Grease Is The Word.

The Grease Live Musical was so good I'm still happy about it 2 days later.

I really think the local gyms should create a "Musical Theater for Moms" (With Unfulfilled Drama Dreams) exercise class because I will happily sweat to those oldies.

Things I Loved About Grease Live:

1. The excitement of a live production

2. Ana Gasteyer as the principal.  So much goodness.

3. Praise Hands for Aaron Tveit who played Danny.  I now know he also played Enjolras in the recent Les Miserables movie and I want to personally congratulate him on being both incredibly talented, artistic and masculine.  The storyline of Grease is  pretty formulaic and a less-than-ideal roadmap for our daughters and their romantic aspirations, but at the end of the day, GIVE ME A MAN WITH TENDER FEELINGS AND A LEATHER JACKET. Mercy.

4.  Julianne Hough totally rose the the vocal challenge of the role.  She is so beautiful.  Again, blah, blah, blah. beauty comes from within, but really, can you imagine being as blindingly beautiful as the actors who played the lead roles?  I think that would be fun for a day.  I don't think I'd mind someone overlooking my beautiful soul for awhile.

5.  Boyz II Men doing "Beauty School Dropout".  That was so perfect.  I'll be singing it for awhile.

6.  Fox made a very savvy move and cleaned up all the cringe-worthy innuendos in "Greased Lighting" as they rightly knew their audience (women who grew up on Grease) would be watching with their own kids. Upon hearing the family-friendly lyrics, said demographic would download the album and the broadcast and have maybe already listened to the soundtrack on loop and re-watched the musical.  

7.  The whole "Greased Lighting" dance number.  The physicality of that number (look at me using that groovy showbiz lingo) was astounding.  

8. The joy of the actors performing at their very best.  You could hear the actors whoop a bit in sheer excitement on certain songs.

9.  Ending with a live carnival for the final song.  I almost thought they'd be able to get Danny and Sandy to fly away in their car.

10.  The little sly updates to dialogue, like when Frenchy tells Sandy that "We (women) have to be our own people... like they teach us in Home Ec."

Do I like TV too much?  Does it consume a bit too much of my mental energy?  Yes and yes.

But Grease Live was a shot-in-the-arm of infectious musical joy and I'll take it.


Did you watch?  What did you like about the production?