Dirty Dancing

Question: When Baby helps Penny out by dancing with Johnny at the Sheldrake hotel, it is stated that it is Thursday night (when Penny has the abortion). At breakfast the next day Baby's dad says they are leaving tomorrow, even though they are paid up til Sunday. Thursday night is the first night that Baby and Johnny sleep together, yet they seem to be seeing each other for ages before Johnny even gets sacked, let alone the time that's past when he comes back. I don't see how all of this be squeezed into 2 days?

Answer: The father says they're leaving the next day, but when the mother asks why, he realizes he'd need to explain what happened, so he decides not to leave, and they stay for the rest of the trip as originally planned.

Answer: They were there for 3 weeks, so they had been together for at least 2 weeks.

Question: When Johnny takes Baby up to do the final dance, Baby's dad is obviously pretty angry about it and tries to stop him. However, after the dance all is forgiven? All just from the magic of their beautiful dancing?

Answer: It would be improper to cause a scene, plus Robbie admitted to getting Penny pregnant and insulting her, especially it's what made get an abortion and medical complications.

Answer: While he probably was still angry with Johnny for sleeping with Baby, he can see how hard she must have worked to dance so well. Anger is often hard to release. Being a loving father, he is proud of Baby "in the moment" and was more disappointed with her than mad. He likely also grudgingly admires Johnny for having the courage to stand up for her.

raywest

Answer: It is implied that she was.

raywest

Question: Despite it being pretty clear Penny had an illegal abortion the word is never said in the whole film. Was that still taboo in the 80s? Or is it more indicative of how people in the 60s didn't want to use the word directly?

Answer: I think it's both reasons. Abortion has always been a controversial topic, so the movie apparently preferred to avoid the word. In that time period, abortion was still strictly illegal, so the people around Penny would likely not say the exact word out loud to protect her and keep it as quiet as possible. It was typical to allude to something like that in a more colloquial manner, such as "getting rid of it." It's similar to how people would rarely even say "pregnant." It was always terms like "expecting," "in a delicate condition," "in a family way" etc.

raywest

Question: Baby's dad comes by to check on Penny after her botched abortion and confirms she can still have kids in the future... Wouldn't further tests have been needed to establish this? Not just a house doctor examination?

Answer: It seems unlikely that the doctor could confirm that Penny could have children without her having a complete medical exam to ensure there was no internal injury, infection, complications, etc. I think this was merely a plot device known as "suspension of disbelief." It's meant to tie up that part of the story so the audience isn't left wondering what happens to Penny. The movie can then focus back on Baby and Johnny and the rest of the story.

raywest

Continuity mistake: In the last dance scene of the movie, Patrick Swayze jumps down from the stage and the hair on his forehead which was completely dry is suddenly very wet and plastered to his head. (01:32:30)

More mistakes in Dirty Dancing

Johnny: You just put your pickle on everybody's plate, college boy, and leave the hard stuff to me.

More quotes from Dirty Dancing

Trivia: In the scene where Johnny and Baby practice dancing, and she keeps laughing when he runs his arm down hers, it was not part of the scene, she was actually laughing and his frustration was genuine. They left it in the movie because it was effective. Baby falling over in this scene was unplanned too.

More trivia for Dirty Dancing

Join the mailing list

Separate from membership, this is to get updates about mistakes in recent releases. Addresses are not passed on to any third party, and are used solely for direct communication from this site. You can unsubscribe at any time.

Check out the mistake & trivia books, on Kindle and in paperback.