Grease Live

As someone who grew up on the movie and played a few different roles in the show over the years, I both love this material and loathe it. I've also not been a huge fan of the TV adaptations focusing on a live event before an audience. So I went in with low expectations. But "GREASE LIVE!" makes and incredibly persuasive case for how the format can work.

The production is a marvelous blend of staging ingenuity, environmental theater and spectacle of the best kind. It moves fairly seamlessly from scene to scene, including some extremely clever breakouts like Marty's fantasy sequence in "Freddy My Love" (although there's an unfortunate Velcro rip of the costume just prior that reminds us of the very live nature of the show). All of this climaxes in a joyful - and Internet famous - joyride in tramsthrough the backlot and ending at a re-staging of the famous carnival from the end of the movie. It's an exhilarating end to a presentation that bubbles with energy and a modest amount of talent.

Julianne Hough and Aaron Tveit are cardboard cutouts of Sandy and Danny- strong singing and dancing skills proves why they won the roles - and I imagine their rendition of "You're the One That I Want" looks much the same today as it did in the auditions. In this moment they are the living embodiment of John Travolta and Olivia Newton John without feeling like they're copying it. Outside of these moments they are awkward musical theater adults trying to pull off innocent 1950s teenage angst. It's a few degrees too many these days.

The rest of the cast turns in overall B+ performances, although Carly Rae Jepsen's turn as Frenchy lost me. She's neither an interesting actress nor did the show do her any favors with the new song they wrote for her. To make matters worse, they divided Teen Angel into the three Boyz II Men. Given Ms. Jepsen's lack of connection in the first place, adding this element further killed any joy "Beauty School Dropout" once had.

"High School Musical" alum Vanessa Hudgens was a "bad girl" Rizzo for the 21st century - not really bad; just winking at us a little... Disney bad. She nailed "There Are Worse Things I Could Do" and showed plenty of heart through the show. She led the ensemble to some fantastic heights in the big numbers ("Hand Jive" and "We Go Together") while Carlos PenaVega (Kenickie) and the rest of the T-Birds gave us a high-spirited and inventively choreographed "Greased Lightening."

Perhaps the two takeaways from "GREASE LIVE!" are that it shows which can adapt to the environmental space will work well in this newfangled trend and where this musical excelled was the way it referenced the iconic 1976 movie without copying it. Imitation would have been a sincere form of flattery for the classic film; in the hands of Thomas Kail and Alex Rudzinski, "GREASE LIVE!" is a successful homage to the film that charts its own course to buoyant effect.

The additional material is mostly your standard cheesy info that wouldn't likely interest anybody over the age of 18, but the "behind-the-scenes" peek into how it came together was fascinating and worth watching.

GREASE LIVE!
DVD (available now)
$22.98
http://shop.fox.com/grease-live-dvd/detail.php?p=956604