16. Eleanor Bergstein, Dirty Dancing, second draft, September 23, 1985 (available for consultation at the Margaret Herrick Library, Los Angeles).I have been providing, on this blog, images from a script dated July 16, 1986.
Gruner describes the 1985 script in the following passages.
Early in the film Baby is privy to the removal of camp owner Max Kelleran’s moral authority. She overhears him demanding that his well-to-do wait staff romance the guests’ daughters — ”even the dogs," as he bluntly puts it.At the same time, he orders working-class Johnny to keep his “hands oft” the female guests. In the 1985 draft, Baby was not present during Kellerman’s outburst, and is thus not provided with a rationale for wanting to break from this kind of sexism and middle-class snobbery. The finished film, however, has Baby peering from the doorway.If you have this 1985 script -- or any other early script -- please contact me at MikeSylwester@gmail.com
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The character of Neil was drastically altered between 1985 and 1987. In the 1985 draft, he was a more earnest and less condescending character who starts off attempting to endear himself to the working-class entertainment staff by joining their after-work activities and participating in their banter. Neil’s transformation into the patronizing brat with whom viewers of the finished film are familiar occurs only after he has been beaten up by one of the working-class characters; he is thus given a reason (of sorts) for becoming the “little boss man,” as he is termed. None of this mitigating content remains in the version of Dirty Dancing that reached audiences, and Neil comes across as a wholly unsympathetic character.
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A number of script changes, particularly with respect to Vivian — who was going to be presented in a more sympathetic light (the 1985 draft paints her initially as a bubbly, affable, and artistic friend of Marjorie) — suggest that female characters were simplified during script development. They became less complete individuals than stock representatives, intended merely to act as foils to Baby and her process of personal development.
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Dirty Dancing plays with ideas of femininity and female identity throughout. Such a concern is immediately illuminated in the opening credit sequence.
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It is clear from the 1985 draft that music was always going to act as a non-diegetic commentary on Baby’s personal development. There is what Bergstein refers to as “Clean Teen” songs like “Goin to the Chapel" that emphasize the safe, middle-class girlhood enjoyed initially by Baby and her sister, Lisa. This musical style is equated with repression and emotionlessness. Then there is “Johnny’s Music,” the raw, soulful sounds of songs like “Do You Love Me” and "Wild Thing."
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With regard to Dirty Dancing’s abortion subplot, Bergstein has said that her intention was “to show a generation of girls who have up grown up post-Roe what could happen without legal safeguards.” She first inserted the abortion subplot in 1985 because she was worried that Roe vs. Wade was in danger of being overturned. Given the high-profile public conflicts over abortion rights raging in the 1980s, its inclusion indicates an attempt to inject the film with serious subject matter and to engage with political debate.
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The estimation in which Johnny holds Baby rises throughout the film. His referring to “Frances” as opposed to "Baby” during the final scene acts as a symbolic assertion that Baby has grown up, has become her own woman. Bergstein tellingly cut a line of dialogue in the 1985 draft following the couple’s first sexual encounter that would have weakened the narrative greatly. When Baby informs Johnny that her real name is Frances, in the 1985 draft, Johnny replies, “Frances? ... That’s a real grown-up name. But you’re still Baby to me." Removing the final part of this statement curbs what might be construed as quite a patronizing assertion of authority on Johnny’s part, paving the way for the film’s conclusion.
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