John Travolta is synonymous with "Grease" for his flip as Danny within the 1978 movie -- however when he initially auditioned on Broadway, he landed the goofy position of Doody.
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In 1972, the hit Broadway musical “Grease” was able to go on the street, which meant that a new solid needed to be put collectively.
In Los Angeles, an 18-year-old actor simply breaking into the enterprise auditioned for the a part of Danny Zucko, clad in a black motorbike jacket and a white T-shirt. He slicked again his hair and sang Carole King’s “I Really feel the Earth Transfer.”
“His audition was fully unfocused,” recollects Tom Moore, who directed the unique Broadway manufacturing. “It was far and wide. However he had a terrific voice. He was immensely charming. And he was very engaging. He appeared like a French film star.”
His identify was John Travolta.
Moore solid him within the present, however not as Danny. “He was too younger for the half,” Moore says. “So we made him Doody, a goofy character who bought sort of thrown away within the film.”
Travolta toured with the present for 2 years. “I bought to watch three to 5 Zuckos and bought to see precisely what labored and what didn’t,” he recollects in “GREASE: Inform Me Extra, Inform Me Extra: Tales from the Broadway Phenomenon That Began It All” (Chicago Assessment Press), a brand new oral historical past of the present. What labored was his efficiency within the film, which up to now has grossed $400 million.
“Grease” opened in New York 50 years in the past this yr. The e-book is edited by Moore, “Maude” star Adrienne Barbeau — who performed the primary Rizzo on Broadway — and Ken Waissman, who raised $110,000 to supply the musical on the Decrease East Facet earlier than shifting it to Broadway, the place it ran eight years.
The inspiration for the musical struck one night time in 1969, when Jim Jacobs and Warren Casey, two aspiring theater writers residing in Chicago, went on a nostalgia journey. Drunk and stoned, they’d been listening to Led Zeppelin, however then determined to placed on a file by Dion and the Belmonts. It took them again to their highschool days within the Nineteen Fifties. Jacobs puzzled why nobody had ever written a musical with a ’50s type rock ‘n’ roll rating.
“Enjoyable concept,” Casey stated, “however what the hell wouldn't it be about?”
Jacobs thought for a second and replied: “Possibly it needs to be in regards to the folks I went to highschool with.” A second later he had the title. Since every little thing was greasy in these days — meals, hair, guys working underneath the hood of a Ford De Luxe — Jacobs stated, “It could possibly be referred to as ‘Grease.’”
Jacobs and Casey didn’t realize it on the time, however their nostalgia journey would someday develop into one of many longest-running reveals in Broadway historical past in addition to the 1978 film that had the world doing the hand jive — and made stars of John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John. The unique solid would come with actors similar to Marilu Henner (earlier than her position in “Taxi”), who performed Marty within the authentic Broadway solid, Richard Gere as Sonny and Barry Bostwick (later of “Rocky Horror Image Present” fame).
Waissman first heard about “Grease” from his faculty roommate, an orthodontist residing in Chicago. Jacobs and Casey had scraped the present collectively and, with a solid of amateurs (together with one Henner), put it on within the basement of an previous trolley barn. The dentist, “who by no means had a superb phrase to say about something,” Waissman tells the Publish, “referred to as me and stated, ‘I believe I’ve discovered a present for you.’”
Waissman flew to Chicago, sat on newspapers (there have been no seats within the trolley barn) and watched youngsters from Rydell Excessive sing “Magnificence Faculty Drop Out,” “We Go Collectively,” and “Greased Lightnin’.”
“What I noticed was my highschool yearbook coming to life,” Waissman says. “The present was barely the present it grew to become – it was just a few scenes and a few good songs — however the characters have been genuine. You knew Danny. You knew Sandy. You’d gone to highschool with them.”
Waissman believed that, for the present to work in New York, it needed to retain its authenticity and ragged edge. The actors must appear like they actually have been in highschool. An agent urged him to rent Michael Bennett, just some years away from creating “A Refrain Line,” to stage the present, however he balked. Bennett’s work was slick and relied on skilled dancers. It could be too polished for “Grease.” He went as a substitute with choreographer Patricia Birch, who had a fame for instructing non-dancing actors find out how to dance.
For his director, he turned to Tom Moore, a latest Yale graduate who had one New York credit score to his identify: “Welcome to Andromeda,” a two-character play a couple of quadriplegic who needs to kill himself and a nurse who urges him to go on residing. Waissman had seen the play and was struck by how actual the characters have been. Moore, he thought, would carry the sort of authenticity to the appearing that Birch would carry to the dancing.
“I had carried out a play wherein solely ONE individual moved,” Moore instructed The Publish, “so I wasn’t positive musicals have been in my future.” He learn the script, which “had extreme issues,” and listened to the “spectacular” rating. However he turned down the job. “It wasn’t one thing I needed to,” he says. Then he flipped by the script once more and caught what Waissman had seen in Chicago: His highschool yearbook coming to life.
“I went to highschool in Indiana and there have been about three Greasers there,” he recollects. “They have been soft-core — they drank, they smoked, they lower class. I wasn’t a part of their group in any respect, however I remembered them and there they have been in ‘Grease.’”
Within the authentic draft of “Grease,” the characters have been rough-edged. Some have been downright unlikeable. Working with Jacobs and Casey, Moore saved them tough, however gave them humanity.
“There are two the reason why ‘Grease’ has been so profitable,” Moore says. “Primary: the characters are prototypes for everyone you knew in highschool. However they've coronary heart and vulnerability. I believe I helped with that. And quantity two, and that is what Jim and Warren understood, the present is about all people’s first expertise: Your first time in a brand new faculty; the primary time you develop into a part of a bunch; your first kiss; your old flame.”
Moore and Birch assembled a solid of younger and unknown actors, together with Alan Paul, who thought he was auditioning for a musical about “Greece, the nation,” he says within the e-book.
Rehearsals have been “pleasant,” Moore recollects. After which got here the primary preview on the Eden Theater on Second Avenue. “Rocky doesn't start to explain it,” Moore says. “It was a catastrophe. It shook us to our core.”
“I needed to commit suicide,” says Waissman. “There was gloom and doom far and wide. However I stated to Tom, ‘How do you clear up a room? You begin by selecting up the primary sock.’”
They started selecting up the socks and inside three weeks, that they had reworked the present from a catastrophe into one thing that, they felt, audiences have been having fun with. The film model of “Grease” would usher in a wave of nostalgia for the Nineteen Fifties, however the ripples started down on the Eden Theater.
Sadly, the critic for the New York Instances was British — Clive Barnes, who was proof against ‘50s Americana.
“They're beginning to be nostalgic about 1959 now, and nearly all I can keep in mind about it's that it was an excellent yr for Burgundy,” he wrote. “The present is a skinny joke … and as soon as the preliminary joke has been established, it's certain to put on skinny.”
All people instructed Waissman to shut the present. His lawyer instructed him he was $20,000 in debt. However Waissman held on. He couldn’t pay the $20,000 in any case, so he thought he would possibly as properly hold the present open and see what occurs. Inside three weeks, “Grease” was a success. Phrase of mouth trumped the critics. Audiences have been flocking to the Eden to relive their highschool years.
Waissman moved the present to Broadway, the place it instantly offered out. Amongst its many followers have been Richard Burton, starring in “Equus” on the identical block, and his ex-wife Elizabeth Taylor. Burton and Taylor took the solid to dinner at Sardi’s. All people jockeyed for an opportunity to take a seat subsequent to Taylor, who polished off a good quantity of Johnny Walker.
Neither Waissman nor Moore had a lot to do with “Grease,” the film. However that’s by no means bothered them.
“They organized a personal screening for me, and I believed, ‘They’ve turned it into bubble gum,’” says Waissman.
Provides Moore: “The film is successful as a result of it’s the ‘50s seen by the eyes of the ‘70s. That might not have been my selection. It wasn’t the nitty-gritty present we did. However when the film got here out, I threw a celebration, which ‘Grease’ paid for. ‘Grease’ has been very beneficiant to all of us.”
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