How many times have you watched Grease?

It was 1982 and I was 10 years old and I think in one day alone I may have watched the entire film five times back-to-back. It was on VHS tape. Do you remember them? Of course, Grease was released in 1978 and my Auntie Gail and her best mate, Shirley Lee, who actually named her kids after the T-birds had the vinyl LP with the fabulous cover jacket. I would pour over the cover – it would open like a book and there would be stills of the magical film that brought me such happiness. I can vividly remember the smell and the texture and the feelings of obsession that it would instill in me again and again and again.

I couldn’t get enough of the film. I could quote it. I knew the nuances of each look of each still. I watched it with my girlfriends again and again and again. It’s familiarity brought us great comfort, excitement and joy. We were transfixed.

It was Grease that introduced me to the notion of the American High School, with their athletics tracks with seats in rows. We had grass fields with chalked on lines and you sat on your arse in the grass on sports day. American High Schools seemed so glamorous.

I loved the look of the baseball jackets with Rydell High “R” and longed to live in America and go to High School where they had lockers, yellow school buses and carnivals.

School here in the UK seemed so grey and cold in comparison, like our weather. America seemed golden – the land of milk and honey. But then a few years later came a film which also took over my life and made Britain feel safe and warm and cosy…..

Nightmare on Elm Street…..

America ceased to be so attractive once I’d met Freddy.

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