GREASE: LIVE

I saw the movie version of Grease just once when I was very young, and then the stage musical (which was actually the original, before the film, which many people, shockingly, don’t know,) also just once, a few years ago, (when Taylor Hicks played the Teen Angel,) and hated them both.*  It’s just not a musical I like. [Note: * Worst run-on sentence ever!]

I don’t get a lot of it. I don’t know why some characters sound like they’re from Brooklyn, while others don’t, and it’s supposed to be Chicago, anyway! (Believe me, I researched it for hours in the middle of the night, after I saw this new TV version, and had decided to review it for you!)

But this one on Fox didn’t annoy me as much as the other versions did, after the first hour, that is. Outside of Jesse J’s wonderful live rendition of the title song, it started-out being pretty brutal.

But it really picked-up after that. (And having commercial breaks definitely helped.)  And, to both of our shock, Mr. X really enjoyed it!

I sort-of did, as well. And this comes from someone who hates the songs in this show! Some I can tolerate, (like You’re The One That I Want, and We Go Together,) but some are just nails on a chalkboard. I used to go to one dance club in Aspen, where I spent many of my recent summers, and if they played the anger-in-me-inspiring Greased Lightning, they ruined my whole happy-to-that-point night! I hated going to “70s night,” (which my friends loved,) just because of that one song!

I’m not going to discuss every little thing about Grease: Live; I’ll give you the highlights of the thoughts that came to me as I was watching it (fake)live (because I’m on the West Coast, of course.)

So, here are those not-related paragraphs, including the overview:

Julianne Hough was sooooo perfect.  They need to pay her triple whatever they did, because without her, I feel that it would have stayed awful. Her performance is the one that got everyone engaged. (At least, it did us.) Not to mention that she was the only one on that stage who looked like a teen-ager! (Some of the rest looked like they were doing a senior citizens version of the show!)

But she started-out looking more like she was playing Alice in Wonderland. What was up with that outfit?!

And I was desperate to see her dance more! She’s the best, so they should have come up with much more for her to do in that department.

The whole production was sooooo much better than the amateurish NBC duo of recent live musicals—The Sound of Music and the even worse Peter Pan. And I concur with Mr. X’s assessment that this one featured the strongest vocal performances of all three shows. And he also admired “the flow of it all.”

It was an extremely well-done production, technically. The crazy logistics didn’t do them any favors, though. I have a feeling they could have made it much easier on themselves, by having some of the sets on the same soundstage, as sitcoms do, instead of spacing everything out over the entire backlot of the studio. But it seems that the powers-that-be at Fox wanted to make it harder, by using different areas of the lot, which necessitated the use of tour carts to get the actors and crew to each location in time, just to make it seem like a much more difficult undertaking, in order for them to reap more glory. Just sayin.’

Everyone (except for Julianne) overacted the whole time! That was so annoying.

My main thought during most of the three-hour presentation was: Who directed this over-acting fest?  Jim Carrey???

Aaron Tveit, (who’s thirty-two in real life, but played Danny, the lead high school guy) and Keke Palmer, who was one of the girls, look like they’re in their forties! When they’re supposed to be teen-agers in this show. (I know that Keke is only twenty-two, but she looks, and seems, so much older.  She could play Diana Ross now!  I’m not saying anything mean about her, by the way—she’s just mature and a seasoned performer already. But Mr. X said that she could play Little Richard!)

Last thing about Keke—she’s obviously a very talented girl, so it was nice to see her perform. But, (and it’s sad to say,) a black girl would not have been in that gang in the fifties. And you know that I’m not a fan of ethnically-incorrect casting. I would not be allowed to star in A Raisin in the Sun, (nor should any white, Latino, or Asian person ever be cast in it—that would just not be right,) and I’m good with that. There was an uproar when, in the past year, some college cast a white actor as Martin Luther King, Jr. That was a ridiculous thing to do, and I feel may have been just to gain all that publicity, negative as most of it was. Most roles are written with a certain kind of person in mind, to tell the story. Sex, age, and ethnicity are some of those factors, and it’s just crazy to me when shows change that to look open-minded.

Some of the earlier songs sounded like just noise. (I read that they had a sound issue on the live feed, but it didn’t effect those numbers of which I speak.)

That “cheerleading try-outs” bit was great, because of Julianne!

But that other woman, the blonde who was trying to out-do her, was perhaps the most annoying person I’ve ever seen on screen! Why was she even in there?! How did she get an acting job?! (Maybe they listed it as an overacting job.) I swear—I wanted to cut her out of my TV, so she would stop ruining the show. (I just broke down and wasted a minute to look her name up for you, so you, too, can avoid ever seeing her: Elle McLemore. Get that woman out of show biz, quick!)

Poor Vanessa Hudgens started-out awful as girl gang leader, Rizzo, but she got a pass from me because she did it all with a heavy heart. She even gets extra props for showing-up at all, when her father had just died that morning!!! (Or the night before; there are differing reports on the actual day.) That had to be the hardest thing to do. I couldn’t even function at all when I lost my mother, so Vanessa must have a deep well to dig down into to have been able to perform that night. So, good for her. It was a major victory for her to have done that.

For the most part, the choreography was pretty pedestrian.  But I was happy to see Marko Germar, a finalist on So You Think You Can Dance, in there.  I noticed him because he was definitely better than the others.

I love Jordan Fisher’s singing!  (He played the unfortunately-named Doody.) I think I started paying attention to this show when he did his solo, (while successfully accompanying himself on guitar.) [Note: This is what I wrote about him two years ago, when I saw him in person playing Aladdin in the Pasadena Playhouse Christmas show: “…the singing voices of everyone involved, especially Jordan Fisher who plays Aladdin and…are fabulous. I wanted to hear them all sing more!” And I felt the same way now, without even knowing he was the same person!)

The appearance of the R&B trio, BoyzIIMen, singing Beauty School Dropout, (which is supposed to be performed by one solo dude,) was a fun surprise.

I guess they got away without having to hire “ extras.” They just (mis)used the audience, (who I’m sure didn’t mind.) But it was kind-of suspicious that most of the audience was very young. And female! What was up with that?!

But I loved that they invited real military personnel to be in the audience, especially during that one “USO” number, performed by Keke Palmer. That was a real picker-upper for me.

So, to sum up Grease: Live, it actually grew on me.  There was some really good singing by the two leads, Julianne and Aaron, towards the end. And then the finale was upbeat and lively; I can’t imagine anyone shutting the TV, and not going to bed (or wherever, ) in a better mood than when they began.

But I was wondering if that let those fun, enthusiastic audience members stay and party on that final carnival set after, as they should have done! I sure hope so!