By Eleni Himaras
reporter@ltview.com
After playing Doody in the original movie, Sonny in the original national tour and seeing the constant popularity of Grease over the past three decades, Barry Pearl still loves bringing the timeless production to fresh eyes.

 “It’s a wonderful haunting,” Pearl said of the musical. “It will haunt me until my dying day, in a positive way.”
He spent last week playing improvisation and acting games with the young cast of TexARTs currently running production of the classic.
“All of the stuff I’ve gotten to do since the movie transcends the initial experience,” he said. “Meeting the people I do, seeing generation after generation get hooked.”
He said that each time a new company performs the play, it transforms, and that he has thoroughly enjoyed helping to bring it to the Lakeway stage.
“They surprise the heck out of you,” he said of the level of talent he saw out of the young cast. “Any of them that have made it this far have the sparks.”
During part of the classes, the students and Pearl played a game called, “The Department Store,” where students acting as patrons had to go up to an information booth and ask for various items, all from the 50s.
“The person playing Kenickie came up, and in the words of Grease, asked for ‘A four-speed on the floor,’” he said. The other student in the game immediately picked up and the two began into the lyrics of the song.
“They took it out of context and put it into the game, that’s what it’s all about,” he said.
Still active in the theatre, Pearl most recently performed in the tour of Happy Days, but spends much of his time teaching.
“It all works together, the teaching teaches me. The more I work, the more I put it all together,” he said.
Pearl was also known for his roll as Professor Tinkerputt on Bedtime with Barney: Imagination Island. He holds a