Leather bound

Theatre-By-the-Sea's potent Grease

by Bill Rodriguez

GREASE. Book, music and lyrics by Jim Jacobs and Warren Casey. Directed by Gordon Greenberg. At Theatre-by-the-Sea through August 2.

Program managers at independent TV stations have a reliable trick when they want to impress their bosses and boost ratings. They schedule Grease and know that viewers will flock. Why? Check out the current hell-bent-for-hickeys production at Theatre-By-the-Sea and you'll understand.

High school in the '50s was that golden pre-nose-ring age when all it took to dismay grown-ups was a pompadour. When rock 'n' roll songs could be both sentimental and deliciously disreputable. And when PG meant quite the opposite of Parental Guidance. There's enough nostalgia packed into the heyday of diners and hot rods to give the overflow to kids whose grandparents were kids then.

An apple-cheeked John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John were the Danny Zuko and Sandy Olsen of the 1978 movie, of course. Tough competition. But it's easy to forget that their version was an adaptation of a stage musical, which was a hit on Broadway for a good reason. The immediacy of theater can be gripping, even without the air being humid with teenage hormones. (Okay, okay, some in the cast are a decade past their cafeteria-line years, but they're not out of pheromones yet.)

As you know, our virginal lovers had a summer romance, and the story begins on the first day of school. They hadn't known they'd both be going to Rydell High. Sandy is befriended by the Pink Ladies and black-leather-jacketed Danny is hoodlum-in-chief of the Burger Palace Boys. The challenge of fitting in, that's the problem every character is wrestling with here. Danny has to act cool and uncaring in front of the guys instead of relaxing into the puddle of mush he feels like when he's with Sandy. At a pajama party, Sandy grits her teeth and offers an ear to a sewing needle ear piercing. And, inevitably, she faces the dilemma of remaining a "good girl" or submitting to the temptations of drive-in lust.

Playing them with flair and energy are Sarah Uriarte Berry and Michael Berry, a couple off-stage as well. The chemistry shows. From the opening notes of their first duet, "Summer Nights," we want to listen to them all evening. Michael has the acting chops to risk giving us a (comically) anguished Danny who wears his heart on his sleeve. When he sings "All Alone At a Drive-In Movie," melding pain and humor, we wish he had more solos.

Sarah's little girl voice is quite beautiful and blends marvelously with Michael's deep baritone. She had the leading role of Belle in Beauty and the Beast on Broadway, and she brings the authority of a young veteran to the strong-minded Sandy. Her "Since I Don't Have You" is all the more touching because of that combination.

The main other couple is tough guy Kenickie (David Josefsberg) and the, well, slut Rizzo (Deb Rascoe). Rizzo is written as a hard-as-nails kid who would have been a gun moll in the '30s and an ordinary liberated teenager in the '90s. Rascoe gives her substance as well as spine. In "Look At Me, I'm Sandra Dee" and "There Are Worse Things I Can Do," her big numbers, she doesn't avoid poignancy in the snide parody or off-handedness in the defiance.

Director Gordon Greenberg does a snappy job on two counts. He goes for burlesquing the personality types, such as the nose-picking dancing ace Cha Cha DiGregorio (Noreen MacDonald), which sets the real emotions of the main characters in effective contrast. And he keeps funny stage business embellishments on tap, such as having Danny run his fingers through his glistening hair when his ring won't come off. The broad humor works. The martinet English teacher, Miss Lynch, gets hilarious exaggeration by Marilyn Farina in her tipsy prom dance scene. And Shari Jordan is allowed to be adamantly oblivious as the feloniously perky Patty Simcox.

This is the best staged Grease that I've seen, including a national touring version. Why wait for it to come on TV again when you can see it live at Matunuck? sophisticates.