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Hinsdale Central students get slick for ‘Grease’
Sixteen-year-old Clare Sullivan has her hair styled by Casey Rust at Zazu Hair Salon in Hinsdale. Sullivan is in the cast of Hinsdale Central High School's production of "Grease." | Brian O'Mahoney~for Sun-Times Media
‘Grease’ is the word
When: 7 p.m., March 7-9
Where: Hinsdale Central High School Auditorium, on Grant Street at 55th Street
Cast: 75 student actors, musicians and crew members, plus cameos by Central teachers
Tickets: $7 for students, $10 for adults, can be bought at the auditorium or by calling the box office at (630) 570-8165.
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Updated: March 7, 2013 10:12AM
HINSDALE — Zazú Salon was filled with busy hairstylists, chattering teenagers and lots of hairspray.
The teenagers are in the cast of Hinsdale Central High School’s production of “Grease.” Boys and girls alike needed tips on how to create the 1950s-look depicted in the musical, and the hairstylists at Zazú Salon and Day Spa, at 18 E. Hinsdale Ave., volunteered to show them.
T. J. Sulejmani of Burr Ridge worked on student Katie Cushing’s hair.
“I’m setting it, so it is big, with volume and curls,” Sulejmani said. “We might put a headband in it.”
Cushing, who is in the ensemble, paid attention so she could duplicate the look herself for each of the three performances.
“Tight curls with a lot of volume,” Cushing noted.
Clare Sullivan, 16, of Hinsdale, enjoyed watching Casey Rust curl her light brown hair into long locks with a curling iron. Rust then brushed out the curls and pulled the hair back in a high ponytail.
“We don’t always do plays where our hair is fun and up,” Sullivan said. “Last year, we were all poor and peasant-y,” in the school’s production of “Les Misérables.”
“We’re showing them how to tease their hair to get that greaser look,” said hairdresser Holly Fitzgibbon.
The stylists needed a bit of preparation themselves. They looked up ’50s hairstyles and specifically those of the “Grease” characters on the Internet.
“A little Google image search goes a long way,” said Zazú manager Laura Chappetto. “Then we played around on our own.”
Johnny Pierce, a Hinsdale Central junior in the cast, said his hair will “probably be slicked back and smooth and a lot better than it usually is.”
When Shannon Gallo of Clarendon Hills asked the hairdresser if she was going to put her son David’s hair in a D.A., “she had no idea what I was talking about,” Gallo said. The letters stand for another version of “duck’s tail,” in which men’s hair is high in the front and slicked back on each side to meet like a duck’s feathers in the back.
Some students took advantage of the hairstyling session, even though their hair would not be an issue during the play.
“I am going to be wearing a wig for the show,” said Jena Sugay, a senior who plays one of the “Pink Ladies,” the girls’ clique at the fictional Rydell High School. “But I wanted to get my hair done all big and curly (at Zazú). I’m a big girly-girl.”
