Stockard Channing as Rizzo

[David]

Stockard Channing plays Rizzo in GREASE with such command & such craft that it's impossible to think of anyone else in the role.

Consider the scene in which Rizzo, attired in black skirt, pumps, & sunglasses, presides over the gaggle of silly female geese (including Sandy & the Pink Ladies) like Cleopatra commanding her palace plebs & slaves. And she does so with the most minimal of means: a raised eyebrow here, a disdainful twitch of the mouth there, a "shove-off" with the shapely leg, & a bored bon mot delivered with perfect timing.

In later scenes, Ms. Channing acts the part right down to the ground, investing the essentially shallow character with anxiety & desperation. The emotional stature of her performance in the girls' bathroom, & her consequent betrayal by a "pal," is as resonant & stirring as the high trumpets in contrapuntal play with the full chorus in the Gratias agimus tibi propter of Bach's B Minor Mass.