X: Xanadu by Olivia Newton-John

W: Wellerman by Nathan Evans Y: You Oughta Know by Alanis Morissette

X: Xanadu by Olivia Newton-John

Welcome AtoZ-ers and other blog friends! This month I'm participating in the AtoZ blogging challenge, and you'll see a post every day (except Sundays) about one of the Songs of my Heart. Today's edition: Xanadu by Olivia Newton John. (If my embedded video won't work, you can listen at this link).

For a little while there, when I was an older kid, but not yet a teenager, Olivia Newton-John was the it girl. I knew her from her song "Let's Get Physical" which I thought was about exercise and from her stint as Sandra Dee in the movie Grease. I remember hearing about the movie Xanadu, but no one took me to see it. The song was all over the radio, but mostly, I heard the movie was awful, and my mom was shocked that Gene Kelly was in it.

I didn't see the movie until last year, when it came to the Carolina Theatre of Durham, renowned for its retro film series. Sweetman and I are regulars. And…it wasn't the kind of awful I was expecting. It was more a near-miss kind of thing. Lots of potential there--kind of a fun concept of the Muses coming to contemporary society and one of them deciding to inspire the opening of a nightclub: Xanadu. And this bit where she had inspired Gene Kelly's character when he was young, then came back around. But the acting is overall pretty wooden and you could drive entire trucks through the logic gaps.

Gene Kelly could still move at age 67 though, even on roller skates.

Lyrics from AtoZ:

A place where nobody dared to go

The love that we came to know

They call it Xanadu

(The days you cried can't be denied)

And now, open your eyes and see

What we have made is real

We are in Xanadu

(The dream in you, they offer you)

A million lights are dancing

And there you are, a shooting star