Podcast: Interview with Cynthia Rhodes (1987)

Patrick Swayze and Cynthia Rhodes in Dirty Dancing (1987).

From 1981 to 1989, I was assistant producer and co-host of the radio show On the Arts, at CJRT-FM (today Jazz 91.1) in Toronto. With the late Tom Fulton, who was the show's prime host and producer, we did a half-hour interview program where we talked to writers and artists from all fields. In 1987, I sat down with dancer and actress Cynthia Rhodes.

At the time, Rhodes had just completed her role as dance instructor Penny Johnson in Dirty Dancing, alongside Patrick Swayze and Jennifer Grey. Rhodes's brief career in film had begun nine years earlier with a small ensemble role in Xanadu (1980). She went on to play Tina Tech in Flashdance (1983) and was then cast opposite Sylvester Stallone in Staying Alive, the appalling 1983 sequel to the 1977 hit Saturday Night Fever. Rhodes's most famous role, however, remains the one she played in Dirty Dancing.

– Kevin Courrier

Here is the full interview with Cynthia Rhodes as it aired on CJRT-FM in 1987.

Kevin Courrier is a freelance writer/broadcaster, film critic and author (Dangerous Kitchen: The Subversive World of Zappa, Randy Newman's American Dreams, 33 1/3 Captain Beefheart's Trout Mask Replica, Artificial Paradise: The Dark Side of The Beatles Utopian Dream). Courrier teaches part-time film courses to seniors through the LIFE Institute at Ryerson University in Toronto and other venues. His forthcoming book is Talking Out of Turn: A Collection of Reviews, Interviews and Remembrances currently being assembled on Blogger. 

Tom Fulton was the host and producer of On the Arts for CJRT-FM in Toronto for 23 years, beginning in 1975.