Coming of Age Films—Dirty Dancing

So many coming of age films are about boys, but as the films get more current, girls get their place in the sun, too. And Dirty Dancing [1987], by Eleanor Bergstein, was one of the first to deal with the coming of age—and the sexual coming of age at that—of an older teen.

One has to wonder if this film, set in 1963, would be made today without changing the main character’s age. Baby, as she’s called, has just graduated from high school and is 17. The romance and sexual encounter that the film centers on is with a 25-year-old man. And despite the fact that the average woman loses her virginity around 15, I’d guess the filmmakers would raise her age to 18 just to avoid any controversy or accusation of rape by the older man.

I mention this because, as a writer, you need to be aware of the culture you’re living in. Sure, you can decide to buck that culture and write as you like, but you need to be aware of the fallout. There would be those who would read your script—see you’re having a sexual encounter between an ‘underage’ girl and a male adult—and simply write your script off. So while your writing life should be about getting your unique perspective and ideas on the page, you should be aware that you don’t write in a vacuum, you write for that reader at the studio who’s going to read your script—and you don’t want them to be turned off by something like the age thing. So, just be aware as you write.

Now, back to Baby and her coming of age. She’s not a complex character. She’s a sort of pampered teen from a well-to-do family who is rather bored vacationing with her family at a Catskill’s resort. She’s attracted to a dance team, Johnny and Penny, who perform, and give dance lessons. Some of their performing is in the range of what’s being called “dirty” dancing because it’s sexually explicit—or seems to be.

Here’s the trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIcmQNy9FsM

When Baby discovers Johnny’s partner Penny is pregnant and needs an abortion, she goes to her dad and borrows the $250 that Penny needs, telling her dad it’s for a good reason but she can’t tell him what. The problem is that Johnny and Penny will miss a very lucrative beginning of their dance contract at another resort for the summer if Penny misses their first performance. So, on a whim—and because she has a crush on him anyway—Baby volunteers to be Johnny’s partner. So he teaches her the “dirty” dancing moves and, of course, they become attracted to one another and form a relationship that’s eventually consummated.

The film was a mega-hit. It focused on that crucial moment in a woman’s life when she moves from being a girl to being a woman—at least in terms of her independence and sexual maturity. And the interesting thing to know from a writer’s point of view is that it came out of the screenwriter’s own time vacationing with her family at a Catskills resort. Like a lot of great stories, sometimes the ones that are most universal are the ones that come from something personal. So it’s worth asking yourself if there’s a personal story in your life that could be a film.

Next week, another young woman, in a very different situation.

Copyright © Diane Lake

25Jul21

Email Diane a question to Diane@DianeLake.com