Karin, however, is now a hardcore Travolta fan ("Han är SNYGG, mama!"*) and when asked if she wanted to be a Pink Lady or a Scorpion emphatically declared that she was a T-Bird. I haven't wanted to crush her illusions by mentioning that Mr Travolta is older than her mother by a good 10 years or that he looks like this now:
and not like this:
I admit to feeding my kid's musical habit with frequent injections of movies and music I have loved as well. If I can influence their musical taste away from rap and thrash metal, I'll do so gladly and be proud of it. My dad did it to me at a young age, giving me a lifelong admiration for musicals, by raising me on My Fair Lady and Fiddler on the Roof and The Sound of Music and South Pacific and Hair (and I wonder if he had the same sort of worries in regards to THAT film as I have with Grease, and hoo boy, Grease is a walk in the park compared with Hair in terms of sexual connotations).
While in this mode, however, I have realized that I don't actually have very many classic musicals on film, and although I DO have the soundtracks that isn't enough at this stage to capture the interest of the visually-oriented generation my kids belong to. And after looking at a (by no means complete) list of contemporary stage musicals, there are many that I haven't seen myself which makes me long for Chicago and the many, many theaters with which it abounds.
While looking for musicals on DVD, I also came across something frightening. David Hasselhoff in the musical version of Jekyll & Hyde? SO WRONG IN SO MANY WAYS.
Anyway, I'm thinking maybe Cats ought to be next up for the musical-obsession-maniacs that my children are turning into, or perhaps Fame. What do you think? Got any favorites you can recommend?
*He's HAWT, mom!