Reviews 2008
Reviews 2008
✭✭✭✭✩
by Bob Gaudio, Bob Crewe, Marshall Brickman & Rick Ellice, directed by Des McAnuff
Dancap Productions, Toronto Centre for the Arts, Toronto
August 24, 2008-August 22, 2010
Dancap’s last production of the season is Jersey Boys, winner of the 2006 Tony Award for Best Musical. It’s a jukebox musical centred on songs made famous by Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons and a clichéd rags-to-riches tale at that, but the generally unknown background story has enough grit and the performances by the four leads are so fantastic that they make the old-hat seem brand new.
The story follows the efforts from 1954 on of part-time criminal Tommy DeVito (Andrew Kushnier) to form a successful band until he discovers the talented Frankie Valli (Joseph Leo Bwarie) and adds their signiture songwriter Bob Gaudio (Andrew Rannells) to the group. After a golden period of number one hits, internal strife tears the group apart with original members Nick Massi (Steve Gouveia) leaving in 1965 and De Vito in 1970. The show concludes with the original members meeting for a last time in 1990 for their induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
Unlike Mamma Mia!, the songs here are nearly always sung as songs, not as expressions of character. That fact means we have to judge how well the four principals capture the sound of the originals. In short, they are simply amazing, especially Bwarie, who has the same high tenor and beautifully rich falsetto of Valli himself. Were the show no more than a tribute band performance it would still be a winner. Indeed, the set looks more like the rig for a rock concert than a musical. Gay audience members will be displeased to find charismatic polymath Bob Crewe (Jonathan Hadley), reduced to a stereotypic limp-wristed queen and, worse, portrayed solely as the group’s producer with no mention made on stage that he co-wrote the nearly all of the Four Seasons’ hits. The program credits him with the show’s lyrics. Why doesn’t the musical itself do so?
On December 12, 2008, new cast members join the show. Jeremy Kushnier, who has been playing Tommy DeVito since the Canadian run began, will continue in that role. He will be joined onstage by Derek Krantz as Bob Gaudio, Michael Lomenda as Nick Massi and Jeff Madden as Frankie Valli with Timothy Sell as Gyp DeCarlo and Shawn Wright as Bob Crewe.
©Christopher Hoile
Note: A version of this review appeared in Eye Weekly 2008-08-25.
Photo: Steve Gouveia, Joseph Leo Bwarie, Andrew Rannells and Jeremy Kushnier.
©Dancap Productions.
2008-08-25
Jersey Boys