March
1, 2008
Monday,
March 03, 2008
"Four Seasons" Musical Jersey
Boys To Repeat US Success in
The
ANNOTICO REport
The
English Backers are concerned if their audience will be able to relate to
industrial wasteland of
Can Four
Seasons musical Jersey Boys repeat
March
1, 2008
First, a
clarification: Jersey Boys has nothing to do with guys from the most southerly
of the British Isles, just off the
Conventional
wisdom holds that for a musical to have long-lived international appeal, it
should concern exotic subject matter. Set your show in a fantastic locale or in a
distant period, and audiences can project on to its romantic strangeness. Witness classics such as Cats, Phantom of the Opera, even Fiddler
on the Roof. Localism is a no-no. Jersey Boys flouts that rule,
depicting four Italian-American youths from the mobbed-up industrial wasteland
of New Jersey clawing their way to fame and fortune as the Four Seasons. It's
a jaunty rags-to-riches story with catchy songs such as Beggin'
and Can't Take My Eyes Off You - but will English
audiences relate to it?
"Many of us
knew the songs, but very few knew the story behind the songs," points out
the director Des McAnuff. The man who brought The
Who's Tommy to life on Broadway in 1993 certainly knows his way around a rock
catalogue, and how to avoid making it look naff in a
theatrical context. "You have these very recognisable
tunes, and then bodies in trunks of cars. There is a
weird juxtaposition."
McAnuff is referring to the extra
spice that makes Jersey Boys stand out from the pack of nostalgic jukebox
musicals: a true-crime backstory. Audiences who know
the Four Seasons through their bubblegum hits showcasing Frankie Valli's stratospheric falsetto will be surprised to
learn that the band hid a steamy past.
Before
their Top 40 hit Sherry in 1962, the guitarist Tommy DeVito
and the bassist Nick Massi had spent several years in
jail for various petty crimes. In addition, the band maintained ties with Mafia
mobsters. Even after the big hits Sherry, Big Girls Don't Cry and Walk Like a Man there were troubles. In 1969, the band was out of
favour with psychedelic listeners, and Valli and Gaudio discovered that DeVito
had accumulated large debts. DeVito agreed to be
bought out of the band and the remaining members had to work feverishly to pay
off the money.
"If you pull
the songs out, it's a play," McAnuff says.
"And it's quite different from most American musicals. It is an unusual
hybrid. I've described it as a musical for people who don't like
musicals." McAnuff says that he isn't changing a
thing for the
When the director
and his team were polishing Jersey Boys for its world premiere in
Achieving musical
authenticity will be key. Charles Alexander, a former
editor for Time magazine and an expert on all things Four Seasons (he
contributed liner notes to the box set Jersey Beat), cites Britain as second
only to America in terms of Four Seasons fandom. ?There
aren't Beatles-size numbers of Seasons fans in the world, but whether they are
in
Another potential
source of appeal is class, which gives the libretto much of its pathos and
comedy. "The British are still very conscious of class, while we in
For most
Americans,
Although Jersey
Boys gets its spark from the love-hate interplay between its four male leads
(who include Stephen Ashfield as Gaudio and Phillip Bulcock as Massi), there is no
doubt that the vocal burden falls on Ryan Molloy playing Valli.
This insanely demanding role requires a performer who not only has the acting
chops to play Valli from about age 17 to 53, but the
pipes to reach those falsetto highs in more than 20 numbers threaded throughout
the show.
It's daunting
stuff and Molloy is keenly aware of the vocal challenge. ?It's
the most singing that anyone's done in a show, ever,? Molloy says after a
rehearsal with a rueful laugh. ?It's a real Everest of
a show.?
As for the
characters' thick "dese, dem
and dose" accents and "fuggedaboutit"
manners, Carter doesn't foresee any cultural barriers. "We know our Goodfellas, A Bronx Tale, The Sopranos - it's all become
part of our knowledge of American culture."
Molloy says that
he can relate to Valli's youth, which started out in
a low-income housing development. "I was raised in a North Shields council
estate in a rough area," Molloy recalls. "It was tough living there.
I used to hang out with my cousin a lot and he's done about 15 years in jail.
He just got out this year."
If all goes well
with Jersey Boys, the only thing Molloy will be stealing is hearts.
Jersey Boys,
The
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