NOTE: This Grease: Rise of the Pink Ladies interview has been edited for clarity.
As a Japanese fan of the Grease films (but mostly Grease 2), I never expected to see a new instalment in that universe with any Japanese leads. All that has changed with the new Paramount+ prequel series, Grease: Rise of the Pink Ladies. This series documents the events that birthed the famous girl-gang, and one of the four founding members is Japanese.
Tricia Fukuhara portrays Nancy, an aspiring fashion designer who experienced being forced into internment camps with her family and other ethnically Japanese people during World War II. Her eccentric personality makes her stand out considerably among the large ensemble.
LadyJenevia: Nancy is my favourite Pink Lady because she has the self-confidence and acerbic wit of a middle-aged woman.
Tricia: Yes, she does! [laughs]
LadyJenevia: From your perspective in bringing her to life, where does her confidence come from? None of the other teenagers are as confident as her.
Tricia: No, they’re not. I think that her confidence comes from her upbringing. I think it’s from her family. Her parents, I think they just wanted her to feel nothing but love and support, especially since she is just coming out of [an internment] camp. That’s what just happened. She’s always had that support system around her. I think they want to shield her and make sure that even though these things were happening in the world, that she was protected from that. In doing so, maybe she is a little bit spoiled and maybe she is a little overconfident. Maybe that’s where gets it from because she’s always had the support of her family behind her.
Ari Notartomaso (they/them) portrays Cynthia (she/her), a tomboy who is first introduced as wanting to be part of the T-Birds gang. Unfortunately, the T-Birds’ gender biases prevent them from fully accepting her as a member of their ‘just for boys’ gang. As the episodes progress, her seemingly confident persona is peeled back to reveal an array of insecurities.
LadyJenevia: Ari, I thought that Cynthia was also super confident but then we learn how terrified she is of basically everything. As the actor bringing her to life, what do you believe motivates that fear she struggles with so much?
Ari: It’s hard to be a young person generally, in any decade. Specifically to be a young queer person without much understanding of who you are, and not much of a queer community around you in the 1950s, it’s a whole other level on top of that. I think that there’s certainly part of that that is the way she doesn’t fit in with the world and what’s expected of her gender-wise and sexuality-wise. But I also think that all young people struggle with identity, all people generally struggle with that. I feel like that’s where Cynthia struggles a little bit on paper but also, it’s sort of like the human condition to try to find where you fit and to still struggle sometimes.
LadyJenevia: Both of your characters have some really fun solo musical numbers that I enjoyed. They’re narratively doing different things but do each of you want to share a little bit about getting to have that moment in the spotlight, working with Jamal Sims, all of that?
Tricia: Sure. I mean, wow. Getting to work on “World Without Boys” was a dream that I never thought I could even have come true. Having that moment down the staircase, how grand! Having my Disney Princess moment down the staircase, but getting to slink! Also, it was difficult and I feel very proud of all of us. We were doing choreography but then we were also asked to do things backwards and forwards. Sometimes I would have to learn something backwards really quickly and then just go ahead and do that even though we’d been practicing it forwards or even with the lyrics themselves. To make things so cool and slow-mo, that means I have to sing backwards in double time. That’s something that I never thought I would have to do. But with the support of Justin Tranter and Jamal Sims, it was just an incredible collaboration and experience that I’m so proud to be a part of.
Ari: Being a part of all the musical numbers, even if I’m not in the forefront like I am in “New Cool” and a few other numbers on our show, just being able to be part of such an amazing triple-threat cast is not something you get to experience very often. I would say for “New Cool” specifically, just being able to pay tribute to “Greased Lightning” in Grease 1 was a huge thing and then make it kind of queer and trans was very spectacular for me, very important, and very fun.
Watch Grease: Rise of the Pink Ladies on April 6 on Paramount+.
Watch the full interviews with the cast/crew of Grease: Rise of the Pink Ladies here:
Grease: Rise of The Pink Ladies premieres on April 6 exclusively on Paramount+