Stepping into the red stilettos beloved Australian singer Olivia Newton-John made famous in the 1978 film Grease, was a little overwhelming at first for Annelise Hall.

Growing up on Sydney’s north shore and northern beaches, Hall, who plays Sandy Olsson, in the 1971 stage play which opens at the Capital Theatre Tuesday night, said she was “Hopelessly Devoted” to Newton-John, just like the song Sandy sings.

“Olivia Newton-John was someone I always looked up to growing up – she was graceful, a great singer and dancer and an inspiration to all young Australian women,” Hall said.

“When I was young I watched the movie so many times with my sisters, but my mum would throw a tea towel in front of the TV when it got a bit risqué,” she said. “I never saw the scene in the car when bad boy Kenickie got Rizzo pregnant.

“Mum’s a massive Olivia-Newton John fan, I can imagine her being very much like Sandy when she was young, a bit prudish.”

Going to a Catholic school - Corpus Christi in St Ives - she says she too could relate to the role of the naive Australian exchange student who comes to America’s Rydell High and meets the supercool Danny Zuko, played by John Travolta in the film, and Joseph Spanti, in this stage production.

“I can relate a lot to Sandy too, I love the beach, and although I’m wearing a wig I’m still a blonde beach girl at heart like Olivia Newton-John, and I love playing this role as she transitions into the woman she wants to be,” she said.

At 24, Hall is a graduate of the Queensland Conservatorium’s musical theatre program, a little younger than Newton-John who was 28 when she starred in the ’50s era movie, which was the highest-grossing musical film at the time and whose soundtrack remains one of the world’s best-selling albums.