Johnny Castle, breaks out into song as he moves his way across the dance floor with Penny. And that’s when we knew…this amazing, iconic film was indeed turned into a musical.

Now we love musical’s, we’re all for them…but there’s just something unsettling when you take something already perfect, something most people know like the back of their hand and make this giant change. A change that did not fit with the movie or the story being told. Dirty Dancing was already a strong movie without singing, never have we watched the true version and thought “Man, this would be even better as a musical with the cast singing and dancing.” It just wasn’t fathomable, you know the saying “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” this is a pretty good quote that stuck in our minds as we continued to watch. Bottom line, the singing did not work and it took away from the okay-ish dancing, but even if there had been no singing, would it have made this adaption better? Nope. Probably not.

Sometimes less is more, and in this case less would have been better.

Baby’s older sister Lisa, wasn’t a character we often wanted to know more about or a character we wanted growth from, what we knew about her was enough. Her and Baby weren’t alike, they weren’t really close, but Lisa was there for Baby when Johnny left. Same goes with Mr and Mrs Houseman, who were happily married and loved each other and the girls. Jake Houseman was a doctor who finally took time off to vacation with his family before the girls moved on to the next chapter of their lives, we also knew him to be protective over them, especially Baby, but what we got in the original was enough, it told us enough about them to not wonder or ask questions. A little bit went a long way with those characters, but what ABC did with adding more story to these characters not only dragged the story out, but took away from what Dirty Dancing has always been about, and that’s the growing relationship between Johnny and Baby.

The road they took Lisa Houseman (Modern Family’s Sarah Hyland) down felt like a filler, like they had this great actress in Hyland and in order to use her more they stretched the character of Lisa to give Hyland more screen time. This was a problem because they overextend the character too much to where Lisa’s story didn’t go anywhere, it didn’t add anything extra or interesting, it was as if they needed to occupy extra time to drag the movie out to 3 hours.

When it came to Jake and Marjorie Houseman, they totally flipped the script and gave us a couple that are not happily married at all. Actually they are the furthest from happy as Marjorie Houseman (Will & Grace’s Debra Messing) is fed up with her husband’s lack of attention and ready move on and be on her own, she even asked for a divorce! This is a complete turnaround from what we know from the original and the chemistry that Kelly Bishop (Gilmore Girls) and Jerry Orbach (Law & Order) had was not really there between Debra Messing and Bruce Greenwood. Actually, Bruce Greenwood’s version of Jake Houseman wasn’t likeable. He came across a little cold and mean and he was kind of a jerk. How he treated Marjorie and how he spoke and treated Baby felt kind of possessive in a jealous way, which made their scenes together uncomfortable to watch.

Sometimes you have supporting characters you want to know more about, but sometimes what you know about them is enough, and this was a perfect example of diving too deep into characters we really don’t care that much about.

The importance of chemistry when Dirty Dancing.

When Dirty Dancing came out in August of 1987 it was no secret that Patrick Swayze and Jennifer Grey didn’t really get along from a previous movie, but despite that they still blew up the big screen with their undeniable chemistry. Watching the movie, you believed them as a couple, you could see the love they had for one another, you watched the walls Johnny had built come down a bit. They were the couple you rooted for and it hurt when Johnny got in his car and left, but then he returned – “Nobody put Baby in a corner” – and they did their final dance and that iconic lift…it was completely magical and everything they had worked towards from the start. There was chemistry, they had a spark between them and the way they danced together left you breathless; they completely dominated their roles.

So it was surprising and very disappointing to watch this adaption and see there was nothing there between Abigail Breslin and Colt Prattes. Neither of them were very believable in their roles, their dancing was stiff and awkward -not hot and exciting like it should have been (or like we were expecting it to be). There was no sizzle or spark. There was no heart or tether pulling them together, there was a complete missed connection and lack of chemistry between them, and that unfortunately showed on screen in a big way.

Prattes’ Johnny was a jerk to Baby for the first half of the 3 hours, which made it difficult to like him, even when they started their relationship we couldn’t get on board with them together or even root for them in the end, maybe it was the lack of chemistry or how the character was being portrayed, but it was a little too late for us. It wasn’t until closer to the end that we googled who was playing Johnny and found out that 1 – Prattes has never acted before (not at all surprising, as it showed) and 2 – he’s actually a dancer, and was in P!nk’s music video for “Try.” Color us surprised because there were more than a few dance numbers that were difficult to watch him in, some of his moves that were meant to be sexy and hot, were more like creepy and not. (Maybe it’s the choreographer or directors fault, but his dancing didn’t win us over.) Breslin’s take on Baby was just as bad, if not worse. She was rough, cringe worthy, and her dancing skills, well let’s just say she was painful to watch -like cover your eyes and/or turn away from the television because you feel embarrassed for her bad. We know that it must take a lot to take on a role like Baby Houseman, we assume a lot of work would go into the part, especially the dancing aspect since it is a movie about dancing, but Breslin brought nothing to this role, except making Baby extremely awkward and not in a cute way. She didn’t embody it or make Baby her own character, there was nothing memorable about her in this adaption that’s positive. There also wasn’t a lot of growth with Baby by the end. She started in the middle and didn’t really climb or have a break out moment, she kind of just stayed right where she started -unless you count the makeup department making her look a few years older with a little more makeup and hair extensions, but that’s not the growth we were looking for.

These roles are important to Dirty Dancing fans everywhere, we’re pretty sure almost every girl has had that dream where she’s Baby, being lifted in the air over Johnny’s head, so why couldn’t it be treated like a dream role? Why couldn’t it be treated with the utmost importance in bringing these characters to life? Because watching it…it lacked in that sense. Like this is Dirty Dancing, everyone knows this movie, it’s loved by millions, so you’d think instead of it being just another role to get paid for or another role to add to their resumes to show they played a rebooted version of an character from a classic movie, it would be treated like a role of a life time, a role that everyone would remember in a good, positive way, sadly they couldn’t stick the landing.

Final Verdict: Stick to the original and pretend like this one never ever happened.

It’s no lie to anyone who knows me that I was against this adaption since the moment it was announced, but, thanks to Heath Ledger and his incredible role as The Joker, I’ve learned to not judge any movie, TV or Book until I’ve actually seen or read it. So going into this, I told myself not to compare it to the 1987 version and to keep an open mind knowing full well that it wouldn’t be exactly like the original I was so used to, but it was hard! All the changes they made, all the added storylines, the acting, most of the dancing, and especially the singing, was just too much to get past and I unfortunately couldn’t enjoy any of this adaption.

I felt ABC had a 3 hour time slot that needed filling and in order to do so, they dove into these side characters that had nothing to offer and came up with boring storylines for them and completely missed the mark in trying to make them feel important to the story when actually they fell flat and felt like a time filler. I also had an issue with some of the added scenes, the Johnny and Vivian (Sons of Anarchy’s Katey Sagal) song and dance number for example. My first thought, “Why? Why? WHY?” It didn’t fit and was unnecessary. It in no way moved the story along except to show more to the Johnny/Vivian storyline which, in my opinion, was pointless and unneeded. It put a spotlight on their relationship and kind of made it obvious that they were sleeping together, when what we saw in the original was plenty to give us that information. Dirty Dancing is about two people – Baby, a coming of age good girl and Johnny, an experienced older man, who had a “bad boy” vibe going on, who despite their differences fall in love regardless of what her father and others think. With the 1987 version we watched the characters grow. Baby went from an innocent good girl who was afraid of disappointing her father and unable to stand up for herself to becoming a beautiful, confident woman who finally stood her ground and made choices she wanted. And Johnny was a bold, rough and tough, macho man who finally let his guard down and allowed someone into his heart – something this adaption didn’t succeed in doing very well.

I really wish I could say there were moments in this that I liked and enjoyed, but I’d be lying because the truth is, I spent most of the time angry and sad, while yelling at my television saying, “You got it wrong! How could you change an iconic line! Its ‘I carried A watermelon’ not ‘I carried HIS watermelon!’” (I really did yell that, I have witness’.) When I wasn’t yelling or cringing at the terrible acting and singing and dancing, I was crying (and not in a good way) over how poorly they handled my favorite scenes (I’m looking at you ‘Hungry Eyes’, ‘Love is Strange’ and of course ‘(I’ve Had) The Time of My Life’.)

Now, with all that said, I have to end with this… the biggest slap in the face came at the very end, the last few minutes. Before I get into why I say that, let me say this. When the original ended, we were left to imagine what happened to Baby and Johnny, I and I’m sure I’m not alone here, imagined they lived happily ever after, am I right? Well… the ending to this adaption is when I shut my TV off and paced back and forth, angrily wiping away the tears as I tried to comprehend what I had just watched and wondered how they could take a cherished, classic movie and flip it and rip it apart like they did. Now I know this is a “new take” on a loved romance, but there are certain things you do not mess with or change, ever! If you’ve seen the original Dirty Dancing and love it as much as I do and decide to check this awful adaption out, you will know exactly what I am referring to by time the credits roll.

QUESTIONS, COMMENTS AND OTHER RANDOM THOUGHTS

• You can’t watch this and NOT compare it to the original. There’s no way, but if you can, kudos to you. I applaud you. No seriously I do!
• I’m unsure why they felt they had to add all the extra storylines and scenes instead of sticking to heart of Dirty Dancing.
• Why did they have to even do this adaption in the first place?
• Who was in charge of choreography because I find it interesting the choreography from the 80’s was better than this.
• Is Colt Prattes’ really a dancer or is Google and IMDB lying to me? Because most of his dancing was on the creepy side and made me cringe (in a bad way), but that could be the choreographer and directors fault, right? Maybe?
• I didn’t mind Sarah Hyland. After a few scenes she sunk into the role of Lisa and was one of a very few (2) I could actually tolerate.
• Nicole Scherzinger was a smart choice for Penny. I actually like most of her scenes, I didn’t cringe or think her acting sucked. But I will say I found one of the scenes between Penny and Baby very strange, then again it was probably added to make it more “sexy” -which was a fail.
• Was it me, or did the final dance look like a country western shindig and the only thing missing was the bails of hay?
• Can we leave classic movies alone now? If Hollywood is running out or ideas or Television Networks need ideas to fill time slots, call me. I have A LOT of ideas.
• Hey costume department, what was up with the choice of clothing Abigail Breslin wore? Surely you could have found better options -strange that the 1987 Baby dressed 1000 times better.
• And jeans and biker boots on Johnny for the last dance? No. Just no. Nope. Another fail.