Jennifer Grey Will Star in a ‘Dirty Dancing’ Sequel

Let’s hope we have the time of our lives.

During Lionsgate’s CinemaCon presentation this week, as the company hyped their upcoming projects to the assembled members of the movie theater exhibition industry, the studio confirmed they are working on a new Dirty Dancing movie starring one of the two leads of the ’80s classic. According to Entertainment Weekly, a sizzle reel included footage of the original Dirty Dancing while a voiceover said “Jennifer Grey returns to Kellerman’s in the next chapter.” Kellerman’s was the name of the Catskills resort where Grey’s Baby fell in love with Patrick Swayze’s Johnny in the first Dirty Dancing.

Before you get too amped to dirty dance again, be aware that this project has been discussed before. In the summer of 2020, a Grey-backed Dirty Dancing sequel was reported for the first time. Two years later, it doesn’t seem like a wild amount of progress has been made in the interim.

Dirty Dancing wasn’t a massive hit in movie theaters — it was only the 16th highest grossing movie of 1987 — but it became a phenomenon on home video and cable. Its ongoing popularity inspired a prequel called Dirty Dancing: Havana Nights in 2004 that was basically unrelated to the original beyond the basic idea of sexy dancing, although Patrick Swayze did make a cameo in the film. (Swayze passed away in 2009 after a battle with cancer.)

There’s also been a Dirty Dancing stage show, as well as a TV series, and a TV film remake in 2017. None has matched the success and popularity of the original — but none had Jennifer Grey playing Baby. So we’ll see what happens this time.