Grease: 1978 film starring Olivia Newton-John and John Travolta gets TV reboot with Rise of the Pink Ladies

The iconic film Grease, which featured the likes of John Travolta and the late Olivia Newton-John, has received a TV reboot. The new series sees the characters navigating their way through high school in the 1950s.

The first episode, released on Thursday (April 6) on Paramount+ follows four female characters who overcome their own personal obstacles to found their own musical quartet - aside from that, it bears little resemblance to the 1978 classic.

Unlike the 1978 movie - there will be no Danny / Sandy romance as this TV reboot features an all-female cast who will explore sexual orientation, gender expression, racial identity and more.

Family favourite songs will appear in the TV reboot alongside some new music, including one centred around white supremacy. The TV show will also feature a mix of LGBT and black characters - something not seen in the film.

Grease: Rise of the Pink Ladies is set in 1954 and is a prequel to the famous film. It will show how the girl-gang counterpart to Danny Zuko’s T-Birds, the ‘Pink Ladies’ was founded.

Speaking about the show, Ari Notartomaso said: “Queerness, gender nonconformity and transness throughout time hasn’t always been exactly the same.” The actor notes their character, who initially wanted to join the all-male T-Birds, may have had the same identification on screen.

Notartomaso, who portrays the role of Cynthia, continued: “All of us are a product of the culture that we live in, but it is really special to be able to tell that story of what it may have been like in the 1950s.”

Despite being released some 45 years ago, Grease continues to be shared down generations, and is still loved, and watched by millions. At the time of its release, it became the highest-grossing musical film at the time. Its soundtrack album ended 1978 as the second-best-selling album of the year in the United States.