The final performance of Grease last night was before a mid-sized, but very appreciative crowd.

They may not have clapped as loud as the larger audiences have, but they certainly did it as enthusiastically.

Things went smoothly with Colleen Sullivan doing her finest "Hopelessly Devoted to You." Dahni Trujillo was even better. One of the sad aspects of closing the show is that we know if Dahni sang "There are Worse Things I Could Do" one more time, then it would again be even better than the time before.

Poor Jasper Oliver. He cut his finger pretty badly and has been performing with a bandage on his finger that looks more like a broken leg cast.

The household knife accident did not hamper his crowd-pleasing "Mooning" number. But I think he may have contracted blood poisoning, or something. At least, something mysterious must have circulated to his brain. How else to explain his decision to moon the audience in his final bow, right down to the skin? The elementary school age kids in he front rows got an eyeful, to be sure.

Darek Riley, a 13-year-old who did the other novelty tune in the show, reached a new personal best with "Beauty School Dropout" last night.

Note that Riley's first name is spelled Darek, here, not Derek as it was previously. The producers have two versions of his first name floating around, so I'll write both.

Matt Monaco did a fine "Alone at a Drive-in Movie." All in all, Monaco, for all of his liberties with the script and sometimes-frantic entrances following lightning costume changes, has done a fine job with "Danny."

The Rydell High School pennant was already gone when crew and cast struck the set this morning. Based on some eavesdropped information I think it fair to say Monaco got a much-deserved souvenir of a memorable show.

Most of the Burger Palace slept over night on the set so as to clean up the make-do theater in the morning: Monaco Tyler Brand and James Wilton.

So did many of the Pink Ladies. Sullivan was on hand in the a.m., So were Mary Cobb and Shannon Doscher.

Probably the best thing about community theater is the number of acquaintances and friendships that begin there.

Staci Johnson said her next project would be The Acting Company's "My Fair Lady," which starts auditions soon.

According to Johnson, she won't be directing this one. She'll be playing "Eliza."

Those with new shows in the works, in any capacity, might want to tell Stage Door Canteen about it so it can be publicized.

Bouncing back from a rain-soaked morning the cast of Grease put on its best show yet.

Personal bests -- if anyone was giving out awards -- went to Dahni Trujillo and Colleen Sullivan.

Trujillo's "Sandra Dee" was saucier and "Worse Things" more soulful. Each show ends leaving the audience feeling lucky to have heard that girl sing that's she'll be even better the next time.

Sullivan has opened up at least on "Hopelessly Devoted" and somewhat on "You’re the One I want." "Summer Night" is cute enough and it works. But the real credit on that one goes to the ensemble singers and choreographer Candee Jensen.

Last night Sullivan came as close as she ever will to delivering the perfect "Hopelessly." The smidgen missing in her songs is soul. It seems her heart has never been broken -- or at least, not often enough.

A few have expressed disappointment in Sullivan's Sandy. I think that's unfair. I suspect they were hoping for Olivia Newton-John and got something else.

But I saw the movie and was disappointed with Newton-John. The problem for me was that Newton-John already had established herself as something of a vamp. She wasn't credible as scrub-cheeked high school girl, and her transformation at the end was illogically double-reversed. She went from vamp to ugly duckling back to vamp.

Sullivan is certainly believable as the ingenue, and again her acting has to be praised. She's very, very good.

But the final transmogrifcation of Sandy-late-of-Immaculata into Sandy-a-red-hot-Pink Lady has not yet gelled. She came closer to doing it last night, but Sullivan's still not there.

Who knows what the pretty Colleen Sullivan's like in real life, but on stage she's got zip sex appeal. And it is passing strange that it should be so, since ostensibly she should have it all.

As soon as I saw her at the auditions I pegged her for Sandy. Blonde, pretty, fresh looking. Hell, she even looked freckly, from a certain angle.

She came in a plain shift dress straight out the Villager collection and the charming Fifties-style eyeglasses she wore signaled made her look like the real thing.

Personally, I would have left her just as she was, glasses and all and had her play herself until the last act denouement.

Then in the final scene and number, Shazam!, Sullivan/Sandy's eyeglasses and street clothes disguise would come off -- Hey, it worked for Clark Kent/Superman -- to reveal something sultry in come-hither Spandex and a Hairspray wig and Danny would at last and forever see "The One I Want."

But that's all minor quibbling over an overall great show, and any shortcomings are gladly forgiven when the whole cast reprises "We Go Together."

One look and the story was told. Wet streets, dripping leaves, overcast sky: sometime in the night it had rained on the open-air Grease set.

Flats, lights, sound system, cables and costumes -- all of them wet.

Ah, but surely someone had stayed with the set overnight at the Peach Tree Golf and Country Club and, when the first raindrop fell would have covered the most expensive equipment.

But no. Upon arrival the set looked as bedraggled, vulnerable and forlorn as a tramp ship, hastily abandoned at sea.

Poor little April Clark had left all her costumes neatly hung up on a laundry rack left out in the rain. There will be an extra dollop of emotion her vice, no doubt, when she sings "Raining on Prom Night" tonight.

No good deed goes unpunished, they say. This may explain the rain disaster followed the cast's best performance so far.

After a week's lay-off the kids returned Friday to a SRO house. But for some annoying glitches with the microphones, it was the best show to date.

Everyone seemed on it, Dahni Trujillo, especially. Almost all the diffidence had departed her acting voice. What remains of her languidness resides in he body and mannerisms.

Mat Monaco remembered to drop is lunch. At the right time, even. Derek Riley reached a new, higher, sharper final note in "Beauty School Dropout, Joe Moye rocked harder. Sara Guerrero, Mary Cobb and Shannon Doscher amped their Pink Ladies dialogue.

Philip Roberson explored the theatrical possibilities of a saxophone, Kyle Noland -- who still would rather be one of the star -- pushed a little harder on his dancing skills envelope.

Burger Palace Boys Jame Wilton, Tyler Brand, Austin dixon and Jasper Oliver further tightened their repartee and put even more English on the ball they're having on stage.