Jersey Boys 10/15 Matinee - WOW

Saw it this afternoon & it was great

Almost 30 songs listed but about half are only snippets of songs. The guy who played Frankie Valli was great . There were many standing ovations. There is not much dancing in it & it has a small orchestra which sounds larger. The book was quite good especially useful for those who know nothing about the formation of the group & its history.

The critics will probably trash it but based on audience reaction today it might make it. I hope so

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The PlayBill lists nine musicians in the "Jersey Boys Orchestra" who are not part of the cast.

The cast consists of 13 actors, the majority of which (including all the principal actors playing the original members of the Four Seasons) play insrtuments.

The sound is AWESOME. I hear that Bob Gaudio, the writer of most of the group's hits, and original group member, was involved in assuring the vocal and instrumental performances in the show were as originally performed by Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons.

Based on the amazing reaction of the audiences at this show (ie multiple show stopping applause and standing ovations in the middle of the show), it would be criminal if Jersey Boys it is not judged on its true merits, and simply dismissed as another "jukebox" musical which it clearly is not.

The first Four Seasons hit song is not played until nearly 45 minutes into the show....allowing the BOOK (which I thought was really quite good) to develop the individual characters and backdrop to the rest of the Play.

Jersey Boys is actually a good drama with great music and outstanding performances by the very talented cast, with clever direction and smart staging and lighting.

As so many others have already stated in Hushpuppy's link "Jersey Boys-First Preview-My Review" elsewhere on this board (https://forum.broadwayworld.com/readmessage.cfm?thread=870083&dt=101505120912), Jersey Boys equals a great night of joy and entertainment....so surrender and enjoy it....labels nothwithstanding.

Updated On: 10/15/05 at 10:02 PM

I sell merchandise at a few shows and tonight I was at Jersey Boys. I was quite surprised by the show as a whole. I thought it was going to a be another jukebox musical disaster, but it's not. And the audience loved this show. Tonight was one of the most ecstatic and energetic audiences I've ever seen.

And the actor who portrays Frankie Valli is, indeed, very good.

T shirts, sweatshirts (hoods or without ), magnets, books with pictures of NJ. All overpriced as usual but that's what they have now

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I saw this show last night and was very impressed. Having just come from the 5pm showing of LATINOLOGUES, anything would have seemed brilliant in comparisan, but this was actually a very good show. I could have done without so much narration at times which made it seem like a VH1 special, but besides that I had a great time. And the audience just went wild loving every second of it. I have a feeling this one's going to be a very big hit.