Oh What A Night! – Jersey Boys

Jersey Boys may well have been intended as a ‘play about four guys who wrote music’ when it fell from the pens of Marshall Brickman and Rick Elice in 2004, however, it is now one of the most popular ‘musicals’ on the theatre circuit.

Wikipedia refers to it a ‘juke box’ musical which is an insult to this carefully crafted Rashomon-style script which tells the tale of four lads from New Jersey, New York and their rise to international fame.

But, what makes the difference, is that every one of the Four Seasons including, of course Frankie Valli, tells the story from his own perspective: Tommy DeVito the gambler who held the group together, or so HE believed, Valli the lady’s man who could always justify his sexual indiscretions, Nick Massi who liked everything neat and tidy and musical prodigy Bob Gaudio, a cut above but instrumental to the group’s success, or so HE thought!

I last saw the show in 2018 and, whilst appearing a little slow at first, it rapidly picked up, seducing the audience with its string of hits. If you don’t like the show you’ll probably love the music so, either way, you’ll lose the argument!

This remains a slick production that is beautifully directed so that the action is not allowed to stop for a second, and director, Des McAnuff’s stagecraft is as key to the success of Bob Gaudio’s music as the numbers are themselves.

Clearly there was continuing friction between the original Four Seasons, Valli, Tommy Devito, Gaudio and Nick Massi, before Valli eventually became the definitive front man and evolved into Frankie Valli & The Four Seasons.

As Franki Valli said: “How much better does it get than to see your life pass before you, with a 20-minutes intermission, and never have to break a sweat?’ And on that score book writers, Brickman and Elice have triumphed.

But the real challenge in 2022 continues to be finding players to bring Gaudio’s historic hits to life and Oh What A Night! The clean, choreographed lines of Lewis Griffiths as Nick Massi had me mesmerised: you really believed he was a man who needed his towels neat and tidy and his shirts twice ironed!

Luke Suri as Frankie Valli has learned his trade well on the cruise ships and few would know that Jersey Boys is his theatre debut: top dollar, whilst Blair Gibson as Bob Gaudio was as cultured as Dalton Wood as gambler Tommy DeVito was annoyingly good with his overbearing personality and accent.

This one will continue to run no doubt because it tells a story about real people, who escaped the prospect of Mob life and rose above the drudgery of New Jersey to achieve wealth and fame. Entertaining? Absolutely.

Jersey Boys
Alhambra, Bradford
Until Saturday March 19th