NEW YORK — Kathleen Marshall is dealing with durability these days, finding a new way to tackle "Grease," a pop staple of American musical theater for more than 30 years.
Born in Chicago in the early 1970s, "Grease," a raucous celebration of 1950s high school life, has never really disappeared. Critics may not have embraced it the way they did "My Fair Lady," "West Side Story" or "Gypsy," but there have been two long-running Broadway productions (the 1972 original and a 1994 revival), a hit movie starring John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John and countless stock, foreign and amateur incarnations.
Now Marshall is shepherding the musical back to Broadway in a new $10 million production that had its two leads — Max Crumm and Laura Osnes — chosen earlier this year on an NBC-TV reality series, "Grease: You're The One That I Want."
"The TV show did exactly what it was supposed to do: find us two talented, young, fresh people to play these parts," says the director-choreographer, who along with the musical's lead producer, David Ian, and co-creator, Jim Jacobs, were judges on the television program.
"It also has brought a whole new audience to the Broadway show," says Marshall, sitting in an upstairs foyer of the Brooks Atkinson Theatre before a matinee preview performance. The show officially opens Aug. 19.
"I talked to one family — father and son — and they said they were going to take their family vacation in Hawaii, but the kids loved the TV show so much that they decided to take their vacation in New York instead. I figure, if we get audiences hooked, if they have a good time, they will come back. Maybe they will experiment and see a show they haven't heard of before."
Marshall says she has had an advantage as the show's latest commander in chief. She never saw the Broadway original or the 1994 revival — although she did see the movie back in high school.
"I'm approaching 'Grease' like it was a new show," Marshall says. "Even though, obviously, it's a musical that's really well-known and beloved, it's still kind of fun to say, 'OK, let's get to know the story and these characters and figure out who they are."'
Who they are include bad boy Danny Zuko (Crumm), the virginal Sandra Dee stand-in Sandy Dumbrowski (Osnes), bad girl Betty Rizzo (Jenny Powers) and the rest of the gang at Rydell High.
Marshall examined the musical, written by Jacobs and Warren Casey, with a meticulous attention to period detail and to the actors she has chosen to inhabit a very specific era.
After all, the director dusted off an earlier part of the 1950s in the recent Tony-winning revival of 1954's "The Pajama Game." She tapped into the magnetism of Harry Connick Jr., transforming him into a Broadway leading man by showcasing his strengths.
For "Grease," she did a lot of research for her young cast (14 of them — including Utahn Natalie Hill — are making their Broadway debuts). "A lot of them weren't even born when the movie came out in 1978," she says.
Powers remembers a high school production in her hometown of Andover, Mass., where the girl playing Rizzo was someone she always looked up to. "I vowed then I would be Rizzo someday," she says.
Ryan Patrick Binder, who plays Doody in the revival, saw a community theater production back in Michigan when he was in the sixth or seventh grade. He always liked the movie, too. "I thought it was the coolest thing that these guys were dancing around a car," he says.
Lindsay Mendez — she's Jan in the new production — grew up with the film. "My parents were big movie-musical fans," Mendez says. "And I thought 'Grease' was different from the usual MGM musical. I was intrigued and fell in love with it."
Five years ago, in her first big job right out of high school, Mendez played Jan in a European tour of "Grease," phonetically learning her lines in German.
Marshall and her production team created a library of DVDs for the new cast to watch. Classic '50s-early-1960s-teen-flavored flicks such as "Rebel Without a Cause," "Blackboard Jungle," "The Young Savages" and "Rock Around the Clock." There were CDs, too, featuring the music of Elvis Presley, Little Richard, Bill Haley and the Comets, Bo Diddley, Connie Francis, Chuck Berry and more.
"There was a great Time-Life book called 'Rock & Roll Generation: Teen Life in the '50s,' which has all kinds of information about the social behavior of the day," she adds. "We put together research boards on the walls of the rehearsal room — all about car culture, teenage dating at the time, clothes, where (kids) would hang out and more."
Although she loved doing the research, Marshall says it's the characters and actors portraying them who really count.
"We've got a lot of fresh faces in the cast — and they range in age from their early 20s to early 30s," Marshall says. "The hard part is that even though they're supposed to be high school students, there aren't many 17-, 18- or, 19-year-olds who really have the skills to play these parts.
"The great thing about the TV show is that we could just cast the best people for all the rest of the roles. There was no pressure about big names."
"I think Kathleen wanted newbies galore — and the energy that comes with that; we have this group that is so excited to get out there every night," says Powers, one of the more veteran members of the cast. She has been on Broadway in "Little Women" and portrayed the sultry Diana Devereaux in the 2006 "Encores!" concert version of the Gershwins' "Of Thee I Sing."
Mendez agrees. "It takes a lot of energy to do this show the way Kathleen wants it done — which, to my mind, is just the way it should be done — with excitable, teenage, freaked-out energy every night."
Yet the energy has to be rooted in character, according to the director.
"These characters are very specific in a lot of ways," Marshall explains. "The balance you want to find is a performer who is believable, ... who doesn't seem like a caricature."
"Kathleen has let us develop what we need to develop as characters," Binder adds. "I used to think that 'Grease' was very campy and over the top. But she's encouraged us and helped us find the truths and the dynamic layers of these people, particularly how these characters act in different situations or with other characters."
"Grease" purists — there must be a few — will be surprised to discover that, when it comes to the score, this latest revival is not a replica of the original show.
"This is the first Broadway production that has permission to use songs written for the movie," Marshall says. Four have ended up here: the title song, "Sandy," "Hopelessly Devoted" and, of course, "You're the One That I Want," which became part of the title of the TV reality show.
The television show has given Marshall a new visibility, at least in New York and particularly around the Broadway theater district.
Yet she says, "TV is really a producer's medium. The executive producer and the network control the content, the tone and the direction of the show. They wanted us to be tougher in the sort of 'American Idol' vein of being tougher on the contestants and being combative with each other.
"But we said, 'That's not the way theater works.' We were the people making the decisions anyway: the Broadway producer, the author and the director.
"My way as a director of getting the best out of people is by encouraging them, not by terrifying them or intimidating them. They wanted that sort of 'This is your chance to prove it or you're out of here.' That's not how it works in theater. We actually nurture talent in the theater."