For the final credits of Jersey Boys, director Clint Eastwood sends the whole cast into a backlot street to dance to the Four Seasons’ most recent chart-topper, 1976’s “December, 1963 (Oh, What a Night).” Hmmm, the confused viewer might wonder, perhaps this is supposed to be a musical….
The movie is, of course, derived from the long-running Broadway hit, and includes numerous Four Seasons songs. But this adaptation, as reworked by original writers Marshall Brickman and Rick Elice, adds dialogue and subtracts music. Large sections are devoted to the drama of making it, or of keeping it after initial success.
Eastwood may not be the project’s ideal director. He’s known for working quickly, which could explain why parts of Jersey Boys feel undercooked. (The rear projection in car scenes is particularly cheesy.) But the movie is engagingly lively, if not always graceful, and often surprisingly comic.
The laughs can be incongruous, since the backstory is grim: Future Four Seasons Tommy DeVito (Vincent Piazza), Nick Massi (Michael Lomenda) and Frankie Castelluccio (John Lloyd Young) are inept small-time criminals in a crummy Newark suburb. They’re under the protection of a local mob boss (Christopher Walken), a devotee of sentimental ballads, although that doesn’t keep Tommy and Nick from doing time.