The week before last week I entered this SMS contest on Astro and luckily I won(..yeah!) 2 free tickets to watch Grease the Musical at the Plenary Hall in KL Convention Centre. Why did I enter this contest? Well, for those who were paying attention to my useless and pointless rantings, Grease is like my favourite movie of all time. Why does a movie about teenage lust, soppy music and American subcultures interest a guy like me so much? I mean, I'm not really a movie musical fanatic.. but yet I could memorized every single line to that movie. I could I sing every single song word by word. I don't really know why, but I enjoy that movie so much, I never grew tired of watching it. The fact that the movie was released on the month and the year that I was born also help I guessed. Plus the No. 1 song all over the world on the day that I was born was, you guessed it, 'You're The One That I Want' from Grease: Movie. So you could imagine my excitement and expectations for this live musical version.
The verdict? Well, it doesn't really lives up to my expectations, really. It was OK but lacking in some parts. First of all the sound systems sucks. You could barely hear the dialogue especially when they were singing, the music drowned the vocals. The musical arrangements was not that impressive considering the fact that Grease is one of the successful musical of all time in Broadway. In some parts it feels like a children sunday matinee show, largely because they were hundreds of children in the audience, laughing hysterically at every crass joke. I'm not really sure if they understand the whole story because they were laughing when Danny and Sandy had their (..quite long) onstage kiss. And speaking of kisses, the show was not really suitable for kids with all the upskirts pulling, breast touching, air-humping, smoking and one character shoves up his middle finger to the air 3 times. I guess that Berita Harian reporter is not a fan of Grease, otherwise we might hear about it in the papers... hehe.
What I like about the show was the very solid vocal arrangements that sounded really amazing, especially those acapella, doo-wop songs. The actors were all very good singers. They sounded great most notably, on songs like 'Beauty School Dropout', 'We Go Together' and 'Hopelessly Devoted To You'. I really enjoy the hype before the show started when several actors and dancers invited the audience to dance on stage. There was this one very sporting makcik who went up and do the twist and rock the party like it was 1959. I swear if I was sitting nearer to the stage, I might go up there and pull the Hand Jive. But if I did that, I'm not sure my girlfriend sitting next to me would agree..hehe. Other than the vocals and those familiar songs (..that I sing along quitely), the show was just OK.
I do know the fact that the movie version of Grease was very different in some parts from the stage musical. For example, the song 'Grease Lightning' was actually sung by Kenickie and not Danny Zuko. It was John Travolta who persuaded Randal Kleiser, the director of Grease movie to let his character sing that song. And in the stage musical the guys were not called T-Birds, but Burger Palace Boys. I guess these little differences make it less enjoyable for me to watch. For instance, the Teen Angel in this stageshow was a black woman who sings 'Beauty School Dropout' in a gospel version. Where the fark is Frankie Avalon and the flying angels? And my favourite song 'Sandy' was nowhere to be found. My favourite scene in the movie, the school dance contest scene, was not that exciting in this stage version. It lacks the excitement and flair of the movie version.
Well, I guess you can't please them all. But for what it's worth, I guess it's an OK show. I have now, seen both the stage and the movie version of my favourite movie. But for me, the movie was a classic, the stageshow was just plain OK.
Links :
Wikipedia - Grease: Movie
Wikipedia - Grease: Musical
Grease: Movie official site
The verdict? Well, it doesn't really lives up to my expectations, really. It was OK but lacking in some parts. First of all the sound systems sucks. You could barely hear the dialogue especially when they were singing, the music drowned the vocals. The musical arrangements was not that impressive considering the fact that Grease is one of the successful musical of all time in Broadway. In some parts it feels like a children sunday matinee show, largely because they were hundreds of children in the audience, laughing hysterically at every crass joke. I'm not really sure if they understand the whole story because they were laughing when Danny and Sandy had their (..quite long) onstage kiss. And speaking of kisses, the show was not really suitable for kids with all the upskirts pulling, breast touching, air-humping, smoking and one character shoves up his middle finger to the air 3 times. I guess that Berita Harian reporter is not a fan of Grease, otherwise we might hear about it in the papers... hehe.
What I like about the show was the very solid vocal arrangements that sounded really amazing, especially those acapella, doo-wop songs. The actors were all very good singers. They sounded great most notably, on songs like 'Beauty School Dropout', 'We Go Together' and 'Hopelessly Devoted To You'. I really enjoy the hype before the show started when several actors and dancers invited the audience to dance on stage. There was this one very sporting makcik who went up and do the twist and rock the party like it was 1959. I swear if I was sitting nearer to the stage, I might go up there and pull the Hand Jive. But if I did that, I'm not sure my girlfriend sitting next to me would agree..hehe. Other than the vocals and those familiar songs (..that I sing along quitely), the show was just OK.
I do know the fact that the movie version of Grease was very different in some parts from the stage musical. For example, the song 'Grease Lightning' was actually sung by Kenickie and not Danny Zuko. It was John Travolta who persuaded Randal Kleiser, the director of Grease movie to let his character sing that song. And in the stage musical the guys were not called T-Birds, but Burger Palace Boys. I guess these little differences make it less enjoyable for me to watch. For instance, the Teen Angel in this stageshow was a black woman who sings 'Beauty School Dropout' in a gospel version. Where the fark is Frankie Avalon and the flying angels? And my favourite song 'Sandy' was nowhere to be found. My favourite scene in the movie, the school dance contest scene, was not that exciting in this stage version. It lacks the excitement and flair of the movie version.
Well, I guess you can't please them all. But for what it's worth, I guess it's an OK show. I have now, seen both the stage and the movie version of my favourite movie. But for me, the movie was a classic, the stageshow was just plain OK.
Links :
Wikipedia - Grease: Movie
Wikipedia - Grease: Musical
Grease: Movie official site
2 comments:
Tahniah, dude!
btw, apa perasaan kau bila Soul Patrol kalahkan McPhee? hehe...
dude, visit and komen blog gitar aku ek?
http://epongs-guitar.blogdrive.com/
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