Front Row Centre: GREASE

Theatre review by Mark Andrew Lawrence

GREASE, the musical parody of teen life in the 1950s, opened on Broadway on Valentines Day, 1972.  The stage musical is very different from the incredibly popular 1978 film version. The movie focussed more on the central Danny-Sandy relationship, and interpolated four new songs. Naturally when fans go to see the show now, they expect to see and hear the songs they love from the movie.

Stage West's production does manage to slip in "Hopelessly Devoted to You" giving the talented Sarah Connell as Sandy a chance to shine. In the play, Sandy has so little to do she can often appear as a secondary character.

Two other "movie" songs have snuck into this production: "You're the One That I Want" replaces the original show's "All Choked Up" and a new finale is set to the song "Grease" which was for the movie's animated main title sequence.  While purists may quibble, all three additions give the show a lift.

The trouble is, only a few of the songs in GREASE actually relate to the story:  "Summer Nights" which chronicles the summertime romance of the two leads; and two songs sung by Rizzo.  First, mocking Sandy with "Look at Me, I'm Sandra Dee" and later trying to justify her behaviour with "There are worse Things I could Do. "  The latter is song is particularly well sung by Valerie Stanois, despite a tiny blemish in the staging that has her directing the song to the audience instead of to Sandy.

This presentational style can work well for some of the numbers, notably the lively high school dance "Born to Have Jive" which provides a choreographic highlight near the top of Act Two. This is followed by Kent Sheridan's show stopping turn as Teen Angel advising Carol Hunter as a "Beauty School Drop Out" and then Paul Nolan as Danny, scoring with one of the show's funniest songs "Alone at a Drive In Movie" after not scoring with the virginal Sandy.

The entire cast works hard towards making the show enjoyable, but they are let down by a script that is only a notch above your standard TV Variety show sketch.

The script Stage West is using removes the more vulgar language and nudity from the Broadway original.  Director Max Reimer has coached the cast to ground the characters in reality and infuse the songs and dances with the energy of a high school variety show.  When it sings and dances, this GREASE is enjoyable fluff.
 

GREASE plays at Stage West Dinner theatre until February 19th. Performances are Tuesday through Saturday evenings with matinees on Wednesday and Sunday. To reserve tickets for the dinner/show package visit www.stagewest.com or contact the Stage West Box Office at (905) 238-0042.
 

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