If I have not previously mentioned it on the Dump, I am a massive This American Life fan. I know you all must be rolling your eyes, thinking what a tragic hipster. Blame my husband and brother for getting me into listening to public radio. But honestly the show is so frickin good and it makes me laugh and/or cry every week. I highly endorse downloading the podcast, if you do not already.
Anyhow - to the point - this past week's episode was about origin stories and there was one I just had to share. It turns out that Peter Sagal (amazingly funny host of another NPR show, Wait Wait ... Don't Tell Me!) wrote the script that would later become....wait for it.....Dirty Dancing 2: Havana Nights.
Turns out Peter was commissioned by Lawrence Bender (producer of Pulp Fiction) to write a gritty script about politics in Cuba during the rise of Castro. Of course the wise powerful people in Hollywood asked him to tone it down and make it more like Dirty Dancing, which had just been a big hit at the time. He did his best but totally hated it and it ended up sitting on a shelf until the early 2000s when somebody decided to take it off the shelf, blow the thick layer of dust off of it and turn it into the gratuitous sequel of the best movie in the world.
I you have no clue who Peter Sagal is, I recommend listening to a few episodes of Wait Wait, then you will realize how absolutely amazing it is that he is responsible for that movie.
I listened to this! And I loved how Hollywood the part where the people are like - could you make your movie more like...hmmm.... Dirty Dancing, oh and add some history.
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