“Jersey Boys”

Highly Recommended **** It has been several years since Chicago has seen “Jersey Boys”, the award-winning musical depicting the behind-the-scenes- lives of four guys from Jersey, who changed the musical scene in the 1960’s. The new rendition of this wonderful musical is on the stage at the Auditorium Theatre located at 50 East Ida B. Wells Drive ( Congress between Michigan and Wabash) for a short week.

While the music is wonderful ( I am not sure that younger people will feel the same as we do) and the story is powerful, the theater itself is not as conducive to showing us this story. When we first viewed this play, it was on the stage at the Shubert Theatre ( which has gone thru many changes), the smaller of the Loop Broadway In Chicago venues. On its last incarnation, the Cadillac Palace, which I found lost some of the intimacy of the show and now, on the larger stage , in the larger Auditorium, I feel bad for those in the upper balconies, what could they see? The show is as always, wonderful. Getting the right actors to play the roles of these four talents is one of the main ingredients to the show. Just as “Million Dollar Quartet” must have great sound-alikes and a powerhouse Jerry Lee Lewis, one cannot do “Jersey Boys” without a strong Frankie Valli, and this production truly has just that. Jonny Wexler has the right touch in his vocal ability, his facial gestures and his overall understanding of the role. Sitting in the fifth row allowed for us to see his face and watch him grow.

I will say that this production seemed to start off a little slow, but as the story unfolded, the ensemble of 11 (yes a total of 15 actors in the cast) and our four “Seasons” filled the stage and told the story to perfection. I was impressed by not only Wexler, but Eric Chambliss as Bob Gaudio, who wrote many of the songs performed by this quartet, Jonathan Cable as Nick Massi and Cory Greenan as Tommy DeVito, the man responsible for Frankie Valli being a singer in the first place.

It is a story filled with the trials and tribulations of the times and the business of “ recording”. Songs like “Big Girls Don’t Cry”, “Oh What a Night”, “Walk Like A Man”, “Can’t Take My Eyes Off of You”, “Sherry” and”Working My Way Back To You” are not only performed to our delight, but we get a little insight to the creation of these songs.

The ensemble members, Ashley Bruce, Tony L. Clements, Rick Desloge, Wade Dooley, Todd DuBail, Caitlin Leary, Kevin Patrick Martin, Jeremy Startin, Chloes Tiso, Kit Treece and Jessica Wockenfuss are all amazingly talented, playing musical instruments as well as characters in the story. Highly energetic and very young. Nice work!

While the Auditorium is not the perfect place for this production, I can understand that the larger theater allows more people to see it in a shorter period of time. The show is here thru the 7th with performances:

Wednesday at 2 p.m. and 7:30 p.m.

Thursday 7:30 p.m.

Friday 7:30 p.m.

Saturday 2 p.m. and 8 p.m.

running time  2hours and 40 minutes with an intermission

Sunday 2 p.m.

Tickets range from $30-$115 and can be purchased at any of the Broadway In Chicago box offices, or online at www.BroadwayInChicago.com To see what others are saying, visit www.theatreinchicago.com, go to Review Round-Up and click at “Jersey Boys”