There Is a Grease Prequel in the Works
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Before the existence of such iconic high school movies like Clueless and Mean Girls, Ferris Bueller's Day Off and Fast Times at Ridgemont High, The Breakfast Club and 10 Things I Hate About You, there was Grease. The 1978 film adaptation of the musical, starring John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John, is still today—43 years later—a paragon of the classic American teen flick. It was the highest grossing movie musical of the 20th century, one that catapulted its leads to superstardom, inspired decades of '50s-themed Halloween costumes and karaoke go-tos, and spawned generations of funny, charming, nostalgic tales of teen love, angst, and attitude.
So in this era of seemingly endless revivals (see: Gossip Girl, Sex and the City) and prequels (see: Bridgerton, the Robert Langdon series, Game of Thrones), it was almost inevitable that Grease would soon be resurrected in one form or another (we are going to ignore the fact that there was a widely panned Grease 2 in the '80s).
In fact, there are two such projects officially in the works. The first, called Grease: Rise of the Pink Ladies, has just been green-lit as a ten-episode series set to air on Paramount+, the streaming service of ViacomCBS. The show, which was originally being developed for HBO Max before switching networks, will focus on the Pink Ladies, the clique of mischievous, sexually active, stereotype-busting Rydell High greaser girls led in the original film by Stockard Channing, aka Betty Rizzo.
The events of Rise of the Pink Ladies will take place four years before Grease. Per the show's logline: "Before rock ‘n’ roll ruled, before the T-Birds were the coolest in the school, four fed-up, outcast girls dare to have fun on their own terms, sparking a moral panic that will change Rydell High forever.”
Over on the big screen, a film prequel is also in the works at Paramount. Called Summer Lovin', it will go into detail on that fateful summer romance between Danny and Sandy before all the high school drama got in the way. And yes, before you ask, it will be a musical.
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