Jersey Boys - Review and photos by Joe Calleri.

Jersey Boys - Book by Rick Elice and Marshall Brickman, lyrics by Bob Crewe, music by Bob Gaudio

Melbourne Premiere – Saturday, 12 January, 2013

Stars:             5

Review by: Joe Calleri

Great stage musicals possess wonderful, magical and transformative powers. For two hours we forget all that is wrong with the world and become hypnotised by a carefully crafted creation replete with bright lights, toe-tapping show tunes and militarily precise choreography. Jersey Boys, which makes a most welcome return to the Princess Theatre after a three-year absence, ticks the boxes for a great musical. It remains one of the very few show that deserves its 5-star rating, and that, I unreservedly recommend to the public that they support with their hard-earned money.

A quartet of charming, charismatic, enormously talented performers led by Canadian-born Jeff Madden (Frankie Valli), Anthony Harkin (Tommy DeVito), Declan Egan (Bob Gaudio) and Glaston Toft (who plays Nick Massi, and is the only returning performer from the 2009 season) portray the improbable, rags to riches Jersey Boys who, in 1960, formed the singing group The Four Lovers. They later evolved into The Four Seasons, whose timeless melodies including Sherry, Can’t Take My Eyes Off You, Rag Doll, Walk Like A Man, sell millions of records, transforming our Jersey Boys into multi-millionaires. That’s the American Dream, right?

Besides a charming, all-singing, all-dancing cast, this finely tuned production owes its success thanks to the stirring book written by Rick Elice and Marshall Brickman, catchy lyrics by the largely underestimated Bob Crewe, toe-tapping music by wizard Bob Gaudio, frisky direction by Des McAnuff and vivid, Roy Lichtenstein-inspired set design by Klara Zieglerova. I’ve added some of the images I took during the media call for the show, so you get a sense of its style and color.

This musical follows a clever narrative arc and linear time-line, as we follow our four protagonists through their own personal four seasons as they endure, and survive the gamut of friendship and betrayal, doomed love affairs, band creations and break ups, petty crime, prison time, problem gambling, and various run-ins with the gangsters, with the law, and with record producers. But, it’s the superb music of The Four Seasons that punctuates this narrative, and this production crams a staggering thirty-four musical numbers into its running time. Trust me when I say you get your money’s worth!

By the time the Jersey Boys perform Who Loves You, the audience already knows the resounding answer – Melbourne loves you, baby! 

 

Declan Egan as the forward-thinking, musical wizz-kid, Bob Gaudio - by Joe Calleri

Jeff Madden as Frankie Valli

(L) Michael Griffiths as Bob Crewe, (R) Brent Trotter (Sound Engineer and other roles).

(L) to (R) - Declan Egan (Bob Gaudio), Jeff Madden (Frankie Valli), Anthony Harkin (Tommy DeVito), Glaston Toft (Nick Massi).

(L) to (R) - Declan Egan (Bob Gaudio), Jeff Madden (Frankie Valli), Anthony Harkin (Tommy DeVito), Glaston Toft (Nick Massi).