File this particular brand of news under wop baba lumop a wap bam why though? Paramount is reportedly gearing up for a prequel to Grease, titled Summer Loving, which will assumedly work to answer age-old questions like “did you get very far?”, “like does he have a car?”, and “did she put up a fight?” Wow, that last one is extremely un-chill. 1978, man.
The studio has tapped John August to pen the script. The writer is a long-time collaborator of Tim Burton, starting with the script for 2003’s Big Fish and continuing on through Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Corpse Bride, and Frankenweenie. He also co-wrote both of the early-2000s Charlie’s Angels films. August has two more high-profile projects just over the horizon; he co-wrote the script along with Guy Ritchie for Disney’s upcoming live-action Aladdin movie and is one of five credited writers on the Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark film.
The original Grease—which itself was based on the 1971 musical by Jim Jacobs and Warren Casey—starred John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John as a greaser named Danny and a brainy transfer student named Sandy who strike up a romance over one fateful summer; star-crossed high school lovers who literally rode a flying car into pop culture history. The film got a sequel (a superior film, fight me), but the original is still hanging around in one form or another. In 2016, Fox staged a live(!) performance of the musical starring Aaron Tveit and Julianne Hough in the two main roles.
No word yet on exactly how August plans to bring this story to life, but the way I see it we have three options here. 1) A Rashomon-style contrasting story with both Danny and Sandy serving as unreliable narrators, 2) We do this Wet Hot American Summer: First Day of Camp style and the original cast just returns without it ever being addressed, or 3) They just do a straight rom-com, in which case the only question is whether that He-Man movie would conflict with Noah Centineo playing Danny Zuko.