Reality Show to Be Filmed at Mountain Lake
By Lindsay Key lindsay.key@roanoke.com 381-1671
Along with the calm water and cool summer breeze, Mountain Lake visitors may also encounter British accents and TV cameras the next couple of months.
Three employees of ITV, a television network in the United Kingdom, were at the resort this week to scout the lake as a filming spot for a new reality show — tentatively called “Dirty Dancing: The Time of Your Life” — based on the “Dirty Dancing” movie, which was filmed at the lake.
Series editor Ed Sayer, production manager Angie Hill and producer/director Victoria Watts said Thursday they plan to begin filming the 10 one-hour episodes Aug. 17, four days before the 20th anniversary of the release of “Dirty Dancing.”
The series will feature 16 British contestants who auditioned in England for the parts about three weeks ago, Sayer said. The eight men have had considerably more dance training than the eight women to re-create the Johnny and Baby relationship from the movie, he said. The winners earn a one-year contact with Bloc talent agency in Los Angeles.
The weekly dance contests will take place in the resort’s activities barn, and residents are invited to attend. The judging panel will consist of British soap star Jennifer Ellison, champion Latin dancer Thomas Michael Voss and Canadian dance choreographer Sean Cheesman.
Dancers will take on a mix of “Dirty Dancing”-inspired choreography, as well as samba, pop and line dancing, the crew said. The pieces will also include a re-enactment of the memorable lift in the lake performed by Johnny and Baby and a log dancing scene to be filmed at Sinking Creek.
The couple who win each round will be invited to a lake cabin informally known as “The Love Shack,” where they’ll be treated to massages. The losing couple will be escorted from the resort in a 1959 Ford police car, the crew said. Antique car enthusiast Donnie Martin of Newport is letting the crew use his car.
The Giles County community has been generous when approached by the production crew, Sayer said.
“We’re lucky to find all of these resources from the area,” he said. “We have literally been driving up to people’s front doors.”
The crew will largely rely on the area for the “challenges” featured in each episode. In addition to their dancing responsibilities, contestants will go horseback riding on a Giles farm, skydiving and participate in adventure sports on the New River.
The crew visited Virginia Tech this week in hopes of arranging for the contestants to work with the university’s Corps of Cadets and to perform with the dance team and cheerleaders at the Sept. 1 football game.
The series is scheduled to air in England on Oct. 17 and will run through December.
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