Jennifer Grey was always a star, but her career experienced heights beyond her wildest dreams when she starred as Frances "Baby" Houseman in Dirty Dancing.
The iconic role had a more complicated legacy for Jennifer. Unlike the rest of the world, she wasn't so taken with costar Patrick Swayze. There was constant pressure on her to look a certain way, which led to her first forays into plastic surgery.
Jennifer opens up about all of these subjects and more in her 2022 memoir, Out of the Corner. She spoke with People ahead of the book's May 3 release and also shared some details on an upcoming Dirty Dancing-related project.
Jennifer Grey knew what it was to be famous before she experienced it herself. The daughter of Broadway star Joel Grey and actress Jo Wilder, she found her star rising in the late '80s after appearing in Ferris Bueller's Day Off, which linked her up with Matthew Broderick, her brother on-screen and beau off-screen. It catapulted in a major way after her role as Baby Houseman in Dirty Dancing.
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Her unique way of growing up had some staying impacts, Jennifer revealed in her memoir, Out of the Corner. One of them was the pressure to get plastic surgery, only to feel differently regarded after she did.
"In the world's eyes, I was no longer me. And the weird thing was that thing that I resisted my whole life, and the thing I was so upset with my mother for always telling me I should do my nose," she told People.
"I really thought it was capitulating. I really thought it meant surrendering to the enemy camp. I just thought, 'I'm good enough. I shouldn't have to do this.' That's really what I felt. 'I'm beautiful enough.'"
"She loves me, loved me, always has, and she was pragmatic because she was saying, guess what? It's too hard to cast you. Make it easier for them," Jennifer said of her mom's directness.
"And then I did and she was right. It wasn't like, you're not pretty. It's like, guess what? If you don't want to be an actor, okay. But if you wanna be an actor …"
The other complicated side of her Dirty Dancing fame was that she was not as taken with Patrick Swayze as the rest of the world was. She was uncomfortable with how the world wanted them to be an item, even though she was with Matthew Broderick and Patrick Swayze was married at the time.
"And the weird thing was, it's like, 'What's wrong with me?'" she said of questioning why she wasn't attracted to him. "I mean, I was not lacking. And he was married. And very in love with his wife. Whatever he was doing, I was not … I was very busy with Matthew. Like, what could be more different?"
Her relationship with Matthew Broderick had been private until a 1987 tragic car crash. He was driving and Jennifer was a passenger when they crossed into another lane and struck another car, where a mother and daughter were killed.
"There was some very, very heavy stuff that went down that changed my life forever and there was no one to blame. And many people might think that I'm here to tell some long held secret," she said.
"None of that, it's just we had an accident. It was a pure and simple accident that was tragic. And it had very serious traumatic lasting effects on, I'm sure, Matthew and the family of the other women and me."
Following that relationship, she found herself dating Johnny Depp.
"There was some heat. It was a [expletive] bonfire. It was literally like, 'Are you [expletive] kidding me? Are you [expletive] kidding me? I've never seen a guy like this,'" she recalled.
"And energetically, what it was like being with him, it was like, 'Oh, I'm being totally, totally compensated for the [expletive] I just went through.'"
Jennifer is all about her second stage of life, which involved working on a Dirty Dancing sequel.
"It was lightning in a bottle, it's like this thing happened, and it's so beautiful, and I can't explain it. No one can explain it," she gushed.
"We're working on this sequel, I'm working on it with Lionsgate and working on the script. We've been working on it for a couple of years. And I know in my heart, I would love to give fans or a young, new audience an experience that would never replicate that, but has the same kind of underpinnings."
"Today people think that their identity is limited, the world has told them what it is. But there are certain people who can see other parts of you," she continued.
"Dirty Dancing was a fairy tale, a successful movie and formula, using dance as a metaphor for embodying your energy and getting out of your head, and your limiting belief systems."
"I believe in my heart that the second half of a woman's life is the best half. I can't speak to a man as I've never been one, but I will tell you that my experience is the second half is the best half," Jennifer said of life today.
"I'm sure of it. I've never felt what I'm feeling these days. It gets disrupted by doing press, by getting hair and makeup done, getting glam and styled. (It's not like doing press in the '80s though!) But it turns out I like to write. I like to have a little control. I like to just be right sized. It just feels peaceful. It's not doing the press of the '80s."
