Source : the age
The revival of interest in Grease 2 over recent years has been confusing for me as a long-term fan. The film was not just a critical and box-office flop, it was a notorious critical and box-office flop, though I didn’t know this when I first watched it as a tween and I certainly would never have guessed it. Grease 2 was raucous and riveting. It cast a spell on me. Made in 1982 and starring a young Michelle Pfeiffer, it’s a film I watched about a thousand times throughout the ’90s.
Not only do I have favourite Grease 2 songs (Cool Rider and Who’s that Guy?) and favourite stunts (such as when the mild-mannered Michael Carrington jumps the police car on his motorcycle outside the Bowl-A-Rama), but I also have favourite hairstyles (Stephanie’s hibiscus-braid in the finale) and favourite extras (the squeaky-clean twins). I’ve always liked Grease 2 better than the 1978 original.
Why? Because the outfits are great. The songs are great. Pfeiffer is great. The dialogue is (occasionally) great. (“Are you free tonight?” “I’m free every night. It’s in the constitution.”)
Like the first Grease movie, the sequel delivers a brutal message about social survival and natural selection: if your crush doesn’t like you, then change everything about your image and personality until they do. And like the original, the film exploits moral panic around teenage sexuality, though Grease 2 cranks it up a few notches.
There are scenes that are not for the squeamish. The raunchy classroom number Reproduction – where a biology lesson turns to chaos – is the obvious example. But I’d say the first 15 seconds of the musical number Score Tonight, set in a bowling alley, are among the most obscene in the history of cinema, purely on the strength of dance moves, chest hair and eyebrow activity. (Adrian Zmed, as lead T-Bird Johnny Nogerelli, was perhaps anxious that the song’s double-entendre might escape some young viewers. He took matters into his own pelvis, delivering a lusty performance that is frankly terrifying.)
Perhaps another reason I loved it was because I didn’t have to share it with too many other people. Hardly anybody had seen the sequel, so they didn’t know what they were missing. Growing older, I was aware that the film had attained cult status (how could it not?), but I chose not to engage with the fandom. I watched my favourite Grease 2 songs on YouTube in mesmerised solitude. I never read the comments. I didn’t want my sacred memories polluted.
Over recent years, however, there have been several big waves of Grease 2 revival energy – impossible to avoid. Lip-syncs of Cool Rider and Reproduction were all over TikTok around the time of the film’s 40th anniversary in 2022. Entertainment Weekly produced a definitive Grease 2 oral history in 2023. Earlier this year, there was a New York Times think-piece. And there was a free screening in January at Federation Square.
But instead of embracing this enthusiasm, I’m troubled by it. I want to protect this precious artefact of my childhood. I want to save the film from dissection and discourse. I know the Do It For Our Country scene is incredibly messed up. I know it’s a teen movie with too many receding hairlines. I know Grease 2 flips gender norms. I know Pfeiffer’s gum-acting is outstanding. I know, I know, I know. I don’t want to talk about it and I don’t want anybody else to talk about it either.
It’s like I’m an archivist who has held a delicate ancient document in a climate-controlled environment for decades. And now hordes are raiding the facility, exposing this precious article to harmful sunlight, pawing at it with their filthy fingers. I’m like Zmed’s pathetically possessive Nogerelli. My head says Grease 2 deserves its greasy flowers, but my heart seeks to trap it inside its own throbbing chambers.
It’s not right – this pathetic jealousy, this Nogerellification of the soul – and I’m working through it slowly. For now, I won’t be attending any free summer screenings or liking any Cool Rider step-ladder tributes on TikTok. I’m not ready to encourage it.
But the film’s cult status is now firmly cemented. Like the students of Rydell High, I must adapt to survive. I do hope that one day soon, I’ll be able to look upon the Grease 2 revival with an open heart. When that day comes, I’ll salute the like-minded fans and newcomers from a safe distance, channelling Michael Carrington: Actually I think you’re kinda terrific.
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