Taking in Army Community Theatre's production of "Grease" is like enduring high school all over again.

There are a few encouraging moments, but they are swamped by long stretches of pointless activity. And individuals with potential seem to be marking time until they can graduate to better things.

"Grease" doesn't slide by easily in this production. It puddles up and sticks.

The 1972 musical about life in 1959 at Rydell High has become a revival vehicle for entertainment names that can barely carry a tune, a slick and iconic movie, and the target of a recent television reality series. Not to mention its original Broadway run of more than 3,000 performances.

That's a pretty good record for a show filled with pedestrian songs and characters. Memories of teenage angst obviously run deep and wide through the American theater audience. But directed by Coco Wiel at ACT, those memories neither drive the show nor fully connect with the crowd.

The characters of Danny Zuko and Sandy Dumbrowski are especially shallow and vapid in this production.

Kekoa Young gets off a good solo with Danny's "Alone At A Drive-In Movie," but is far from the dangerous bad-boy persona that John Travolta brought to the film character. And Shawna Masuda's huge voice and powerful stage presence is little exercised and sadly wasted on the meager character and songs that make up Sandy.

Daren Kimura's musical direction provides a good sound from the chorus and his small combo. But while the ensemble is uniformly young and agile, Jennifer Shannon's choreography is not sufficiently challenging and Wiel's staging moves between musical numbers with a foot on the break instead of the accelerator.

Sean Jones as Kenickie doesn't get all the power he might from "Greased Lightnin'," but has the right look and moves — all elbows and ankles — to keep the character interesting. Vida Mae Fernandez as Rizzo has some strong vocal moments with "Look At Me, I'm Sandra Dee" and "There Are Worse Things I Could Do." And James Kaona and Pomai Lopez hit the right musical comedy notes with "Mooning."

But other featured roles fall flat.

Pedro Haro as Johnny Casino and Lanai (Tabura) as Vince Fontaine are lost in the crowd at the high school hop. And Al Waterson as Teen Angel sadly performed in pantomime when his body microphone failed to kick in on "Beauty School Dropout," his one and only number.

The glossy giant juke box set designed by Jon Savage works better in concept than in practice, when too much time is spent wheeling around a pair of its staircases. And Jarrod Larsen's lighting plan is marred by unexplained shadows and reflected spotlight glare.

Ah, high school. So much potential. So much misdirected energy. Sad that someone couldn't manage to pull it all together.