Competing with the legacy of Patrick Swayze is no easy feat, especially when it comes to “Dirty Dancing.”
But Broadway actor Colt Prattes holds his own as Johnny Castle in the good-natured ABC remake of the unabashedly romantic 1987 blockbuster that co-starred Jennifer Grey.
In the three-hour TV movie premiering Wednesday night, Prattes, sporting an Elvis-style pompadour, comes across like a lost Lord of Flatbush as the gigolo/dance teacher who attracts women like a No-Pest strip. Vivian Pressman (Katey Sagal), a rich widow with a rockin’ body, “rewards” Johnny with one of her dead husband’s watches after a good night’s work. Dancing partner Penny (Nicole Scherzinger) sticks with him through good times and bad.
The woman who takes him by surprise is Frances Houseman (Abigail Breslin), nicknamed Baby. The utterly plain introvert is dragged to Kellerman’s, an upstate New York Borscht Belt resort, by her well-meaning parents (Bruce Greenwood and Debra Messing). Elder sister Lisa (Sarah Hyland) plans to do some husband hunting but Baby could care less. “You can’t spend the whole summer with your nose buried in books,” her surgeon father warns.
Baby’s world outlook changes dramatically the night she sneaks into the staff-only lounge on the Kellerman property. Having just seen a tastefully choreographed stage show in the dining room, she has one of several epiphanies in the film as she watches the young waiters and dancers executing all the right moves at a hot and sweaty dance party. I want some of that, she thinks. But who will be her teacher? Hmm … Lawrence Welk or Johnny Castle?
“Dirty Dancing,” which is based on the original film script by Eleanor Bergstein, follows the formula for a successful Hollywood romance, with the girl-pursues-bad-boy storyline coming to its usual conclusion of acceptance by the disapproving dad while Baby “becomes a woman.” The romantic longings of the older generation are addressed as well as the elder Housemans confronting the lack of passion in their marriage. Soon enough, everybody is getting it on — and singing!
Much of the corniness is camouflaged with one musical number after another, many of which work well. Some, like Sagal — a television MVP at this point — singing Peggy Lee’s “Fever,” are sensational, reminding you why Bette Midler hired her as a Harlette back in the day: She can sing her ass off.
There are several surprises: Who knew Greenwood, usually cast as a professional heel, could sing? And the adorable Hyland proves that “Modern Family” has only begun to scratch the surface of what she can really do, as she plays the ukulele and sings a sweet duet of Bob Dylan’s “Don’t Think Twice” with “Hamilton” up-and-comer J. Quinton Johnson.
Breslin does a credible job with the role of Baby, despite being saddled with the unseemly subplot involving a back-alley abortion that calls Baby’s smarts, which everyone talks about, seriously into question. Considering Grey’s lukewarm post-“Dancing” career, she doesn’t have to scale the same heights as Prattes. The film tries to make a star out of him, and if that doesn’t quite happen, it nevertheless succeeds at showing the hidden talents of some of the medium’s most durable stars.