The dark side....it's so peppy.

Jersey Boys won the Tony award for best new musical this year, marking the even further decline of musical theatre into a mass-market, mass-produced, McDonalds style medium, where Jukebox musicals reign supreme.

I'll admit....it was slim pickings....Drowsy Chaperone (a musical which is a stylistic homage to the Cole Porter days of musical theatre), Wedding Singer....the movie had charm, the musical does not and Oprah's swaree into musical - The Colour Purple.

The Drowsy Chaperone was the closest thing to an original concept, and that made it's success by being a moderate parody of musical theatre, and though it wasn't strictly a jukebox musical (it had an original score, and even took the award for best new score), it's a stylistic parody of 30's and 40's musicals -- the Golden Era. So, it's as close as you can get to having a jukebox musical, without actually being one.

I must admit that these opinions are built on little more than stubbornness -- I haven't even listened to the Drowsy Chaperone yet -- more out of pricncple.

However, I gotta admit, that as Jukebox musicals go (and I still swear that I hate the bastards), Jersey Boys is pretty good. At least they haven't tried to cobble together some weak excuse of a storyline, ala We Will Rock You, Mamma Mia, Moving Out etc....

Jersey Boys tells the story of "The Four Seasons". The songs appear in the order they were churned out, and the story follows the trials and tribulations of selling 100 million records when you're a corner lightpost singer.

Maybe I'm just a sucker for the 50's music -- it's just so peppy! The cool grooves, and every song has a hook.

It's still shit.....it's still the darkside.....but it's nice to induldge from time to time.