MARSHALL, NC — Patrick Swayze and Jennifer Grey aren’t welcome at the Marshall Depot community center. Or maybe it’s just Rebecca Willis and her dirty dancing ways. However one slices it, the center’s decision to ban Willis for the way she dances is going to cost big.
“Big” means $275,000 – the price of banning Willis from the popular community hangout due to resident complaints about the then 56-year-old’s dance style, which she describes as “exuberant and flamboyant,” while others use harsher words.
It’s been eight years since the mountain town deemed her musical frisking to be unfit for human visual consumption – and in spite of the financial payout, Willis is still not allowed to return to the refurbished train station converted to a community center.
As her attorney, Jon Sasser explains it, “They said they’d burn the place down before they let her come back, so we decided to see if they’d put a monetary price on the right.”
According to the press, the town’s continued ban on her mini skirted dance floor gyrations and underwear showing humpty humping is fine with Willis.
The American Civil Liberties Union of North Carolina Legal Foundation announced the settlement, which was recommended by the town’s insurance company, yesterday.
Although Willis issued a statement concluding that the settlement sends a clean message about the value of diversity and free expression, Marshall attorney Larry Leake contends that the town not only considers itself blameless but believes it would have won any court trial.
Nonetheless, the newly enriched Willis says that she is “very happy with this settlement and relieved that the lawsuit is finally over”
Now, where to indulge in some celebratory dancing?
