GREASE, before it was released in a movie version, had started in a Chicago nightclub in 1971, then been on Broadway for six years, and continued for two more after the feature film came out in June of 1978. The Broadway run racked a record 3,388 performances, with who knows how many subsequent productions in theaters and schools. The $6,000,000 movie was #1 in ’78 and when re-release takes were added in the domestic grosses would reach $189,969,000, with a whopping $206,200,000 more internationally. To fiddle its ad tag-line, Grease really was “the word.” The soundtrack sold 30,000,000 copies and three new songs composed for the film became chart hits. One of them, “Hopelessly Devoted To You” nabbed an Academy Award nomination. It was the film’s sole Oscar bid (we’ll get to it, specifically, below) because, despite the generally entertaining flick’s astounding popularity, there simply was nothing in it that warranted any achievement trophy beyond a track medal for a dazzling sprint to the box office. *

Fall, 1958. At ‘Rydell High School’, the big news to cruise with is that over the summer senior ‘Danny Zuko’ (John Travolta) had fallen pompadour over sneakers for ‘Sandy Olsson’ (Olivia Newton-John), dreamy Australian transplant. Issue: Danny is a greaser stud who leads his rowdy gang the ‘T-Birds’, Sandy is a well-mannered good-girl cheerleader. Jealousy strolls to the hop from ‘Betty Rizzo’ (Stockard Channing), tough chick leader of the ‘Pink Ladies’. Flustered teachers, drag races, wild dancing at the gym, sex teases, hurt feelings, a buncha songs, a happy ending.

The A-side—a surefire couple in Travolta, 23, have-arrived confidence and a dancin’ machine, and total peach Newton-John, 29 and nicknamed ‘Neutron-Bomb’ for a reason; scene-stealing deluxe from Channing, meshing cynical with vulnerable (she was 33, so maybe Rizzo was held back a decade and a half, big deal); songs that summon the period sound (if you can discount the leering lyrics)—newies but goodies include the title tune (sung by Frankie Valli), “Summer Nights”, “Greased Lightnin'”, “Those Magic Changes” and “You’re The One That I Want”; the retroactive attire, tails (pony & duck), wheels (cars) and assorted doodads.

Flip side, scratched—Bronte Woodard and producer Allan Carr wrote the script and while Woodard also bears partial responsibility for Can’t Stop The Music you can’t blame him or Carr for the vulgarization of the song lyrics—those came from the stage book done by Jim Jacobs and Warren Casey. Flaccid direction from Randal Kleiser (The Blue Lagoon, Summer Lovers) mostly bombs out, along with the unimaginative choreography (Carol Culver and Tommy Smith, report to the Dean’s office, or just go to detention) in the dance sequences: the players and the scoring provide the energy and oomph that are conspicuously missing from sets, camera placement and editing.

Other than decorative hairdos, clothes and props, walking blasts from the past were made by inserting half-hearted turns from 50s icons Sid Caesar, Eve Arden, Edd Byrnes and Frankie Avalon (who croons “Beauty School Dropout”). Harking back a war or two further, game dame Joan Blondell is marched in for a dash of 30s & 40s class among the 70s crass.

Also playing dress-up: Jeff Conaway (2½ years as ‘Danny’ on Broadway, at 27 demoted to wingman/dip ‘Kenickie’), Barry Pearl, Michael Tucci, Kelly Ward (feature debut; he had a better role in The Big Red One), Didi Conn, Dinah Manoff (21, feature debut), Eddie Deezen, Alice Ghostley, Dody Goodman, Fannie Flagg, Lorenzo Lamas (19), Annette Charles, Susan Buckner and Sha Na Na (as ‘Johnny Casino and the Gamblers’). 105 minutes.

* ‘Hopelessly Devoted to Olivia’—the Oscar nominated song is a pleasant enough tune, breezily innocuous in a pretend-it’s-the-50’s-way (Connie Francis, The Poni-tails, Brenda Lee) as demanded by the show, plaintively put over by sweetheart Newton-John. But a nomination? Geez, Wally,  only if you consider how pitiful the selections were that year. The award slushed to the instantly forgettable “Last Dance” from silly pan-flash Thank God, It’s Friday. Our guess: since they’d blindly skipped Saturday Night Fever’s anthem announcement “Stayin’ Alive” the previous year, the show-we’re-with-it voting clique felt compelled to gatecrash the erupting disco inferno.

The slick that Grease left in its wake may have been way out of proportion to its quality but success was drilled in by nearly a decade’s worth of exploratory prep. The popularity of the R&R/Doo Wop revival/spoof group Sha Na Na was launched in 1969 (at Woodstock!). Staged Grease came two years later. The surprise 1973 sleeper of American Graffiti  shifted longing for the pre-Nam positivity into overdrive. ‘Oldies’ swarmed via collections like Old & Heavy Gold, a record series that spanned from 1955 to 1971 with sixteen top tunes from each year. When Grease creamed big screens, TV saw Happy Days in its 4th of eleven seasons and spinoff Laverne & Shirley in the 2nd of eight. Keeping select memories of the 50s & 60s company in 1978 were Animal House, The Buddy Holly Story, American Hot Wax, Big Wednesday and I Wanna Hold Your Hand. Plus the only other cine-musicals that year were non-events; The Wiz fizzled and Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band was a total bollix. Next to those broken records, Grease was Singin’ In The Rain.