Places, Please!: Becoming a Jersey Boy (6 page)

I arrive at the studio and am the only Tommy there. This assures me that every performing Tommy in North America is very happy in his job and will not be leaving anytime soon. That’s too bad for me, but at least it lessens my emotional burden. I am less nervous knowing this is just another step in the process. There are a few Bobs auditioning, and one of them resonates through the walls with such power that I glance over at another actor (auditioning for the part of Nick) and whisper, “Wow.”

“Yeah. He’s got it, huh?” the Nick says.

I agree, “Sounds that way to me.” That resonating voice belongs to Quinn VanAntwerp, and it will land him the part.

When I am called into the room, I am greeted with warmth and, dare I say, affection by Merri, Des, and the rest of the team. Des makes it clear from the first moment that he just wants to see what I’ve been able to do with the material, and that he doesn’t actually need a Tommy right now. No problem, Des. Ready to rock and roll. I play the scenes with subtle power and as much attitude as I can muster. Des says, and I will never forget these words, “I can see you’ve worked a lot on this.” Um. Yes, Des. I have been carrying around these new pages everywhere I go, reviewing them on the subway and running them while I work out, while also studying Christian Hoff’s gestures on YouTube and speaking in a Jersey accent to my wife. But I don’t tell Des about all that.

He gives me a ton of direction and notes about the material, direction and notes that I can simplify as, “Don’t do too much.” The show is written very truthfully, and Des doesn’t want his actors to push at all. They are to play the material simply and truthfully. This advice seems obvious, but must be very difficult to do when you are in the midst of a loud, rocking musical! The tendency is to want to rise to that level of energy. But that is not this show. That is not
Jersey Boys
. So I take the advice, thank everyone for seeing me again, and go back to real life.

At this point I realize, even though I have done a lot of work on this show, there is still more preparation I can do. I remember overhearing a conversation at my last audition in which an actor talked about being called in for a second dance call. What if that was me? I’d be in trouble.

So I call a friend who is an amazing Broadway dancer and has auditioned for
Jersey Boys
at least once before. I ask David Villella, “David, if I buy you some pizza, will you help me write down the combinations from the
Jersey Boys
audition?”

“Sure. Are you going in again for it?”

“No. I just want to write down the combinations.”

“You want to write down the combinations even though you’re not going in for another audition?”

“Well, I might be going in for another audition. If they call me.”

“But they haven’t called you yet?”

“No.”

“But you want to write down the combinations?”

“Yes.”

To a real dancer, my idea is unnecessary and perhaps a tad obsessive. But David agrees to help me anyway because he is a terrific guy. He visits me that week and we piece together the two dance combinations from memory. I write down every single move so that I can re-learn the dances on my own if the need arises.

*         *         *

Another month goes by before I am called in for a “work session.” I am told this session will be a rehearsal to prep me for my next meeting with Des. I guess they still like me for this role. So I go through the morning preparation again and show up ready to tweak my performance. I’ve been working hard on keeping things simpler, and I’ve been trying to develop a voice for the character. My regular speaking voice sits rather high and resonates through my nose. It’s nasally. I find strength in a character, in part, by adjusting my voice down to a deeper chest resonance. This was one major change I made before attending the work session…and I am quickly told that it is no good. Richard Hester, who has seen a hundred guys go through this process, recommends that I find the truth of Tommy in my own voice, that the choice I made is, quite simply, too fake. It hurts to hear because I am having a hard time finding the truth in my version of this character, and I thought I had found a vocal choice that could help.

The session ends with me feeling somewhat disheartened. The only positive thing is that, once again, I am the only Tommy present at the studio this day. From all outside impressions, there are far fewer guys in the mix to play Tommy than there are for the other roles.

The next day I get a call. Merri Sugarman says she appreciates the work I did yesterday and now they would like me to come to…another dance audition!

What?! Can you imagine how proud I feel to have prepared for this very possibility?

Can you imagine how grateful I now feel for David Villella? I spend a week re-learning the combinations from my notes and go to that audition ready as ever. The combinations are exactly as I remember and, even though I am not a good dancer, I make it through with dignity. Sergio, the choreographer, is at this audition and he watches me a few times. His note: “Just chill out.” Ha, that’s great! He doesn’t say, “You don’t know what you’re doing.” He doesn’t say, “You look like a monkey.” He says, “Just chill out.” I cannot possibly chill out. I am far too wound up and sweaty to chill out. But at least it’s not a horrible note. And it puts me in a terrific mood for my wedding...

*         *         *

You may kiss the bride...

©Daniel Robert Sullivan

On May 18th, 2008 Cara and I are married under a brilliantly white gazebo near the harbor in Newport, Rhode Island. Waves roll in gently not fifteen feet from our guests, the majority of whom stand around the perimeter of sea-aged pillars holding up the roof. A handful of chairs form an aisle and hundreds of buoyed sailboats provide a backdrop. The ceremony is simple, written by us and performed by our friend Jessica who was internet-ordained for this very purpose. Cara looks stunning in a slightly retro and very backless dress, and I look adequate in pants that are much too tight in the crotch. Cousins Mindy and Laura help decorate. Uncle Frank takes pictures. And Cara, Mark, Rachel, and I hold hands as we declare ourselves a brand new family.

Our reception is held in an old vaudeville theatre. Now used as a movie house, the Jane Pickens Theater can fly in a screen over its footlight-ringed stage. With a screen and a stage available, Cara and I were compelled to create a movie and a show.

The movie took two months to create, and tells the story of us planning our wedding together. Screening it at the very beginning of the reception sets the tone for the evening, for our movie bursts with funny family commentary, sentiment, and lots of jokes at my expense. One of the biggest laughs comes from a line I took directly from
Jersey Boys
, but stealing another writer’s bit is not something my family can judge me for on my wedding day, right?

After eating, Cara and I host an old-time vaudeville show for our guests’ entertainment. Having solicited our talented friends for acts, we have quite the production. Aaron and Shannon sing a romantic song together, after which Aaron wails on a great power ballad. Chris and Jenny perform “Who’s On First?” in its entirety, having rehearsed it thirty times on the twelve-hour drive here. My new father-in-law, Fred, plays his fiddle, Cousin Emma sings a song she wrote herself, Cousin Brian dresses as John Lennon to give us a tune on his guitar, Dan and Sarah offer a Leonard Cohen piece and forget the words, Rachel sings from
Phantom of the Opera
, TJ kills with some stand-up, Ralph gives a toast in French, and Cara and I sing a fun duet about how we want to be “Rich, Famous, and Powerful.” This is my favorite show that I’ve been a part of to date. At the end of the night, with the kids away with family, Cara and I fall into each other’s arms and I have never been more content.

We honeymoon in an RV for two weeks, exploring Alaska together because it’s the first affordable place we thought of that neither of us has visited. We get eaten by four-foot long mosquitoes, find $0.000012 while panning for gold, get horribly seasick a half-hour into an eight-hour cruise, witness bald eagles mating, and laugh when the RV’s septic tank empties all over my shoes. Now, I am a guy who would normally freak out when something like this happens, but with Cara there it feels like I’m not allowed to be stressed. She gives me a slight smile, and the disaster becomes funny. I think that’s why I like having her around.

*         *         *

More weeks go by. Driven by my new desire to prepare even more for these
Jersey Boys
auditions, I look online for a real rock ‘n’ roll vocal coach. I’m not an amazing singer, but I can do a good rock sound and feel it might serve me to sing with someone who specializes in this kind of thing. The guy I find has a list of singers he has worked with, all of which I have heard of. He coaches out of his apartment on the Upper West Side. I go there and am immediately impressed. The building is one of those old, gorgeous, block-long, pre-war buildings. The apartment resides on the corner and looks like it must be at least seven or eight rooms on the inside. I knock on the door with high expectations…and a short, hairy man wearing old sweat pants and holding a glass of whiskey opens the door. It is 11:00 a.m. and I know I am about to have a good story.

He leads me into his “studio,” which is a cramped room filled with speakers, keyboards, and broken guitars piled to the ceiling. He is definitely drunk. He asks me what I am here for and I show him a couple of songs from
Jersey Boys
. He perks up at this, and pulls out a CD. The CD is his band’s first, he says, and was recorded back in the 60s. He tells me to look at the picture of him on the back cover and see if I can recognize the guy standing next to him. Well, I’ll be damned if the guy next to him isn’t Bob Crewe, the Four Seasons’ writer/producer and a major character in
Jersey Boys
. Bob Crewe produced this guy’s album. Ok, maybe this is going to work out after all!

So, the drunken man (who shall continue to remain nameless so that he doesn’t sue me when this book comes out) begins to play my music. I tell him something is wrong, that I think he might be playing in the wrong key. He insists I am incorrect, and tells me to sing along. I sing, and am now quite sure it is the wrong key. I may not be a musical expert, but I’ve been rehearsing in this key for a year and I know if something is not played in it. After singing his way a couple of times, I notice that his keyboard has a giant screen on the top of it saying that it is in “automatic transposing” mode, changing the song to a different key than what his fingers are actually playing. I told you so.

After a quick break (yes, a break after only fifteen minutes) during which I suspect he had another drink, this guy starts giving me his advice.

“You gotta yell this shit!” he says. “This is rock and roll! The people wanna feel your power; they wanna feel your throat rip apart!”

Did I mention I was singing “Earth Angel?” Now, this song may technically be considered early rock and roll, but I certainly don’t think that 50’s singers were ripping their throats apart when they sang it. This guy is a loon, so I am very ready to leave when my hour is up. And my throat hurts for the rest of the day.

*         *         *

Later in the week I realize that, with all my preparation for the technical aspects of these auditions, I have not yet researched the genesis of the show as a whole.

Jersey Boys
began when a writer named Rick Elice was approached in 2002 about working on a reality-based project about the Four Seasons. Frankie Valli and Bob Gaudio were looking at a number of ideas: television movie, feature-length film, Broadway musical revue. These two original members of the band produced hundreds of pages of interview material with their version of life events. (Rumor has it that Tommy DeVito has an unpublished four-hundred page autobiography with his own version of everything, but
Jersey Boys
uses only Frankie and Bob’s version.)

Rick Elice brought his friend and prospective writing partner, Academy Award-winning Marshall Brickman, along for an initial lunch meeting with Frankie and Bob, and each became enamored with the stories that were told. Yes, Frankie Valli started out as a kid too young to be allowed in the bars where they sang. Yes, Tommy DeVito got arrested multiple times while leading the band through their early years. Yes, Joe Pesci introduced Bob Gaudio to Frankie. Yes, somebody faked a murder in Frankie’s car. Yes, the entire band spent a night in jail together because of an unpaid hotel bill. Yes, they all came from the wrong side of the tracks and struggled together for ten long years before hitting it big with “Sherry.” Yes, everyone in that part of town was connected to the mob. Yes, they removed Tommy from the group because of his gambling and tax debts. And yes, they are the only American group to have Top Ten hits before, during, and after the British Invasion. What great material!

So Rick Elice and Marshall Brickman created an outline for a potential show in a traditional musical theatre style (i.e. slightly fictionalized characters breaking out into song when the scene reaches its peak) and brought it to Dodger Properties, who in turn brought it to Des McAnuff, then Artistic Director of La Jolla Playhouse in California.