Dirty Dancing, the classic story on stage

Me: (excitedly): I won tickets to see Dirty Dancing! Woohoot!

He: To see what?

Me: The stage show of that movie, Dirty Dancing.

He: What movie?

Me: Dirty Dancing. You know … with Patrick Swayze.

He: Patrick who?

Me: You know … nobody puts Baby in the corner.

He: Whose baby?

Me: We can make a night of it in Melbourne. Dinner and show.

He: Can we go to Whisky and Alement after the show?

Me: Sure. Why not?

He: I’m in.

And so it was that we headed off to the big smoke to see Dirty Dancing – the classic story on stage, having won tickets via a social media competition run by Robbie at King of the Castle Cafe. (Thanks, Robbie!)

Now, I admit that I didn’t mention the word “musical” during the above conversation.

Nor did I seek to elaborate on what Dirty Dancing was about. I figured I’d let Mr P leap to his own assumptions. No wonder he was surprised when we headed to the beautifully historic Princess Theatre in the top end of Melbourne’s CBD (rather than than some seedy dive in the other end).

We collected our A-Reserve tickets at the Box Office and I noted (with delight) that we’d be seated in the Grand Dress Circle.

“Just follow the marble stairs,” directed the staff.

And so we did, climbing the beautiful old marble and brass staircase up to the elegant upper bar area then up another flight of stairs where we were ushered to our seats.

Below us, the stage was bathed in blue and above us was the intricate and ornate ceiling and this grand chandelier.

The show began and we were transfixed (yes, even he).

I’d been intrigued to see how the movie’s narrative would translate to the stage. Turned out, it was brought to life with an abundance of talent, on stage and off.

All the familiar characters were there and they danced (boy, did they dance!), sang and acted their way through an almost-true-to-the-movie script.

The stagecraft was crazy with a rolling turntable, drop-down screens and micro-second moves synchronising the scene changes.

The dancing was amazing. Their legs went on forever and executed contortionist-worthy moves.

The two lead characters didn’t sing but those who did were awesome, filling that theatre with astounding, tingle-inducing vocals.

The dancing was a little dirtier (in an arty way, of course) than I remembered. All in good taste, and beautifully executed … but not ideally suited for young children, I’d have thought. I was surprised to see some families there with primary school aged kids. There are some very adult themes in the Dirty Dancing script and this production didn’t hold back on them. I fancy those families had some interesting conversations in the car on the way home. Their call.

We didn’t have any of those conversations to worry about. So it was a joint selfie (just for the blog) …