Get all your news in one place.
100’s of premium titles.
One app.
Start reading
The Guardian - US
The Guardian - US
Entertainment
Alex Needham and Brian Moylan

Grease: Live – watch it with us - as it happened

Julianne Hough and Aaron Tveit in the dress rehearsals for Grease: Live.
Julianne Hough and Aaron Tveit in the dress rehearsals for Grease: Live. Photograph: Frank Micelotta/REX/Shutterstock

A Final Assessment

What a triumph. After three years of watching NBC do summer stock on national television, Fox swooped in and stole the live musical format right out from underneath them.

The sets and staging were absolutely the best part of the show, proving that a live musical could look as much like a movie as it could just a regular Broadway musical. All of that credit goes to director Thomas Kail.

The all-star cast was all up to the task. Julianne Hough managed not to screw anything up and even make the best of her solo Hopelessly Devoted, even though the sound wasn’t always cooperating. Aaron Tveit, little known outside of Broadway before tonight, is sure to keep his agent plenty busy in the next few weeks with the number of offers he’s going to get. H0pefully it will be something a little bit more age appropriate.

The real surprise though was Vanessa Hudgens, who managed to do Stockard Channing proud as Rizzo. Her There are Worse Things I Could Do was a highlight of the evening, especially considering her father passed away just last night.

Of course there were a few glitches, including the sound cutting out during “Born to Hand Jive” and a somewhat mediocre new number for Carly Rae Jepsen’s Frenchy. Then there was the comedy in the show, which was mostly lost because people didn’t know where to laugh.

However, all in all, this was a tremendously enjoyable evening of wholesome fun. If the Twitter reaction is any indication, the ratings should be huge for Fox too. The bar for the live musical has been raised, and I couldn’t be happier.

Updated

So it concludes with the whole cast driving off the set in golf carts and into a fairground, where they continue to perform We Go Together. It’s delightful.

This is just how we wanted Grease: Live to end. On golf carts.

Updated

Don’t forget, people. This is what became of Sandy and Danny.

And here’s Sandy in spray-on black jeans, red high heels and gravity-defying hair. All is right with the world.

Updated

How are your chills? Are they multiplying?

A whole year has gone by at Rydell High? It seems like it only took, oh, about three hours.

Sandy just asked Rizzo for the makeover

And another strange interlude by Mario Lopez talking about the cameramen’s movements “crew-ography” as we go into the final commercial break.

The way they filmed the race, with real suspense and excellent vantage points has been one of the marvels of the evening.

Vanessa Hugdens just gave a showstopping, heartrending version of There Are Worse Things I Could Do, maybe the best performance in a night full of cracking ones. What an absolute trouper.

Updated

I feel like There Are Worse Things I Could Do deserves a better setting than the hallway from Welcome Back Kotter.

But Ms. Hudgens is killing it.

This is the part where Grease: Live meets Revenge of the Nerds. Snooze.

So it turns out that Scott Walker is also enjoying Grease Live

Commercial Break Review

Despite losing sounds during Born to Hand Jive and Hopelessly Devoted, Fox should be commended on doing such a great job. This looks much more like an actual movie than any live musical we’ve seen before. And compared to this, Peter Pan Live looks like something your toddler puts on to make his grandmother laugh.

This is the slow section of the musical and there’s not much to cheer for until the big finale, but with only 45 minutes left, there is no way they crew can screw it up now.

It’s Oh, Sandy after an attempt by Danny to maul her right breast at the drive-in not surprisingly resulted in her slamming the car door in his face and storming off.

Updated

Sandy’s parents won’t let her go to dances. Is this Footloose all of the sudden?

So Vanity Fair wrote a piece about the toning down of some of the lyrics for Grease: Live. Read it here. Among other things, in Greased Lightning, “The chicks’ll cream” became “the chicks’ll scream”.

How they constructed this musical with so many people going to so many different sets is an absolute modern miracle. This drive-in set is absolutely magical.

So the Grease account has just tweeted about the technical hitches just then

It’s a shame that there were some sound issues there because Julianne Hough is singing the hell out of Hopelessly Devoted to You.

The sound is really messed up again for “Hopelessly Devoted to You.” If you’re a sound mixer I bet you can get a job at Fox tomorrow.

Sandy running away from the dance off is ironic because Julianne Hough has never run away from a camera in her entire life.

Thought it was my TV there but no, the entire sound failed for a few seconds during Born to Hand Jive.

Updated

And the sound is down, people. The sound is down on the Hand Jive. Everyone at Fox just got fired.

An anachronistic haircut is annoying some Twitter users:

Sandy not wanting to be on camera is the ‘50s equivalent of a teen without a Snapchat account.

Wait? Mario Lopez is Vince Fontaine too? I thought he was just reminding us what show we were watching. This man can do everything!

And Joe Jonas is fronting the band at the prom in another intricately and immaculately staged big dance number. There may have been a dodgy moustache involved too.

Updated

For the record, Cha-Cha DeGregorio is Marco Rubio’s drag name.

Sorry everyone, but so far Keke Palmer as Marty has been the worst member of the ensemble.

Updated

Commercial Break Review

While the new song All I Need is an Angel was quite good, it did slow things down a bit. Boyz II Men killed Beauty School Dropout, but missed all the insults to Frenchie that might convince her to go back to class.

Otherwise this has been a very enjoyable evening thanks to intricate direction, fantastic choreography, and a whole fleet of short shorts. Fox is really brining the live musical to a whole new level, which is hard to do with a beloved classic like Grease.

OK, so it’s Boyz II Men doing a rather husky Beauty School Dropout backed up by dancers wearing hats that look like heated rollers. Our Rebecca Carroll is into it.

And here’s what it looked like

Updated

Why is Boyz II Men (missing one boy) singing Beauty School Dropout? Was Niall Horan busy?

Not everyone loved the new song.

It’s a Frenchie face-off

This is the musical’s original song All I Need Is an Angel as sung by Carly Rae Jepsen. It’s supposed to immediately proceed Beauty School Dropout, which is going to be sung by Boyz II Men.

If Carly Rae Jepson became a telephone operator like Frenchie wondered, would you call her? Maybe?

The original Sandy is tuning in. 

#TheWireJokes

And there’s a long, extremely well-staged acoustic guitar-toting performance by Jordan Fisher as Doody, who looks a bit like a baby Bruno Mars. It that takes us from the diner to the sports hall, in which Danny is wearing remarkably short shorts. It was beautifully sung, but how live was it? And does it matter?

Updated

WHEE-HOOO WHEE-HOOO WHEE-HOO This is the hot guys in athletic kits on TV alarm.

This musical number in a diner (and the presence of Mario Lopez) is sure giving me a flash back to “The Sprain.”

Here’s that Greased Lightning moment in gif form courtesy of US Weekly.

Oh, hi, Didi Conn, the original Frenchie from Grease (and Grease 2). She stepped in to play the diner worker.

Suddenly reminded by the Grease censorship of America’s aversion of the word “pussy” - the Russian band Pussy Riot has a hard time getting its name into the media here. Strange given how much America loved the UK sitcom Are You Being Served?

That was pretty spectacular, a version of Greased Lightning that saw all the guys go from overalls to tight blue and silver jumpsuits, while the car suddenly turned into a red hot rod. And rather than “pussy wagon” they indeed sang, er, “value wagon”.

Oh good, just what we needed: Mario Lopez to remind us that we’re watching Grease Live. How would we ever know what we were watching without Mario Lopez?

The crowd is cheering for Greased Lightning like One Direction is performing the song. The shiny jumpsuits and the guys rollin gover each other sure look jazzy though.

It’s systematic, hydromatic ... and I think they just censored the “pussy wagon” line.

For those of you that missed it, Mrs. Murdoch, the prison happy shop teacher, was played by Eve Plum, the original Jan Brady.

So we’re in a garage with Kenickie’s busted motor – Grease Lightning is on the way ...

No one with hair as good as Danny Zuko’s can adequately fix a car.

Rizzo and Kenicke in the back seas is the best advertisement for Planned Parenthood I’ve seen in a long time.

And now it’s the commercials. There’s nothing like an ad offering treatment for Opioid-induced constipation to ruin the feelgood atmosphere.

This is just a reminder that John Travolta will be playing OJ Simpson’s attorney Robert Shapiro on The People Vs. OJ Simpson on Tuesday night. There is no singing.

Look at Me, I’m Sandra Dee, was fun and, for some of our eminent TV critics, nostalgic.

I’m personally a bit surprised the censors allowed the phrase “flog your log” before 8pm.

Look, it’s the real Sandra Dee.

Keke Palmer is giving a rousing rendition of Freddie My Love on a set that seems to be the size of Alaska. She went from her bedroom, through the wall and then onto a long stage rimmed with lights and surrounded by an audience. The staging of this show is great so far.

Updated

I prefer Keke Palmer when she’s running away from killers on Scream Queens than when she’s playing Marty.

Here’s some grist to Brian’s conspiracy theory that Grease Live isn’t live from our Grady Smith.

Right here I am going to start my conspiracy theory that Grease:Live was really filmed three weeks before airing “live,” much like the moon landing was.

Commercial Break Review

We’re 30 minutes into the musical and I have to say that Fox is really blowing NBC out of the water. The sets are magnificent and Grease Live looks more like a movie than a community theater stage production that’s being filmed for the camera. Julianne Hough and Aaron Tveit look old enough to have their own 401Ks instead of high school diplomas, but both are very up to the tough performance at task. So far I have nothing but compliments for everyone involved — except the weather.

And Danny has just humiliated Sandy in front of all their friends. It’s time for a quick recap of Summer Nights and another ad break.

And here comes everybody’s favourite character, Kenickie, with his old banger/“real pussy wagon”.

Wendell Pierce has gone from The Wire to playing Coach Calhoun on Grease: Live. His star is really on the rise. (That’s sarcasm.)

Meanwhile, the New York Times’s Roxane Gay makes this very good point

And suddenly everyone’s timeline is full of the male cheerleaders in tight shorts.

None of the jokes are landing because there is no one there to laugh at them. They just fall with deafening silence in the middle of LA soundstage.

Some of the students at Rydell High look old enough to receive AARP Magazine.

And here’s a gif from Vulture.

This is extremely slick and well-choreographed, to the extent that you’d not actually know it was live at all – though finally the live audience has made its presence felt. Turns out they were on the bleachers watching opposite.

Updated

So, there is a live studio audience after all. It’s great we could hear them cheer after Summer Nights, but why couldn’t they be laughing during Ana Gasteyer’s opening announcements?

Does anyone under 40 understand a reference to “Annette’s jugs?”

Updated

And we’re moving inexorably to Summer Nights ...

If Grease: Live accomplishes anything, can we make Kether Donohoe, who plays Jan, a superstar?

And we’ve got a Mormon Sandy, how about that?

First sighting of Carly Rae Jepson as Frenchie, who Brian says not only gets to sing Beauty School Dropout but has her own song in this show!

How are there five teenage guys in the T-Birds and I don’t recognize even one of them from a CW supernatural show?

The cast outside during Jessie J’s “Grease” are all carrying umbrellas. The only time it ever rains in LA has to be during Grease Live?!

And we get off to a flying start with Jessie blooming J walking through the set, backstage, taking a selfie with the Pink Ladies and is now performing it out in the street. It’s spectacular and not a little meta.

Updated

Keep Vanessa Hudgens, who plays Rizzo tonight, in your hearts. Her father passed away last night, but, as the show folk say, the show must go on. This is what she said on Twitter earlier.

Updated

Tell me more, tell me more

Tonight sees Grease: Live hit America’s screens, the latest in a succession of live musicals that have ranged from the terrible (The Sound of Music) to the quite good (The Wiz).

For a quick primer, Brian Moylan wrote about the Fox show on Friday and explained exactly why there are so many live musicals on our screens at the moment – basically, because an awful lot of people watch them.

Rather than a camp hatewatch, expectations are high for Grease: Live – it’s directed by Thomas Kail, the man behind Hamilton and it will also feature celebrity cameos and be performed in front of a live audience. What’s not to like?

While you’re reading Brian’s piece, do take a look at the comment thread as well. Greenlake makes this excellent point.

User avatar for GreenLake

Funny to think the original production of Grease was in 1971 -- only 13 years after the story was supposed to have taken place. The equivalent in 2016 would be a musical looking back on the halcyon days of 2003.

Nostalgia ain't what it used to be.

And there’s also an interesting post from Sandee Cohen about the differences between the original stage musical and the film. I wonder whether Kail will restore anything from the stage version, or whether he’ll take his cues from the famous John Travolta and Olivia Newton John movie.

Grease the blockbuster movie.
Grease the blockbuster movie. Photograph: c.Paramount/Everett / Rex Featur

I’m currently waiting for my co-blogger Brian Moylan to make his way over to my apartment in New York. There’s currently an item about Donald Trump’s sex life on Inside Edition.

Sign up to read this article
Read news from 100’s of titles, curated specifically for you.
Already a member? Sign in here
Related Stories
Top stories on inkl right now
One subscription that gives you access to news from hundreds of sites
Already a member? Sign in here
Our Picks
8 Signs Your Healthy Southern Diet is Actually Causing Inflammation
Traditional Southern flavors often rely on fresh produce and lean proteins, but common preparation methods can unintentionally trigger inflammation. While many believe they are following a wholesome regional diet, specific dietary habits might be working against health goals. Identifying these subtle shifts in nutrition can help restore balance and improve…
Budget and the Bees
Budget and the Bees
The science behind the trend for showering in the dark before bed
The latest wellness trend and “sleep hack” involves switching off the bathroom light before stepping into the shower. In the dimness, the water feels louder, the day’s visual clutter fades and the hope is that sleep will come more easily. This practice, often called “dark showering”, has spread on social…
The Conversation
The Conversation
Country singer reveals horrific hate comment from follower amid incurable cancer diagnosis
Nat Myers first revealed his cancer diagnosis last year
The Independent UK
The Independent UK
So, How Did It Go When Blake Lively And Justin Baldoni Showed Up In Complementing Colors In Court? His Lawyer Speaks Out
This is WILD.
Cinemablend
Cinemablend
Children’s social media addictions linked to mental health problems in new study
Lead author calls for restrictions on addictive social media app features
The Independent UK
The Independent UK
Gene Simmons reignites backlash over ‘racist’ comments about hip-hop artists in Rock & Roll Hall of Fame
‘It’s not my music,’ the Kiss rocker said on a recent podcast appearance
The Independent UK
The Independent UK
Fourteen days free
Download the app
One app. One membership.
100+ trusted global sources.
Download on the AppStore Get it on Google Play