GREASE (1978) (Paramount) Starring: John Travolta, Olivia Newton-John, Jeff Conaway, Stockard Channing. Screenplay: Bronte Woodard, based on the original stage production by Jim Jacobs and Warren Casey. Producers: Robert Stigwood and Allan Carr. Director: Randal Kleiser. MPAA Rating: PG (adult themes, profanity) Running Time: 110 minutes. Reviewed by Scott Renshaw.
The 20th anniversary re-release of GREASE is further proof that pop will indeed eat itself. Based on the successful Broadway musical by Jim Jacobs and Warren Casey, GREASE was orginally released in 1978 in part to cash in on that decade's wave of 1950s nostalgia -- "Happy Days," thin-Elvis idolatry and the like -- becoming in the process the most successful musical in box office history. It returns to screens in 1998 in part to cash in on this decade's wave of 1970s nostalgia -- disco revivals, thin-John Travolta idolatry and the like. The layers of cultural cannibalism involved are simply staggering.
I must admit that I was shocked by the $13 million GREASE took in on the first weekend of its re-release. Paramount had previously misfired with anniversary re-releases of THE GODFATHER and -- a Grand Prize Winner in the "Okay, I'll Bite...Why?" Sweepstakes -- DIRTY DANCING, and there hardly seemed to be a STAR WARS-like clamor from a generation of movie-goers deprived of watching "Hand Jive" on the big screen. Yet there they were, coming out in force for the simple adventures of greaser Danny (Travolta) and Australian exchange student Sandy (Olivia Newton-John) as they struggled to make it works from opposite sides of the Rydell High School tracks.
It's difficult to make sense of why GREASE is once again the word, especially when it's difficult to make sense of why it was the word in the first place. The cast of "teenagers" -- Travolta, Newton-John, Stockard Channing as lead "Pink Lady" Rizzo, Jeff Conaway as Danny's pal Kenickie -- generally looked old enough to be attending high school reunions rather than attending high school; the songs were an uninspired combination of throwback homage and 70s schmaltz-pop; the dialogue and performances were at best a half-step removed from the wooden posturing of 1950s juvenile delinquent melodramas. Nevertheless it thrived, both in an era where its star was a teen heartthrob and in an era where he is a "serious actor." What could be the common thread?
I hope it's not just the eternal optimist in me which makes me believe that GREASE works because it finds an audience hungry for musicals. Of course, this is a very different age from the Golden Age of movie musicals, a more cynical one. Arguably, however, the late 70s were even more cynical -- post-Watergate national disillusionment, gas lines, out-of-control inflation. GREASE provided the same basic appeal the classic musicals provided: it was movie-going as pure escapism, full of utterly improbable musical numbers, fresh faces and plenty of enthusiasm set in a mythologically simpler time. At the same time, it brought just enough attitude and polished-up teen rebellion that young audiences could convince themselves they weren't watching something "corny." They could have their SINGIN' IN THE RAIN and their ANIMAL HOUSE all in one sitting.
It would be amusing indeed if, buried beneath the meta-nostalgia of the GREASE re-release, you could find a nostalgia of a different kind. I suspect few people old enough to have seen GREASE the first time around mark it as a seminal movie-going experience; I suspect even fewer young movie-goers are that anxious to see what Travolta looked like before he was big enough to play Clinton without padding. Maybe even a mediocre musical reminds folks of a cinematic vitamin deficiency they didn't even known they had. Maybe there's a part of every movie-goer that wants to go back to the time when you could watch people sing and dance on screen without rolling your eyes. Maybe this kind of musical, one with sophomoric pranks and plenty of almost-but-not-quite sexual content, is the kind that allows viewers to let their guard down. Somewhere, even if they don't know it, audiences watching GREASE may be watching the 1950s of James Dean but _seeing_ the 1950s of Gene Kelly, all filtered through the 1970s of John Travolta. Maybe GREASE _is_ the way we are feeling.
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