Buffy The Vampire Slayer

A decade after "Buffy," "Grey’s Anatomy" brings on the song and dance. Is it time to retire a tired stunt?

You know what happens to reasonably popular television series already several years into their runs. They suddenly acquire cute younger relatives — a condition pioneered by Cousin Oliver and Scrappy Do. They will-they-or-won’t-they themselves into a frenzy. They do a live episode. Or, as they’ll do this Thursday on "Grey’s Anatomy," they go musical.

It’s been a decade since Joss Whedon and company gave us the audacious, unrivaled "Once More, With Feeling" episode of "Buffy the Vampire Slayer." Back then; anything that smacked of high school theatricals creeping into prime time was downright risky. Singing and dancing? As part of the plot? How old-fashioned could you get? Turned out, it was pure magic.

Although everything about the toe-tapping, bittersweet episode clicked, it would be another five years before the television musical really exploded, when a peppy Disney movie about a bunch of singing and dancing teenagers inauspiciously debuted and — promptly became the biggest thing in the universe. "High School Musical" launched a thousand lunchboxes and became the top album of 2006. It also paved the way for the considerably more sexed-up combination of teens and show tunes that would become "Glee," that juggernaut of Journey tunes and jazz hands. And with the success of "HSM" and "Glee," a slew of other series have interrupted their regularly scheduled laugh tracks and dramatic montages for a little song and dance.

And why not? The back lots of Hollywood are littered with multi-hyphenates, men and women who didn’t put in years at Juilliard just to bark, "Stat! He’s coding!" week after week. The "Grey’s Anatomy" musical event, for example, unfolds from the semi-comatose point of view of Callie, played by Tony Award winner Sara Ramirez. Ramirez has described the episode as "Like a dream I didn’t even know I had coming true," but this being "Grey’s," don’t expect show tunes and overtures. The show instead will be an homage to the soft-alt hits used in episodes past, including "Breathe (2 am)," "Chasing Cars" and, of course, the "Freebird" of dramatic television music, "How to Save a Life."