I had some time before my hair appointment so I walked down the streets of Toronto and stumbled upon Indigo. I thought, ‘a perfect way to kill time, but Gilda don’t buy any books until you finish the one you started’. I had just started reading a book about love and relationships written by a mental health professional. Then, I stumbled upon the biography section. I immediately knew I was in trouble of breaking my own rule. As I perused through this section I caught a glimpse of Jennifer Grey and that was it. Let me make one thing clear, Dirty Dancing and a little lesser known movie, The Power of One, are my top two favourite movies of all time, which I think sums me up pretty nicely. As I forced myself to walk away I also grabbed Michael J. Fox’s book, as if my right hand didn’t know what my left hand was doing. I had succumb to temptation (later I would discover that these two actors are actually very close friends).
The next morning over breakfast, my son, who saw the book on my nightstand, asked me why I buy other people’s books and that I should write my own biography since they interest me so much. He also said that I should stop reading about actors’ lives (he saw Michael J. Fox’s book underneath). I told him that firstly, I don’t just read biographies on actors, and that I have a lot to learn in life still before I write an autobiography. Also, by reading biographies I can learn different ways of writing one (geez kid give me a break, heavy topic over Sunday pancakes!). I should remind you he’s only 9!
Then I began reading and I was hooked. It was a hazy, humid, dark Sunday summer day with breaks of light and threats of a summer storm, and here I was willfully caged in my room reading this memoir. My husband gently pressured me to come outside and join the living (a.k.a our children) but I was in my blissful cocoon and in no hurry to break free.
In many ways I could not relate to her tales of traveling and moving often throughout her life, rubbing elbows with the uberwealthy and famous, and having parents that were open and fluid with their sexuality, but I still found it fascinating! However, the way she describes her awkward teenage years and never quite feeling pretty enough or good enough was all too familiar.
In chapter 5 entitled “Interesting” her mother, whom she highly reveres and loves, told her at the age of 13 that her adoptive brother was beautiful, but that she was “interesting-looking” in a very matter-of-fact way. Her mother, who had rhinoplasty surgery herself, would later on encourage her daughter to do the same in order to salvage her career. This broke my heart and made me stop and think how life altering this must have felt for her at such a tender age. My own daughter recently celebrated her 13th birthday, and I can’t image saying something like that to her. With confidence, I can assume she must have been projecting her own insecurities onto her daughter because the side-by-side pictures of her and her brother that are included in this chapter clearly shows a stunning young lady.
I truly found myself in Jennifer Grey. The way she describes her boy crazy ways of thinking hit home.
“The only constant in my life, as far back as I can remember, is that I’ve always been in some state of romantic obsession, with the singleness of focus on an object of desire, a solitary crush, like an anchor…My first drug of choice was romantic fantasy…(it) gave me a safe place to escape to.”
OUT OF THE CORNER, by Jennifer Grey
Her experience of feeling alone and not believed—even blamed for—after a trusted family friend sexually assaulted her was difficult to read. The familiarity was shocking.
The phrase “these were my people” is repeated throughout the book as she meets many new people during her formative years. It reflects her changing wants and needs as she comes of age.
When she describes her initial meeting with Patrick Swayze while on the set of another movie I got really excited because I could not wait to finally read every single detail of her experience while make Dirty Dancing. She describes her initial displeasure with Patrick and how she did not think that he would be the right fit for the movie, since she was hired first to play the lead role.
When she described the now famous scene on Youtube of her first onscreen try out with him, I just had to put the book down and find that scene online.
“He was strong, manly, and confident. Having never danced with him before, I had never experienced him in this way. There was no question that our bodies liked each other, in spite of what my head was saying.”
OUT OF THE CORNER, by Jennifer Grey
It moved me to tears. I don’t know why. She was right. His gentle strength, his grace, his sensuality. It all moved me.
Jennifer Grey is clearly a talented actor and a gifted dancer (and a damn good writer too!) but she describes herself as being riddled with self doubt at every turn. She didn’t feel that she was particularly good at any one thing until she became a mother in her forties. So many people found magic in her when she was at her low points which helped raise her up to face unimaginable life challenges, such as a very serious car accident and being continuously rejected throughout her career.
In this memoir Jennifer Grey is so painfully honest and raw about her feelings that I experienced second had embarrassment when, for example, she described how she was profusely sweating just before she went on the Johnny Carson Show. Her fears and anxiety plague her throughout her life which fuels her self doubt. She was scared to do ‘the lift’ in Dirty Dancing in real life too! That moment when she finally does it and that feeling of relief that was captured in the movie was all done on the first take in the middle of the night, with the entire cast and crew encouraging (and begging her) to just do it! She mentions at the end of the book that life is a series of coming-of-age stories. I never saw life this way—and you know what?—I couldn’t agree more!
Thoughts At F___ It Forties 