Launceston College's Grease tackles the challenging themes in the musical

Director Cheyne Mitchell said Grease started as a conversation with Tyran Parke, the executive producer of the Australian Musical Theatre Festival.

"We were talking about reinventing works that have challenging themes. Grease has always been one of those show for me that hasn't dated well," he said.

"We set ourselves a challenge of staying true to the show that we love, and the songs that we love, but calling out some of the more problematic moments in it."

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Mitchell said the audience would still recognise the same characters they knew and loved, they would just be framed slightly different.

"We are looking at a Danny that seems caught between friend groups, obligations, and a world he has always known," he said.

"We have a Sandy who isn't as prim and proper as the Sandy you know. She just seems to be making better choices than her friends at the moment, which puts her on the outside of the group."

Another character change to Launceston College's version of Grease is a female T-Bird.

"In 2021 there is no reason why a girl can't be a T-Bird," Mitchell said.

Chelsea Dean, who plays Sandy in the production, said Launceston College's version of Grease had moved with the times.

"Introducing LGBTQ+ and just making sure we are not accepting the raunchy behaviour in the original film," she said.

"Hopefully Launceston is ready to see it because we are definitely ready to show it to you guys."

The songs have also been carefully placed to change some of the moments in the show.

Sandy will be Dean's first lead role and it was a dream come true for her.

"When I first found out it was Grease, a dream role has always been to play Sandy like every other little girl that has seen the movie," she said.

"I am so incredibly honoured to step into such an iconic role and put my own twist on it."

Dean said she felt she was similar to Sandy, but still had to mentally prepare as the role was so iconic and many audiences saw Sandy in a certain way.

"[I want to] recreate her but also make sure [she's] still true to the original character."

Both Mitchell and Dean said it was great to be rehearsing in person again after COVID-19 put a stop to that last year.

"Now that we are all back in the room, it's that incredible energy that you can't replicate anywhere else. You have a whole room of teenagers having the time of their life," Mitchell said.

Grease will show at the Princess Theatre from August 4-7. Ticket information will be released April 26.