Jersey Boys
Jersey Boys is a jukebox musical with a book by Marshall Brickman and Rick Elice. It is presented in a documentary-style format that dramatizes the formation, success and breakup of the 1960s rock 'n' roll group The Four Seasons. The musical is structured as four "seasons", each narrated by a different member of the band who gives his own perspective on its history and music. Songs include "Big Girls Don't Cry", "Sherry", "December, 1963 (Oh, What a Night)", "My Eyes Adored You", "Stay", "Can't Take My Eyes Off You", "Walk Like A Man", "Who Loves You", "Working My Way Back to You" and "Rag Doll".
For other uses, see Jersey Boys (disambiguation).Jersey Boys
The musical premiered at the La Jolla Playhouse in 2004 and ran on Broadway from 2005 to 2017. Since its debut it has been on two North American national tours and two national tours of the UK and Ireland. The show has been produced in London's West End, Las Vegas, Chicago, Toronto, Melbourne and other Australian cities, Singapore, South Africa, the Netherlands, Japan, Dubai, and China. Jersey Boys won four 2006 Tony Awards, including Best Musical, and the 2009 Laurence Olivier Award for Best New Musical.
Development[edit]
In the early 2000s, Bob Gaudio, an original Four Seasons member, sought to make a musical from the band's discography; he noted in a 2008 interview that he was inspired by the success of Smokey Joe's Cafe and Mamma Mia! into believing that a rock-and-roll musical with existing songs could work.[1] He hired book writers Rick Elice and Marshall Brickman, who had difficulty finding a willing director until Michael David of Dodger Theatricals recommended them to Des McAnuff. Brickman suggested creating a show about the band's history, instead of repurposing their songs for an independent story the way ABBA did with Mamma Mia!;[2] Gaudio liked the idea, noting that although biopics were a common format in film, such a story format was still relatively rare on stage and that, to his knowledge, none had been tried at the time.[1] Brickman was drawn to the project because "it's a classic American story. It's rags to riches, and back to rags."[3] McAnuff was initially lukewarm to the project and did not like the idea of naming the project after a Four Seasons song, fearing it would look like a cash grab instead of a legitimate artistic work; Gaudio came up with the title on a plane ride, reasoning that the band members were all just a bunch of Jersey boys, and the name stuck.[1]
Little was known to the public about the Four Seasons' history before the musical, because magazines of the era did not write much about them.[3][4] In their research, Brickman and Elice were surprised to find that the members had prison records, which might have prevented their music from being played if it had been publicized when they were active.[2][4] According to Gaudio, "Back then, things were a little clean-cut, don't forget, so the idea of our story getting out was horrifying to us."[5] Other bands of the time projected street-tough images, but The Four Seasons cleaned themselves up to be palatable to mainstream listeners.[3]
Brickman and Elice also used material from interviews with surviving Four Seasons members Gaudio, Frankie Valli and Tommy DeVito. Nick Massi was aware of Gaudio's plans to make a musical in the last months of his life and enthusiastically approved of the project, but died in December 2000 before he could contribute any interviews.[6] While the Four Seasons as a group made headlines, as individuals they did not receive much press, as groups like the Beatles dominated the media.[7] Brickman noted that each member had his own perspective on what happened during their tenure as a group. Of the three surviving members, they approached DeVito last, who told them: "Don't listen to those guys. I'll tell you what really happened." Elice said that getting DeVito's version was a "eureka moment" and the contradiction in their stories was incorporated in the musical for a Rashomon effect.[2][8] Family members of the late mob boss Gyp DeCarlo also contacted the writers to ensure that he would be portrayed respectfully.[5][9][10]
Gaudio was part of the initial development team, but was not involved in the creative process during tryouts, and met the cast only after the show had premiered.[11] He, Valli, and DeVito decided to step back from the show's creative process because they lacked objectivity, leaving it to Brickman, Elice, and McAnuff to take the story to the stage.[4] But Gaudio and Valli still had the right to end the show if they did not like it; they ultimately recommended some minor changes (mainly to respect the personality rights of still-living people who were portrayed).[8]
Critical response[edit]
Ben Brantley of The New York Times wrote, "...the crowd goes wild. I'm talking about the real, mostly middle-aged crowd at the August Wilson Theater, who seem to have forgotten what year it is or how old they are or, most important, that John Lloyd Young is not Frankie Valli. And everything that has led up to that curtain call feels, for just a second, as real and vivid as the sting of your hands clapping together."[67]
Charles Spencer from The Daily Telegraph wrote: "Overpaid, over-sexed and over here, it will, I suspect be some time before London says Bye Bye Baby (Baby Goodbye) to the PHENOMENAL Jersey Boys."[68] Benedict Nightingale from The Times said, "Oh What a Night. There were times when I felt that the performers were making even the Beatles sound somewhat lacking in musical texture."[69]
Charity performances[edit]
The West End cast of Jersey Boys appeared as a guest act for the Royal Variety Performance 2008, which was staged at the London Palladium on December 11 in the presence of senior members of the Royal family. The Royal Variety Performance is a gala event held annually at a major British theatre, to raise money for the Entertainment Artistes' Benevolent Fund.[76] In 2010, The West End cast of Jersey Boys performed a show, with the profits going to Children in Need. The show ended with Pudsey Bear joining in to sing a medley, and raised £60,150 for the charity. In 2009 the cast also appeared as a guest act for Children in Need.
Jersey Boys Chicago has been honored two years in a row at the Broadway Cares event for being the top fundraiser in the Tour category. In 2008, Jersey Boys Chicago raised $220,000 for BC/EFA.[77]
For every ticket sold for every Broadway performance in the month of October 2010, $1 was donated to the VH1 Save the Music Foundation. Jersey Boys aimed to raise funds to restore one full music education program in a New York City school.[78] The show eventually raised $43,521, enough to restore the instrumental music education program at PS 85 in the Bronx.[79] Plans were made to donate additional funds raised to a second VH1 Save The Music Foundation grant recipient school.[79]
The Boys in Concert[edit]
Four actors of the original Broadway production, Christian Hoff, Michael Longoria, Daniel Reichard and J. Robert Spencer, launched a concert tour titled The Boys in Concert in 2010. Frankie Valli, Bob Gaudio, Marshall Brickman and Rick Elice sued the production, claiming that it "steals songs, stage elements and copyrighted logo" that imply that it is an authorized spin-off of Jersey Boys.[80] The production was rebranded as The 4 Hitmen, and Hoff, Longoria, Reichard and Spencer counter-sued, claiming that the accusations were false, and alleging the use of "bully tactics" in an "effort to injure the livelihood and the reputations" of the actors.[81] On September 23, 2010, Valli and company dropped the original suit, on the condition that the name of the performance is changed to distance itself from Jersey Boys.[82] As of March 2024, this production is still active, and is named The Midtown Men.[83]
The HBO series The Sopranos made several nods to Jersey Boys. For example:
In the 2010 comedy The Other Guys, NYPD detectives Hoitz and Gamble, played by Mark Wahlberg and Will Ferrell accept two Jersey Boys tickets as a bribe and attend the show.