Grease the Musical

GREASE IS THE WORD! and it's back - in a brand new production at London's Piccadilly Theatre from 25 July 2006 and starring in the lead roles of 'Sandy' and 'Danny' that where choosen by the public via the ITV television programme Grease is the Word.

The live theatre show of Grease includes all the hit songs from the movie including Summer Night, Hopelessly Devoted To You, Sandy, You're The One I Want, Greased Lighting and, of course, Grease Is The Word!

Congratulations Danny Bayne and Susan McFadden - the public voted for you both to play the lead roles of 'Danny' and 'Sandy'!

How to book tickets:

Performances take place from Wednesday 25 July 2007 at The Piccadilly Theatre in Denman Street, London (nearest tube: Piccadilly Circus)
Performances take place each week: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday at 7.30pm, Friday at 5.00pm and 8.30pm and Saturday at 3.00pm and 7.30pm. There are no performances on Sunday. (Note Friday 27 July at 7.30pm only, Wednesday 8 August at 7.00pm only).
Tickets are currently on sale for performances up to Saturday 23 February 2008
Online booking: Click here
Online booking: Click here - different seat availability
Telephone booking hotline: 0844 847 1722

The co-writer of Grease, Jim Jacobs explains how he came to have the idea for the show: "It was in Chicago, Illinois, circa March/April 1970. At a cast party for some long forgotten show - just for a laugh - I pulled out some of my old 45 records from the 1950s. These songs sounded extremely dated compared to the very hip, psychedelic funk of 1970 but it was a change of pace amongst the repetitious favourite dance tunes of the day. It was after singing along to several of these old, scratchy 45s by the likes of Little Richard, Dion and the Belmonts, and The Flamingos, that I first suggested to Warren Casey what a funny idea I thought it would be to see a Broadway musical that utilised this type of score i.e the basic acapella/ faisetto/ doo-wops/ hic-cupping/ R&B music of the late 50s instead of the traditional, "legit" show tune type melodies of the Great White Way. Warren raised the rather obvious question: "Yeah, but what would the show be about?" A few beers later - with daylight rapidly approaching - I hit upon the idea that it should be about the kids I went to high school with, mainly the "greasers" and their girlfriends, back in the golden days of rock'n'roll. Harking back to a lifestyle that seemed centred on hairstyles, (oily, gooey, coiffs) the food (cheap, fatty, hamburgers and soggy fries) and cool custom cars (more gunk and sludge) or any and all things "greasy" - I suggested we call it Grease."

Together Jim Jacobs and Warren Casey wrote the first version of Grease as a play with music and, on 5 February 1971, it opened at a damp, drafty, former trolley barn called The Kingston Mines Theatre in Chicago featuring a non-professional cast of 18 actors who played the first of four scheduled performances to full houses of 120 seats. Due to its popularity, the show extended... and extended. Producers saw the show and suggested that it should be reworked to become more of a musical. Thus Jim Jacobs and Warren Casey reworked the script and the show opened off-Broadway the following yeat before transferring to The Broadhurst Theatre on Broadway on 7 June 1972. The show run for just under eight years, transferring to The Royale Thatre and then The Majestic Theatre before closing on 13 April 1980 after 3,388 performances.

The original London West End production of Grease opened at The New London Theatre in June 1973 with a cst that included the (then unknown) Richard Gere in the role of 'Danny'. The show was revived in London in 1979 with a cast that included Su Pollard and Tracy Ullman.

The hit film version of Grease, starring John Travolta as 'Danny' and Olivia Newton-John as 'Sandy', opened in 1978 with a number of new songs. Then, 15 years later, a new version of the stage musical Grease opened at London's Dominion Theatre which, for the first time, included the new songs from the movie. This production run for six years, transferring to the Cambridge Theatre during it's run.