How Motherhood Ruined Dirty Dancing For Me

I’m pretty sure it’s a universal truth that as we grow into adulthood, no entertainment is ever as magical or amazing as the stuff we loved in our formative years.  I’m willing to make exceptions for some of our current-day fare (Looking at you, Adele and Game of Thrones), but for me, the 80’s and 90’s was where it was at for awesome jams, captivating films, and quality TV.

Now that I’m the mom of two young kids, I can’t wait for the day that I can school them in the ways of  great entertainment and introduce them to the movies that I loved when I was their age.

There’s just one small problem.  It turns out that when you revisit your childhood faves, they don’t always live up to the nostalgia.

And when you watch certain movies you once adored through the lens of a parent, it gets even worse when you realize they are shockingly unsuitable for kids.

Case in point: One of my favorite movies from when I was 10 years old was Dirty Dancing.  My parents reluctantly gave in when I begged to see it with my three older siblings.  I can still remember sitting in the audience watching the opening credits. The beat of “Be My Baby” blasted through the theater.  Mesmerized, I stared at the silver screen taking in the dancing couples grinding on each other in slow motion.  I just knew I was about to experience cinematic greatness!

After watching Dirty Dancing, every time I was in a swimming pool, I’d try to convince anyone within Marco Polo tagging distance to hoist me up and practice the famous lift from the movie.  So many wedgies, so much water up my nose.

Ahh, I loved that film dearly and the sentiment lasted well into my early 30’s.

But then I had kids.

Recently, as I was flipping through TV channels whilst folding tiny laundry, I stumbled upon my beloved Dirty Dancing. Of course, I had to watch it.  And I was horrified.  Horrified, I tell you!!  Sure, it has a dope soundtrack and tons of sizzling dance segments.  There’s also some serious chemistry between Patrick Swayze and Jennifer Grey, but that’s where the good stuff ends.

To start with, the coming-of-age storyline, set in the early 1960’s, is pretty basic and – dare I say – just a little meh?  In a nutshell, it is about teenaged Frances “Baby” Houseman (Jennifer Grey) who visits Kellerman’s summer resort with her family and spends all her time learning a dance routine with smoking hot dance instructor Johnny Castle (Patrick Swayze), on whom she develops a ginormous crush.

Baby learns all this fancy footwork so she can fill in for Johnny’s dance partner, Penny (Cynthia Rhodes), for a side gig.  If they don’t perform on this one specific night, they’ll be fired for the season and they really, REALLY need the extra cheddar.

Wait, why can’t Penny perform the dance herself?  Oh, because she got knocked up by an a-hole waiter at the camp and has to have an illegal abortion that same night, duh!  Yes, that is the driving plot once you lay it all out.  It’s a bit less amazing than I remembered.

But besides the unlikely storyline, there are oh-so-many things in this movie that are either unsuitable for kids, or will just plain set you up for a lot of awkward conversations with your brood.  It’s pretty darn tough to explain why Dirty Dancing was the coolest movie ever when you find yourself forced into condemning the scandalous on-screen action.

Here’s my list of grievances of the 1987 original version, which never bothered me at all until I became a mom:

1. A Grown-ass Man Sleeps With a Minor

Sure, Johnny Castle is super dreamy and seems like a decent guy.  Maybe he comes from the wrong side of the tracks and has low self-esteem, but overall he’s managed to make something of himself with his dance skills and he’s got good values and a strong moral compass, right?

WRONG!  There is no ignoring the fact that he sleeps with an underage teen.  Baby Houseman is 17 years old, y’all!  That ain’t cool.

Let’s take a moment to note that Patrick Swayze was 35 during the filming of this movie.  Even if Johnny Castle is supposed to be younger than Swayze’s real age at the time — let’s say Johnny is 25, which is a major stretch that could rival Penny’s fabulous split kicks — it’s still a huge age gap to Baby’s 17 years.

Also, it’s gross and sleazy to take advantage of an inexperienced, impressionable teen who has a mondo crush on you.  Not to mention, it’s illegal. Maybe it wasn’t illegal in the 1960’s (I have no clue what their statutory rape laws were back then), but it sure is now.   How am I going to explain that it’s totes kewl for Johnny and Baby to get it on when my mom instinct is shrieking “Stay away from her, you perv!”?

And, I didn’t see a condom anywhere during the love scene between Johnny and Baby.  A scene, I might add, that happens immediately after Penny’s botched abortion and Baby’s dad, Dr. Houseman, stitches her up and saves Penny’s life.  Granted, maybe condoms weren’t a common thing back then.  But seriously, have they not learned anything from Penny’s experience?!   Apparently, nobody cares about this detail.

Bizarrely, the audience is supposed to root for Johnny.  Poor misunderstood Johnny is just this super hot dude who wasn’t even into Baby until she started insinuating herself into his life, so really it’s not like he was pursuing her in the first place.  And she’s an old soul and mature beyond her years and…NOPE!  Don’t care.  It’s all kinds of wrong and suddenly I completely empathize with Dr. Houseman and understand why he didn’t want his daughter anywhere near Johnny.

2.  Penny Has a Botched Abortion

Yeah, so…I mean…maybe this a good teaching moment to tell your kids how to avoid an unwanted pregnancy?  I’m pretty sure that when I watched this at 10 years old I had zero clue about what was happening with this entire story line.  On second thought, maybe I will actually use this movie as an awkward springboard to talk about reproductive rights, women’s health, birth control and sexual maturity with my kids once they are older.  Hmm.  Now I’m conflicted about putting this on my list of cons.  #FutureTherapyBills

3.  Borderline Prostitution

A client at the resort pays for dance lessons with the assumption of getting a little something extra on the side.  I’m talking about unfaithful cougar, Vivian Pressman, who pops over to Kellerman’s whenever her hubs is out of town so she can take special “dance lessons” (aka the mattress mambo) with Johnny.  The owner, Max Kellerman, seems to know his staff are turning tricks with the guests, and does nothing to stop it.

4.  Baby is Constantly Sneaking Around Behind Her Parents’ Backs

Yeah. I know. I guess I’m just going to have to fold on this one.  I was a major rule-follower in my adolescence, and technically this is typical teen behavior.  But still, I don’t want my kids to get any ideas, ya know what I mean?  And I’m 99.9% positive that this movie is the only way they could ever learn about sneaking around.  #LiesITellMyself

So there you have it: Dirty Dancing is awful and will corrupt your kids if you let them watch it.  Thanks a lot, Motherhood, for taking a once-perfect childhood gem and rendering it utter dreck whilst exposing me as a prudish goody-two-shoes.

On a side note, I think it’s obvious that I’m in for a hellacious ride when my kids hit puberty.

But fear not, because when that day arrives, I’ll have an arsenal of helicopter parenting techniques under my belt, and will be expertly equipped to shelter my kids from all the salacious evils of the world.

I plan to start my curriculum with Blockers — the John Cena comedy about a group of parents foiling their teen daughters’ pact to lose their v-cards on prom night.  I’m pretty sure Dr. Houseman could’ve benefited from this, had it existed in his day.  Or if he was a real person.

Alternately, I suppose there’s the option of engaging my kids in open conversation and raising them to become critical thinkers and make smart life choices…but I’m really feeling that John Cena is the right way to go here.