Sneak Peek of BroadwayWorld’s Interview with JB London’s Tommy DeVito–Jon Boydon
April 4th, 2010Here’s a sneak peek of Carrie Dunn’s interview on BroadwayWorld.com’s with JERSEY BOYS London’s Tommy Devito–Jon Boydon!
Q: How are you settling in?
JB: Great, actually. It’s been a very, very intense rehearsal period. Eugene [Eugene McCoy] and I came in together, and we went over to New York and had a week over there – just doing what we would have done over here in the first week, really, but now they have this global franchise, the first time they did it they all came over here because it was the first time they’d done it elsewhere, but it’s just easier for them to do it from New York. So we had a little bootcamp! We learnt all the ways of Jersey and the boys and a potted history of modern East Coast America, and then a skim over the lives of the guys. Then we started putting it all together. That was fabulous. We saw the show over there, and stopped off to see the show in Toronto on the way back. Then we hit the ground running when we came back.
It was a lot of information going in during a fairly concentrated space of time. It’s a standard rehearsal period. But it’s real. It’s fact. It’s largely truth. These are real guys, and in the case of Tommy he’s still walking about. There’s more information available, and I think as an actor you have to dig a little bit deeper to be honest on the stage. It’s felt like a bit of a rollercoaster. We’ve been open a week now and the dust is settling. It has been hugely enjoyable – just being in the theatre, moving in and making it our own show this last week has been an incredible experience. It’s a very positive building to work in. It feels nice.
Q: How much did you know beforehand?
JB: Um…I saw the show during auditions. I hadn’t seen it prior to that. My first, or perhaps my second audition…I did eight in total. So early on in the process I came to see the show. I knew the music but I think for us in the UK the Four Seasons aren’t as known to us as, say, the Beatles, because they’re not a homegrown band. If you’re from New Jersey, you own them, they’re your family. If you’re from America, people have a better knowledge of who they are, where they come from, and so I knew very little. I didn’t know anything about the guys. Everyone knows Frankie, obviously, but I couldn’t have told you the names of the other three.
The thing is, if you Google Tommy DeVito, all you get is pictures of Joe Pesci in Goodfellas. There’s not much information out there. I know that Tommy has written a book, but it’s not in print – I don’t know if the rights are in dispute, or whether because the show was coming out it got shelved, or if it got bought and used, or bought and shelved, so as not to have a conflict of interests, but there is very little information readily available. So I came in a little bit, I wouldn’t say naive, but bereft of knowledge. But I was like a very dry sponge, ready to be told everything! And we got everything we needed to know.
Read Jon Boydon’s full interview on BroadwayWorld.com.
