--- name: "Emile Ardolino" canonical: "https://film.one/person/emile-ardolino" fi1m_id: "emile-ardolino" imdb_id: "nm0001915" tmdb_id: 716 wikidata_id: "Q490198" roles: ["Director"] born: "9 May 1943" died: "20 November 1993" reviewed_on_fi1m: 1 average_as: "director" average_over: 1 updated: "2026-09-24T03:23:53.957488+00:00" licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL." --- # Emile Ardolino ## Identity Emile Ardolino - **Canonical:** https://film.one/person/emile-ardolino - **Type:** Person - **Fi1m ID:** emile-ardolino - **IMDb ID:** nm0001915 - **TMDB ID:** 716 - **Wikidata ID:** Q490198 - **Same entity:** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emile_Ardolino, https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q490198, https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001915/, https://www.themoviedb.org/person/716 Director. Born 9 May 1943 in Maspeth, New York, USA. Died 20 November 1993. ## Details - **Work:** Director - **Born:** 9 May 1943, Maspeth, New York, USA - **Died:** 20 November 1993 - **Also known as:** Emile Ardolin - **Academy Awards:** 1 Oscar (1 won) - **Elsewhere:** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emile_Ardolino, https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q490198, https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001915/, https://www.themoviedb.org/person/716 ## Streaming the US now - **Pluto TV:** [*Dirty Dancing*](https://film.one/film/dirty-dancing.md) (79) For United States; add `?region=XX` for another country. ## Fi1m on Emile Ardolino > Emile Ardolino makes attraction convincing by letting people dance together. His stories can be familiar and the dialogue too insistent, but we recommend *Dirty Dancing* for the feeling he allows its performers to put into movement. Watch Jennifer Grey and Patrick Swayze respond to each other in *Dirty Dancing* (1987): Ardolino gives them enough space to make attraction visible. The dancing tells us why these two people might want to be together without asking a speech to do the work. We were won over by that physical responsiveness, despite dialogue that sometimes had us waiting for the next dance. His direction earns affection the familiar story cannot always earn for itself. He had spent years directing dance for television, including programmes for *Dance in America* and *Live from Lincoln Center*. His documentary *He Makes Me Feel Like Dancin’* (1983) follows Jacques d’Amboise teaching children. His collaborators included choreographer Kenny Ortega and cinematographer Jeffrey Jur, and his skill lay in finding camera angles and edits that made dancing feel immediate. In *Dirty Dancing*, that experience serves the performers: we can follow their attraction through movement. The weakness is what happens when the music stops. *Dirty Dancing* has spoken scenes that leave us waiting for the dancers to start again, and Grey and Swayze have to sustain our interest through lines that advertise their importance. At 100 minutes, the film gives a modest story a sensible amount of space. We like Ardolino’s willingness to let a romance remain modest, even if we wish he had been tougher on the dialogue. His move into mainstream comedy continued with *Chances Are* (1989) and *Three Men and a Little Lady* (1990). *Sister Act* (1992) put his skill with musical performance to work within comedy. The filmed ballet *George Balanchine’s The Nutcracker* (1993) and television musical *Gypsy* (1993) kept performance central to his later work. Start with *Dirty Dancing*, and be prepared to forgive a few lines once Grey and Swayze get moving. ## Biography Emile Ardolino was an American film and television director and producer. He began his career in off-Broadway theatre before co-founding Compton-Ardolino Films in 1967. He later worked extensively for PBS on the Dance in America series and related programmes. Ardolino won an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature for *He Makes Me Feel Like Dancin'* (1983) and received multiple Emmy Awards. He achieved mainstream success directing the feature films *Dirty Dancing* (1987), *Chances Are* (1989), *Three Men and a Little Lady* (1990) and *Sister Act* (1992). His final works included *The Nutcracker* (1993) and a television production of *Gypsy* (1993). Ardolino was born on 9 May 1943 in Maspeth, Queens, New York, and died on 20 November 1993 in Los Angeles, California. *Sources: en.wikipedia.org, imdb.com, latimes.com, web.archive.org.* ## On Fi1m (1) - *Dirty Dancing* (1987), Fi1m 79, as Cameo (uncredited) — [page](https://film.one/film/dirty-dancing.md) ## Complete filmography (20) Every credit, newest first. Titles without a page can be requested for review on the HTML page. - *Gypsy* (1994), Director, Producer - *The Nutcracker* (1993), Director - *Sister Act* (1992), Director - *3 Men and a Little Lady* (1990), Director - *Chances Are* (1989), Director - *Dirty Dancing* (1987), as Cameo (uncredited) · Director — Fi1m 79, [page](https://film.one/film/dirty-dancing.md) - *The Rise and Rise of Daniel Rocket* (1986), Director - *A Midsummer Night's Dream* (1985), Director - *Good Morning, Mr. Orwell* (1984), Director - *He Makes Me Feel Like Dancin'* (1983), Director - *Rumpelstiltskin* (1982), Director - *Faerie Tale Theatre* (1982), series, Director - *Alice at the Palace* (1982), Director - *American Playhouse* (1982), series, Director - *Leonard Bernstein's Mass* (1981), Director - *Nureyev and the Joffrey Ballet: Tribute to Nijinsky* (1980), Producer, Director - *When Hell Freezes Over, I'll Skate* (1979), Director, Producer - *Baryshnikov at the White House* (1979), Director - *Live from Lincoln Center* (1976), series, Producer - *The Responsive Eye* (1965), Assistant Camera ## Awards ### Academy Awards — 1 won - 1984: Best Documentary Feature Film (won), for *He Makes Me Feel Like Dancin'* *From Wikidata, which records wins more completely than nominations.* --- © Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Canonical: https://film.one/person/emile-ardolino