With the coronavirus pandemic impacting lives around the world and social issues like LGBTQ rights and the Black Lives Matter movement, do we really need to ‘cancel’ a 42-year-old movie musical?
The mega-successful 1978 movie musical Grease was aired over the holidays on one of the BBC channels in the U.K. and some folks took to social media to decry the film as homophobic, racist, sexist, and even ‘rapey.’
In a recent interview, international pop-star Olivia Newton-John, who played ‘Sandy’ in the film, was asked about the kerfuffle.
“I think in this particular instance, it’s kind of silly because the movie was made in the ’70s about the ’50s,” the Aussie shared with the podcast ‘A Life of Greatness.’ ”It’s fun. It’s a fun movie musical and not to be taken so seriously.”
“I think everyone is taking everything so seriously,” added the 4-time Grammy Award winner. “We need to relax a little bit and just enjoy things for what they are.”
Newton-John has previously addressed criticism that the finale of the movie is sexist when ‘Sandy’ becomes a ‘bad girl’ to get her man played by John Travolta.
“Everyone forgets that, at the end, he changes for her, too,” notes the 72-year-old.
For her part, Newton-John prefers to take a more positive view of life.
In 2018, the “Physical” singer shared with the world she was battling stage four breast cancer for the third time.
But today Newton-John says she’s feeling strong thanks to treatments ranging from western medicine to ‘kinder, gentler’ plant-based medicine.
“I think every day is a blessing,” she told The Guardian in an interview. “You never know when your time is over. We all have a finite amount of time on this planet, and we just need to be grateful for that.”
That said, Newton-John isn’t ready to spend her time sitting still.
She recently released a new pop single, “Window in the Wall,” with her daughter Chloe Lattanzi that looks to connect folks, not cancel them.
The music video for the single quickly hit #1 on the iTunes Music Video chart and stayed at the top spot for over a week. Newton-John says the new track will be part of a soon-to-be released collection of duets.
