Grease III

A nonsensical look at a day in the life of Zack and Katie

My idea for the next great musical…

The show opens at a 50’s style drive-in restaurant with a quartet of Doo-Wop singers snapping together in unison and singing the aria from Act One of Wagner’s “Flying Dutchman.”  The stage is set with black-and-white-checked linoleum, girls clad in poodle skirts, and young men with slick-backed duck tails.  Couples order chocolate malts and double orders of fries while the music switches to an accordion playing in a minor key suggesting they will soon all contract swine flu, rendering their vocal chords and the 4th phalanges on their left feet useless.

Off to the side, we see a young blonde girl, named Katherine, who is crying and distraught because her father has recently relocated to Detroit to remarry a large polish woman named Bogna.  Watching her closely is Zack, a handsome young boy in a letterman’s sweater who, although too shy to speak to her directly, leaves uncooked semolina pasta on her doorstep each night.  Katherine�"or Maude as she is called in the musical, is deeply moved by the gift and tries unsuccessfully to meet him each night, especially since she cannot stand elbow macaroni, but prefers cellantani instead.

Maude and Zack finally meet when, unexpectedly, a ’57 Buick Roadmaster with a bad exhaust mistakenly drives in the drive-in.  Cautiously, Zack drags Katherine by her hair to an empty booth where they commence dancing the Charleston, after which Zack tries to make an impression on Maude by clinching his butt cheeks to the tune of Elvis’ “Suspicious Minds”, until he is overcome by exhaustion.  Feeling badly about the scene that just occurred�"especially the hip-gyration of the elderly waitress with the bouffant hairdo�"Zack tries a different approach and suggests they attend the local school sock-hop later that evening.  A suggestion that leaves Maude with no doubt that Zack is suffering from early dementia.

The sock hop, however, is a huge success and one of the band members�"a little person dressed in faded Levi’s and a silk, fuchsia halter top falls in love with Katherine.  Katherine is immediately smitten and when the little person suggests they procreate under the bleachers, she realizes they are meant to be together forever.   Despite the fact that she has just procreated under the bleachers and is sweating like a stuck pig, Katherine says yes and her imagination races to the future where we are treated to a glimpse of their life together�"a cottage together in the woods with 7 small children and an annoying bitchy elderly neighbor who incessantly offers Katherine apples.

Distraught and suicidal, Zack is found precariously swaying drunkenly from high atop the aforementioned ’57 Buick.  After loudly declaring undying love for Katherine, Zack drinks the last of the Fiji mineral water and leaps, leaving the crowd gasping.  Of course, Zack does not die, but is later found smiling happily with a beautiful brunette named Greta and a new titanium hip.

Reviews

[roarke]

hahahhaahaha. I gotta get you to pitch my stories to publishers....

This is a Cecil B. DeMille extravaganza and Busby Berkeley love child....
I think the adaptation of Gone with the Wind was shorter....

Great concepts, ribald comedy, perky style, definitely a mood piece...

Good to see you back and swingin' at the fences HH. Very Fun stuff.