GREASE

Now, don't even pretend that you haven't seen Grease before, either the classic movie, or the stage play. The film version is probably the last great musical that Hollywood put out that people didn't scoff at. I know that my whole generation grew up knowing all the words to all the songs from the blockbuster soundtrack album. This movie was a monster hit, and John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John were easily at their hottest.

Lately in the film festival circuits, movie "sing-alongs" have become all the rage. This phenomenon started in the late 90s with the Sound of Music Sing-Along, which became a huge success across the country. That version was a huge hit at the 1999 Seattle Gay & Lesbian Film Festival, so in 2000 year, they decided to present Grease as a sing-along, literally transforming a theater into a giant karaoke bar (alas, sans alcohol). The Seattle festival was the first to present Grease in this fashion, so they needed the song lyrics combed-over and synchronized with the movie.

This is where yours truly came into the picture. Being unemployed at the time, and a whore for free movie tickets, I volunteered some hours in the office of the film festival. Since I've had mucho proofing and editing experience, I was handed a print-out of the lyrics, covered in chicken-scratch marks and edits, and was sent into the hallway with a TV/VCR, a remote, and a folding chair. I was told to check the printed lyrics with the songs in the actual movie. Seemed easy enough.

Well, as I sat there in the dusty, overly-warm hallway, surrounded by storage boxes, with people gingerly squeezing by me in the limited space, I slowly realized what a hellish task this was. I had a captioned copy of the 20th-anniversary print of the movie, and was told that the director of Grease, Randal Keiser, wasn't entirely satisfied with that version of the lyrics. They needed to be as exact as possible, because if the sing-along was a success at this festival, Seattle's karaoke lyrics would be used for Grease sing-alongs at other festivals throughout the country.

Now, I had only seen Grease twice before (including the time when I was 8). I knew the theme song, "Summer Lovin'", "Hopelessly Devoted To You", and "You're the One That I Want". But to face the hell of the lyrics to "Greased Lightning" (often mistakenly called "Grease Lightning"), and the nightmare of all nightmares, "We Go Together" was a whole 'nother thing. For example, try following the movie, while running your finger along a lyric sheet to:

We're one of a kind like dip da dip da dip
doo wop a doobee doo
Our names are signed a boogedy boogedy boogedy boogedy
shooby do wop she bop
Chang chang ah chang-itty chang shoo bop
We'll always be like one, wa wa wa waaahhh!

And with that being the last song in the film, I was practically crying softly to myself in the hallway: playing, rewinding, marking paper, playing, rewinding, marking paper... I handed my final edits to Jason, the volunteer coordinator, when I was finished, and he typed the fixes into the computer later that night.

The next time I saw Jason, he said that while he was typing in my edits that night, he was laughing at how particular I was, like "boogy boogy" should in all actuality be "boogedy boogedy," and that "changitty" has two t's, not one! He said he blew off half of my marks as too anal, and sent the lyrics to director Randal Keiser for final approval. And wouldn't you know it... turned out Randal Keiser sent back the lyrics with the same marks that I made! VICTORY! A proofreader's proudest moment!

When the Grease Sing-Along finally screened the following weekend, with an introduction by the director himself, and a rollicking sold-out crowd singing along, I hid in the balcony, fearing that there'd be a horrible disaster with the karaoke captions. But all went well! The only glitch was that "You're the One That I Want" had an extra verse written on screen (which the projectionist scrambled to fast-forward through), but the crowd didn't seem to care.

And to top it all off, I got an autographed picture of Randal Keiser standing with Olivia and John! (Sure, Keiser looked at me blankly when I stammered that I had proofed the lyrics for him—he had already signed a hundred of photos—but hey, it was worth it!)

  DVD NOTES  

Finally! Everyone's prayers have been answered! We here at Moviepie have received numerous emails from Grease fans, wondering where they, too, can get their hands on a sing-along copy of the movie. Apparently the studio finally took note, releasing the new Grease: Rockin' Rydell Edition DVD of the film. Not only does this disc let you select subtitled sing-along versions of each song, but you can also recreate the crowd-pleasing experience of watching the whole film with the sing-along subtitles during the songs only (versus watching the whole movie with subtitles). The words are even color-coded (blue for male parts, pink for female parts, and yellow for group yodelling).

The Rockin' Rydell Edition also bundles some other new and old material, to make this upgrade worth the bother, including footage from the release party for the previous 25th anniversary DVD (which is kind of odd, if you think about it). But that party includes a reunion duet of John and Olivia that is frankly charming, plus the whole present cast attempting to sing "Summer Lovin'" without reading the teleprompter. There are also interviews with major cast members from 1998 (well, that's a little awkward) interspersed with others that bothered to show up for this new DVD, most notably director Randal Kleiser who offers feature commentary, plus other little video snippets. Feature commentary from John and Olivia is probably the only thing missing from this nifty re-release. But I guess we'll have to wait 'til next time.

Is it worth an upgrade? Probably, because you have to admit the sing-along lyrics are what everyone's been waiting for. Plus, the DVD comes in a faux-leather zip-up T-Birds Grease Jacket. I thought I'd be able to put it on my cat. But since DVDs don't have arms, neither does the bonus jacket. Drat! Time to get a little crafty...