Aug. 7 (UPI) -- A sequel to 1987's Dirty Dancing is in development at Lionsgate and original star Jennifer Grey is set to return in the followup film.
Grey, 60, who starred in the original as Frances "Baby" Houseman alongside the late Patrick Swayze as Johnny Castle, is also executive producing the sequel.
Jonathan Levine (Warm Bodies) is directing based on a script by Mikki Daughtry and Tobias Iaconis.
"It will be exactly the kind of romantic, nostalgic movie that the franchise's fans have been waiting for and that have made it the biggest-selling library title in the company's history," Lionsgate CEO Jon Feltheimer said in a statement.
The original Dirty Dancing followed Baby as she falls in love with Johnny, her dance instructor at a retreat in New York's Catskill Mountains set during the early 1960s. The film grossed $214 million worldwide and won an Oscar and Golden Globe for original song "(I've Had) The Time of My Life," a duet performed by by Bill Medley and Jennifer Warnes.
Lionsgate released a prequel in 2004 titled Dirty Dancing: Havana Nights, which starred Diego Luna and Romola Garai, and a television remake aired on ABC in 2017. The original film also spawned a short-lived television series on CBS.
Swayze died at the age of 57 in 2009 from pancreatic cancer.
Lionsgate also recently announced that a fifth John Wick film is in development and will be filmed back-to-back with the fourth entry in the series.
