There is a huge connection between the Catskills and the movie Dirty Dancing. Enjoy the following information about the real-life experiences of people in the Catskills and the actual filming locations used to capture the special quality of the Catskills.

Dirty Dancing was actually filmed at two main locations: the Mountain Lake Hotel in Virginia and the Lake Lure Inn in North Carolina, which were used together to represent the Catskills. It is said that the film could not be made in the actual Catskills due to budget constraints.

Great efforts were made to make the film look like it was made in one place. Actually, this is how the scenes were divided between the two main locations. Mountain Lake is where the Houseman family pulled up in their car to the main lodge, Johnny walked into the dining room and told the college boy where to put the pickle, Penny crouched on the floor in the corner of the kitchen crying, Baby and Johnny practiced their lift on the lake, Johnny danced with Vivian in the gazebo, and so on. Now I must say that both the people of Virginia and North Carolina claim that the famous elevator scene was made on their territory.

At the Lake Lure Inn, the scenes filmed include the indoor dance scenes (of course, the grand finale), the scene where Johnny and Baby practice dancing on a log, the scene in Johnny’s cabin, the scene in the ladder from Baby on the Rock and the employee cabin scenes. Did you know that a third filming location, Rumbling Bald Resort in North Carolina, was used to film the golf course scene? The absolutely fantastic thing about all of this is that fans can still visit each of these three locations and get their fix of Dirty Dancing. One can even stay in the same rooms that Jennifer Gray and Patrick Swayze inhabited during filming in the two main locations.

Returning to the original desired setting, the Catskills in 1963 is the backdrop for the Dirty Dancing story. The Catskills is a tourist area less than two hours from New York City. The area has been affectionately nicknamed the “Borsch Belt” as in its heyday (1920s to 1980s), there were more than five hundred resorts (plus many guesthouses and bungalow colonies) open where many Jewish families vacationed. and many Jewish artists got their start and performed regularly there. The summer region became a cultural entity that became a very special way of life. Many prominent people visited and performed at the resorts. Some of the performers included: Woody Allen, Pearl Bailey, Joey Bishop, Red Buttons, Sid Caesar, Rodney Dangerfield, Buddy Hackett, Mickey Katz, Jennifer Grey’s grandfather, Jackie Mason, Don Rickles, Nipsey Russell, and Henny Youngman. Sadly, there are only about a dozen resorts left open.

Eleanor Bergstein, the writer of Dirty Dancing, vacationed with her family (father was a doctor) in the Catskills. It’s so obvious that Mrs. Bergstein captured the special moment that took place in the heyday of the Catskills, the allure of a simpler bygone time, and that’s part of what makes Dirty Dancing so popular. It is interesting to note that Eleanor Bergstein used some of her other life experiences in the story line. For example, she was called Baby until she was twenty-one, since she was her youngest daughter. In addition, she won dance competitions when she was a teenager and was a dance instructor for Arthur Murray.

Jackie Horner, a legendary dancer/entertainment icon who still works as a dance/entertainment professional in the Catskills, claims she was a story consultant for the film (see Jackie Horner’s special on-screen credit at the end of the film’s credits). ). She reports many experiences that she and her Catskills dance partner Steve Schwartz (known professionally in the Catskills as Steve Sands) had in the film. For example, she told me (I was lucky enough to interview her about the film) that the watermelon was punctured and that she would take it to parties, and that Shelly Winters had come up with the idea of ​​doing lifts in the lake. Also, an interesting side note is that Steve Schwartz (I was lucky enough to interview Steve too) used to spend summers in the Catskills with his family before his father died and then ended up dancing there professionally. He tells many stories about the “Babies”, the “Bungalow Bunnies”, dance activities and daily life in the Catskills.

In conclusion, the Catskills connection is key to Dirty Dancing. There are a multitude of authentic experiences used from the heyday of the Catskills that help make this movie so popular and special. Moviegoers experience things as real and go back to a time when things were simpler.

Link: The Patrick Swayze Pancreatic Cancer Research Fund at Stanford Cancer Center http://med.stanford.edu/cancer/features/research_news/Patrick_Swayze_Pancreas.html.

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