‘Grease’ Isn’t As Problematic As You Remember–Here’s Why
Few movies infiltrate the cultural hivemind the way Grease has managed to since its 1978 release.
The Paramount Pictures film starring John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John still manages to be a household favorite, nearly 50 years later. From the Greatest Generation to Gen Alpha, nearly everyone in Western culture has seen or at least grown familiar with Grease.
Because of our changing times with movements like #MeToo and Black Lives Matter, younger generations have criticized Grease for its sexist, homophobic, and racist leanings. But as a former theater kid, I’m forced to disagree. Grease was actually far ahead of its time, introducing anarchical ideology and rebellion to a generation that was taught to follow in their parents’ footsteps: go to college, get a job, get married, have a family, and retire at 65. To this day, millennials and Gen Z are still fighting against this societal tradition. So to anyone battling their Boomer parent’s hope for traditionalism, just remind them of how much they loved Grease.
Many of Grease’s “offensive” moments are tongue-in-cheek.
Several people have taken up issue with Grease because of its overt sexism. Lyrics in “Summer Nights” such as when the T-Birds ask Danny if Sandy “put up a fight” and the Pink Ladies ask Sandy if Danny “had a car.” Of course the actors look like adults—another nod to Grease’s emphasis on satire—but the characters are teenagers. Teens still ask things like this today; all Grease is doing is highlighting the sexist tropes that existed during the ‘50s and how they ran through young minds.
Because Grease was written and created in the ‘70s, the goal of the film is not to promote the backwards thinking of an era two decades earlier but to poke fun at it. Plus, for the kids who grew up in the era of Grease, it was a way to remind their parents that they also said and did despicable things as kids.
Many people have criticized lyrics in “Greased Lightning,” in which the guys work on a car to get chicks. But if you’re taking the lyrics sung by a group of flamboyant men singing and dancing in an extravagant musical number seriously, society has some bigger problems. It’s the true epitome of camp, evidenced throughout Grease between “Beauty School Dropout” and even the costumes. Did the rebellious cool-girl cliques really wear matching pink jackets? Of course they didn’t, but in Grease, it’s an over-the-top indication of their status. The image of the pink and leather jackets is still synonymous with Grease itself.
The characters in Grease are complicated and well-rounded.
In The Guardian’s oral history of Grease, we learn that many of the characters were actually based on real people. “Grease started in a basement in Chicago and these characters are based on real people,” Jamie Donnelly, who portrayed Jan, shared, “which is why they feel so relatable.” Each character has their own journey, and while romantic relationships and friendships are at the heart of Grease’s plot, it’s rare to see main and supporting characters experience their own arcs. Each of these character’s arcs influences the main story and resolution that leads to Sandy’s choice to date Danny and join the Pink Ladies.
No one wants to watch a movie full of 100% morally upright characters; that’s just not realistic. Humanity and humans themselves are full of contradictions and complex opinions. The T-Birds can talk and joke about sex in a seemingly offensive way but still act in ways that are mostly respectful to their female counterparts. In fact, it can be argued that while the T-Birds egg each other on while together and try to play into the macho culture of the ‘50s, all they wanted was to be loved by the girls they loved back. At the time, they were told that to get the girls, they had to be masculine, to drive sports cars, to neg their romantic interests. But by the end of the film, we learn that the Pink Ladies are truly the ones calling the shots.
When Kenickie shows up for Rizzo during the rumors of her unplanned pregnancy, she shoots him down, and he’s left hurt and sad, like a lost puppy. He doesn’t lash out aggressively, he takes the hurt and tries again when Rizzo is ready to receive his love. Danny tries his hand at becoming a jock, wearing a letterman jacket and running track, to win Sandy’s heart. When Sandy rejects him at the drive-in movie, he doesn’t follow her or act violently; he sings “Stranded at the Drive-In,” a heart-wrenching (and slightly funny) inner monologue about his feelings of failure and loneliness. The T-Birds may have tried to look tough on the exterior, but they were really the OG soft boys.
The Pink Ladies, on the other hand, encapsulated femininity and an independent strength simultaneously. While they had romantic relationships, they also held onto their unique personalities, refusing to succumb to the whims of the men who courted them. Jan’s binge eating is played up as a joke in Grease, but her confidence and sexuality was an early representation of body positivity as opposed to fat shaming. Rizzo gets slut-shamed at various points throughout the movie, but she owns her sexuality and in doing so, is a leader as both a friend and a feminist. But when it comes to her emotional peak in “There Are Worse Things I Could Do,” she battles the complexity of being a forward-thinking and independent woman in a society that continues to shame her.
The conclusion of Grease is decidedly feminist and progressive.
The biggest criticism of Grease often comes with its conclusion in which Sandy shows up clad in leather from head to toe, wearing stilettos, hairspray, and exuding a more open sexuality. EW’s Kristen Baldwin mocked it: “Hey girls! Here’s a fool-proof trick for keeping your man: Change everything about yourself!” On a first re-watch as an adolescent, many believe that the idea that Sandy changes herself, going from a “good girl” to a “bad girl,” is actually a bad message. We look back on our childhoods, shocked that our parents allowed and encouraged us to watch Grease.
But what many of us failed to realize was that perhaps Sandy’s change wasn’t just to win a man. Sandy moved to the States with a conservative and traditional upbringing — she was fitting into society’s mold of what was expected of young women. She wore keds, poodle skirts, and even tried to befriend Patty Simcox, the boring head cheerleader. Even when Danny tries to fit into the more acceptable jock culture, Sandy just doesn’t feel right. She enjoys her time more with the Pink Ladies than with the cheerleaders, even if they are a bit more biting and sarcastic.
She learns to take risks and rebel against societal norms. Frenchy drops out of high school to go to beauty school, and ends up dropping out of beauty school and returning to high school with her friends. That’s not a traditional path but it’s the one Frenchy had to take to find where she truly belonged. Sandy went on her own journey of self-discovery, helmed not only by her summer romance with Danny (during which she saw his kind and uninfluenced inner self), but her experiences with various classmates and societal figures.
In fact, the read that Sandy changes herself for a man is more anti-feminist than the film itself. When Sandy walks out in the final scene, she’s more confident and joyous than she was throughout the entire film as she struggles with understanding her identity, a relatable journey for any young person. Danny wants to be with her no matter what, so just because she walks out in a sexy black outfit doesn’t mean she “changed herself for a man.” Criticizing Sandy’s transformation is its own version of slut-shaming instead of understanding that a woman can choose to rebel, to dress how she wants to, to feel free, and that by doing those things, she finally learns to love herself.