Grease actress Didi Conn has said she is still close friends with former co-star Olivia Newton-John, 40 years after the hit musical film was released.

Conn, who played aspiring beautician Frenchy in the 1978 film opposite Newton-John as Sandy, also revealed there was once an original sequel based at a summer school in the works but it never came to fruition.

The 66-year-old told ITV’s Good Morning Britain how the film changed her life.

Grease
Olivia Newton-John as Sandy (left) and Didi Conn as Frenchy in Grease (Paramount/Rso/Kobal/REX/Shutterstock)

She said: “Grease is such a happy movie and I was lucky enough play someone who was a good friend, and I think people respond to that.

“Olivia and I are still friends to this day.

“I go to see her – her band is amazing, and when she sings it comes right from the heart. She’s the real deal.”

Conn said she thinks the film has been so popular over the years because it is “about first love and the first car and the first break-up and the first career disappointment for Frenchy”.

Grease, which also starred John Travolta and Stockard Channing among others, was due to have a follow-up based on events towards the end of the film, according to Conn.

She said: “Towards the end of filming, we were doing that carnival scene and when the boys are throwing pies at the coach and he says: ‘I’ll see you in summer school’ – that was going to be a sequel with the cast called Summer School.

“And Paramount was watching the dailies and they said, ‘no, we don’t want to do a sequel, this is going to be a nice little summer film’.

“And they passed, and then when it was a huge success, John and Olivia were busy and Grease 2 was born, which is very different.”