• The Guardian
  8 Wednesday 24 July 2019
  Style

I got bids,

they’re

multiplying!

When

Sandy told Danny to “Tell me about
it stud,” in skin-tight black trousers
and a leather jacket in the 1978 fi lm
Grease, little did Olivia Newton-
John realise her character’s costume
would go on to fetch a combined
estimate of $230,000 (£185,000) at
auction more than 40 years later.
These items of cinema history,
along with 200 more of the actor’s
costumes and personal clothes will
go under the hammer at Julien’s
Auctions in LA in November, with

32 highlights now on display at the

Museum of Style Icons in Ireland.

Needless to say, the black trousers

will take centre stage and Newton-

John hopes that they get the same

head-turning reaction as they did

during production. “The night

before we fi lmed You’re the One

That I Want, John [Travolta] was

fi lming Stranded at the Drive-in

and I had fi nished fi lming.

I was trying on costumes, hair

and make up in the trailer and

I don’t think anyone knew it was

me at fi rst as all the heads turned

and I thought: ‘Wow! What have

I been doing wrong all this time?’ ”

she tells me on the phone from her

California home.

“The trousers and jacket are the

most identifi able of pieces and what

people remember when they think

of Olivia Newton-John,” says Martin

Nolan, the executive director of

Julien’s Auctions, who is organising

the exhibition.

Although her character Sandy

was memorably called “too pure

to be pink” by Rizzo (played by

Stockard Channing), a customised

version of the “pink ladies” jacket,

which was given to Newton-John

by the cast and crew, will also be up

for grabs and is estimated to reach

$4,000. “It was most likely given

to me at an after party or when we

wrapped a scene with the pink

ladies,” she says, as “they wanted

me to have one of the jackets and

feel I was part of them ”. It is a bond

that has remained: she is still in

touch with Di di Conn, who played

Frenchie (they would rehearse in

her trailer), as well as Barry

Pearl who played Doody, Kelly

Ward who was Putzie and Travolta.

Why-yi-yi is

Olivia Newton-

John sending her

most electrif ying

costumes from

Grease and her

55-year career

to auction? She

talks to Melanie

Abrams

Olivia Newton-

John with

John Travolta in

Grease’s most

rehearsed scene

Sandy’s ‘pink

ladies’ jacket

(left), plus

trousers and

leather jacket,

estimated to sell

for £185,000

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