When a movie proves to be far more successful than expected, studios are eager to greenlight sequels – usually in the hope of setting up a lucrative franchise.
However, putting a movie together isn’t easy, especially when it comes to cranking out a well-structured and tight screenplay, which can take months or even years to complete. This is a problem, since interest in a given film can dry up by the time the follow-up comes to fruition. (Look at what happened with Anchorman: The Legend Continues or Sin City: A Dame To Kill For.)
Striking while the iron is hot is vital in the movie business, which is why a standalone script is sometimes reconfigured into a sequel, as it saves time and effort. After a few tweaks to the first draft, the audience would safely assume the film in question was always envisioned as a sequel.
However, there’s no telling whether this strategy will pay off. A sequel may not come together, even if it fits the source material like a glove. Other times, the finished product works, despite having little resemblance to the initial concept.
Whether or not these ten sequels were a hit or a disaster, it’s fascinating to learn they started off as something else entirely.
Dirty Dancing was a juggernaut at the box office, earning $214 million on a $4 million budget. On top of becoming one of the most defining movies of the decade, the romantic drama catapulted Patrick Swayze into super-stardom. While a sequel getting made isn’t too surprising, what is surprising is that it took almost two decades to arrive.
Said sequel, called Dirty Dancing: Havana Nights, didn’t materialise for a whopping 17 years. Stranger still, it had little in common with Dirty Dancing, since it revolved around star-crossed lovers who fell for each other during the Cuban Revolution.
For this reason, it’s hardly surprising to learn Havana Nights started off as its own thing. Peter Sagal’s screenplay, originally called Cuba Mine, was a political drama that focused on a real-life dancer who fell for a Cuban revolutionary. Lawrence Bender was meant to produce the film in 1992, but decided to work on Reservoir Dogs instead. (A smart choice, all in all.)
When Bender circled back a decade later, Cuba Mine was revamped into a Dirty Dancing movie. Despite maintaining the Cuban revolution backdrop, not a single line from the screenplay made it into the finished film. If not for Swayze’s brief cameo, nobody would think Havana Nights had the slightest connection to Dirty Dancing.
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