“Hopelessly Devoted To You” is a country pop song by the late Olivia Newton-John, sung by her character Sandy in the iconic late 70’s film “Grease”.
Written by Australian music producer, singer, songwriter and arranger John Farrar, the song sees Newton-John’s character Sandy ponder her feelings for Danny – her love interest. “Hopelessly Devoted To You” wasn’t always part of Grease’s tracklist. Halfway through filming, the vocal solo that was contractually-entitled for Newton-John wasn’t yet written, therefore leaving John Farrar (Newton-John’s personal producer) to submit a song he produced. The film production team were reluctant but then approved the song, and it was filmed and recorded after other parts of the movie had been finished.
In June 2004, Farrar spoke publicly about the difficulties he experienced while writing the track:
“I spent the longest period writing the lyrics […] every thesaurus and every rhyming dictionary I had, just trying to really make it work properly.”
The song received an Oscar nomination for best original song at the 51st Academy Awards, but lost to “Last Dance” from “Thank God It’s Friday“. In 2001, Swedish girl group Play covered the song for their first studio album.
On Olivia Newton-John’s official YouTube channel, an audio of the song was uploaded in October 2019. As of the 21st August 2022, the video had a total of almost 40 million views.
After the sad death of Olivia Newton-John in August 2022, “Hopelessly Devoted To You” re-entered mainstream charts, charting at #20 in Canada (Billboard) and #52 in Australia.
Read the lyrics to “Hopelessly Devoted To You” here.
*All information accurate at the time of publishing.
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