<P> Further disputes arose over whether a corporate sponsor could be found to promote the film . Marketers of the Clearasil acne product liked the film, seeing it as a vehicle to reach a teen target audience . However, when they learned the film contained an abortion scene, they asked for that part of the plot to be cut . As Bergstein refused, the Clearasil promotion was dropped . Consequently, Vestron promoted the film themselves and set the premiere on August 16, 1987 . The Vestron executives had planned to release the film in theaters for a weekend, and then send it to home video, since Vestron had been in the video distribution business before film production . Considering how many people disliked the film at that point, producer Gottlieb's recollection of her feelings at the time was, "I would have only been grateful, if when it was released, people didn't yell at me ." </P> <P> Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes gives the film a rating of 72% based on reviews from 61 critics and a rating average of 6.1 / 10 . The site's critical consensus reads, "Like its winsome characters, Dirty Dancing uses impressive choreography and the power of song to surmount a series of formidable obstacles ." Metacritic, another review aggregator, assigned the film a weighted average score of 65 out of 100, based on 20 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A --" on an A+ to F scale . </P> <P> For the film's opening, The New York Times published a review titled "Dirty Dancing Rocks to an Innocent Beat". The Times reviewer called the film "a metaphor for America in the summer of 1963--orderly, prosperous, bursting with good intentions, a sort of Yiddish - inflected Camelot ." Other reviews were more mixed: Gene Siskel gave the film a "marginal Thumbs Up" as he liked Jennifer Grey's acting and development of her character, while Roger Ebert gave it "Thumbs Down" due to its "idiot plot", calling it a "tired and relentlessly predictable story of love between kids from different backgrounds ." TIME magazine was lukewarm, saying, "If the ending of Eleanor Bergstein's script is too neat and inspirational, the rough energy of the film's song and dance does carry one along, past the whispered doubts of better judgment ." In a retrospective review, Jezebel's Irin Carmon called the film "the greatest movie of all time" as "a great, brave movie for women" with "some subtle, retrospectively sharp - eyed critiques of class and gender ." </P> <P> Abortion rights advocates have called the film the "gold standard" for cinematic portrayals of abortion, which author Yannis Tzioumakis described as offering a "compassionate depiction of abortion in which the woman seeking an abortion was not demonized with the primary concerns being her health and preserving her capacity to bear children at a future time rather than the ethical dilemma that might or might not inform her decision, a portrayal that is not necessarily available in current films ." </P>

Who played johnny's dance partner in dirty dancing