Olympic aspirations. A career-long refusal to do scenes in the buff.
Serving as a muse to a Grammy Award-winning songwriter. Yep, there’s a lot more to know
about her than her handful of movie credits. Here’s the truth about "Dirty Dancing’s" Penny.
Cynthia Rhodes' tryst with dance began quite early on in life. At only 3 years old, the Nashville,
Tennessee native took a keen interest in the art form and began her training. And she was inspired
by who else but Hollywood's top-billed, best-known child actor: Shirley Temple.
"We could have had lots of fun together!"
**laughs**
"I bet we could."
In an interview she gave to writer Kevin Courrier in 1987, Rhodes said
that watching golden-locked Temple during her childhood was her cue to pursue her passion:
"I've got to go to Hollywood and see if I can do something with my life, my career."
Fun fact: Temple's career also began at age 3 when she began training for dance,
according to Britannica. The two actors, however, were set apart by an almost three-decade age gap.
Rhodes explained in the interview that she danced her way through her teens before
landing a job as a performer at the Opryland theme park, where she worked for five years.
Rhodes used the platform to make her mark by appearing in minor roles in television
specials – the most notable among them being "Music Hall America," a variety
show that ran from 1976 to 1977. She called Opryland her, quote, "best training ground,"
recommending it for anyone looking to break into the entertainment industry.
Eventually, Rhodes listened to her gut and made the big move to Los Angeles, where she hoped to
pursue her dream of a film career. The blonde beauty earned her first big-screen role as an
ensemble dancer in Robert Greenwald's 1980 musical fantasy "Xanadu." Though not a box office success,
it proved to be a successful springboard for Rhodes — just a couple of years later,
she was picked as a background dancer for a music short directed by Kenny Ortega for
the band The Tubes. She later appeared in videos for Toto and the Bee Gees as well.
Rhodes' accomplishments as a dancer positioned her for the dance-musical genre, which formed
the bulk of her most notable film credits: 1983's "Flashdance" and "Staying Alive" and, of course,
1987's "Dirty Dancing." Her one non-dance film
is the 1984 sci-fi action movie "Runaway," in which she co-starred with Tom Selleck.
"Okay, I want you to sit back and take it real easy. This is going to hurt like a mother."
In an interview from 1987, Rhodes said that, while she loved doing dance films,
she longed for roles that focused only on acting. She said:
"It seems like every time I say, 'That's it, I don't want to dance anymore,' I get another film.
I'm not going to turn down work! I feel very fortunate to be in films that are dancing.
But it's like, give me a chance to do some dramatic
work without dancing. [...] Just give me a straight acting part."
Though her competence for dance was the quality Hollywood prized the most,
Cynthia Rhodes' talents traversed far beyond that of dance. On an episode of the 1989 chat show
"Camp Midnite," the former actor casually dropped an impressive, little-known detail about her life.
She said in response to the interviewer’s question about the early days of her dance journey:
"Yeah, but I was training for the Olympics. So I completely did my body in."
She went on to add that she trained for eight hours a day at the time.
However, life had other plans for Rhodes — as she noted in the interview that she began
working professionally at the age of 16. Thus, she never did get a chance to compete in the Olympics.
Nonetheless, Rhodes reminisced in a 1987 interview about her life as a gymnast
and how that background stood in context of her dance career. She explained:
"The thing was, I used to never be sore. In fact, I was a gymnast. And now it's sort of
frustrating [...] I never used to stretch. Now I have to stretch before I dance.”
Contrary to popular belief, dancing wasn't Rhodes' entire life. She added further:
"I love to dance, but if I never did it again, I wouldn't be sorry."
Rhodes had all of five screen performances prior to appearing in "Dirty Dancing”.
She was cast in the classic 1987 film as the warm, but firm, dance instructor, Penny Johnson.
Though the spotlight in the film remained on lead actors Patrick Swayze and Jennifer Grey,
they were apparently not the first cast members to come on board.
In fact, Collider reports that Rhodes landed her role first.
In rare footage from a 1987 interview, Rhodes described Penny as having an "edge." She said:
"She's from South Philly and she's had a rough life [...] She's got a sweetness about
her but it's put back because she's had a hard time, and she has sort of put up a wall. And,
in the end, I think she finally realizes that life does go on."
The plot of "Dirty Dancing" is loosely borrowed from the life of Eleanor Bergstein,
the film's screenwriter who spent several summers in the Catskills in New York.
Penny was consequently based on an actual woman Bergstein knew named Jackie Horner,
a legendary dance instructor at the ​​Grossinger's Catskill
Resort Hotel. In an interview with the Times Herald-Record, Horner said of the classic:
"I knew every single moment of that movie. [...] Nearly
every line I said to Eleanor they put in there."
Rhodes didn't exactly have the time of her life filming "Dirty Dancing."
In interviews following the release of the film in 1987, she revealed that the
film's rehearsals were so rigorous, she toyed with giving up dance altogether.
Rhodes swayed with Patrick Swayze in two major dance routines in the film,
for which training could last as long as 10 hours a day — despite the pair already excelling
in professional dance. Appearing on an episode of talk show "Camp Midnite" in 1989, Rhodes recalled:
"We started rehearsals about two weeks before we started the film. [...] It was really hard,
that's why I keep saying I'm never going to dance again.
I'm tired of dancing. [...] My bones are hurting, my back hurts all the time."
But it wasn't as if the "Dirty Dancing" rehearsals were all eyerolls and groans. In 1987, Rhodes
said in an interview with writer Kevin Courrier that the long hours of rehearsals — sometimes
stretching past midnight — were essential to the scenes ending up perfect. She explained:
"It wasn't that – 'Oh God, they're making us come in and do this.'
We were bringing ourselves in and saying we want this to be a great dance film.”
Rhodes was raised in a traditional Baptist family. As such, her values were inspired by
her parents' belief system so strongly that she claims to meet every challenge with a question:
"What would my parents want me to do?"
Actor and filmmaker Sylvester Stallone, who directed Rhodes in the 1983 film "Staying
Alive" alongside John Travolta, famously remarked that she would rather, quote,
"quit the business before doing anything to embarrass her parents."
This quote is actually a bit of legend that Rhodes was apparently oblivious to until some years ago.
It seems she was only introduced to it during an interview with Naples Daily
News in 2016 — decades after Stallone first said it, though she confirmed it was 100%
true. The interviewer, whom Rhodes only permitted to write about the "experience" of meeting her,
described her life as being "highly principled and spiritually aligned."
Reports suggest that, during her acting career, Rhodes turned down
any role that required her to strip down to nothing — and she's certainly not the
only actor to do so. She allegedly even spurned posing for adult magazine Playboy,
which helped launch the careers of many actors and other public figures.
Along that same vein, Rhodes remains fiercely private about her life in general.
In 1983, Cynthia Rhodes split her time shooting "Flashdance" and "Staying
Alive." But the year turned out to be important for Rhodes beyond just work,
because it was also when she first met her future husband, singer Richard Marx.
At the time, a 19-year-old Marx was working on the soundtrack of "Staying
Alive”. Older than Marx by seven years, Rhodes felt he was, quote,
"cute as a button," according to CNN — but also very young. The meeting didn't develop
into anything significant. However, only two years later, a romance blossomed when
the two reconnected at a party. The couple dated for a bit and got hitched in 1989.
In addition to being partners in life, the couple collaborated for work multiple times.
Rhodes appeared in Marx's music video for "Don't Mean Nothing" and co-wrote "Perfect Day" with
him for Chris Botti's album "December." Marx, meanwhile, produced two songs on Animotion's album
"Room to Move" when Rhodes was a lead singer for the synth-pop band. That year, Rhodes appeared
on "Camp Midnite," where she spoke about her admiration for her husband. She told the host:
"I look up to him and I think he's an incredible singer. I
think he's one of the best there ever has been."
With her final performance being Vickie Phillips in the 1991 film "Curse of the Crystal Eye”,
Rhodes elegantly exited the stage to focus on motherhood. She and Richard Marx share
three sons — Brandon, Lucas, and Jesse — all of whom are musically gifted, like their parents.
When Rhodes said she was opting out of celebrity life, she really meant it. She has famously kept
the press at bay post-retirement. A one-of-a-kind conversation with Naples Daily News in 2016
revealed that Rhodes had not entertained media interviews in over two decades.
Instead, she had been busy with what she called the "unparalleled experience" of motherhood,
which, for her, trumped showbiz.
After 25 years of a seemingly picture-perfect marriage, Richard Marx and Cynthia Rhodes
parted ways in 2014. Although a reason behind the divorce was never disclosed to the media,
Marx's public statements indicate that the two are still on friendly terms.
In an interview with The Sydney Morning Herald, Marx said:
"I have nothing but tremendous respect for Cynthia [...] even
though our marriage came to an end, we talk regularly."
For Marx, Rhodes was his first-ever partner. The divorce left him "single for the first time"
in his adult life, as he told the newspaper. Marx addressed the split
and his then-newly-single life directly during an episode of Katie Couric's talk show, saying:
"It's all brand new to me, so I'm just having fun."
Though he admitted the divorce was a "painful time" for him,
it didn't stop Marx from gushing about ex-wife Rhodes and how "lucky" he was
for having spent time with her, as he told People in 2014. He said to the publication:
"I had the great fortune and blessing to not only be married to Cynthia for all those years,
but to just share her company. There's not a finer human being.”
A year after his divorce from Rhodes, Marx married former MTV VJ Daisy Fuentes.
"Right Here Waiting" by Richard Marx is widely regarded as one of the most romantic tracks ever
composed. Released on his 1989 album "Repeat Offender," the piano ballad catapulted Marx
to global fame. And the inspiration behind the classic was none other than Cynthia Rhodes. Marx
revealed he wrote the song when Rhodes was away in South Africa, telling The Indian Express in 2010:
"We were not married then and I wanted to meet her because I had not seen her for a
few months. But my visa application was rejected and when I came back
I wrote this song which was more of a letter from me to her.”
The Grammy winner's greatest song was also his fastest written — according to him,
it took "barely 20 minutes" to write.
In his memoir, "Stories to Tell," Marx recalls mailing the song to Rhodes,
though he had no plans to include it on his album. In fact, had it not been for friends
who pushed him to the recording studio, the song may never have made it to the album.
Even after his divorce from Rhodes, Marx continues to perform his hit on stage.
As for what singing "Right Here Waiting" feels like to him now, Marx told the Chicago Tribune:
"I embrace that song and what it says and what it meant to both of us and that will never change."
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