Gettin' the Band Back Together

D+

It isn’t often that a musical with an original book makes it to Broadway these days, so I decided to buy a deeply discounted ticket for this Jersey import that garnered respectable reviews at the George St. Theater a few years ago. I wish I hadn’t.

First warning sign: the list of producers was much longer than the cast list.

Second warning sign: the lead producer, Ken Davenport, is also the author of the book, along with an improvisational group called The Grundleshotz.

Third warning sign: Davenport hops up onstage to give a pep talk before the show begins.

By the time the show began, I already knew that it was going to be a long night.

The silly plot revolves around Mitch Papadopoulos (Mitchell Jarvis; Rock of Ages), an unsuccessful stockbroker who is fired on his 40th birthday and forced to return home to Sayreville, NJ to live with his widowed mother Sharon (Marilu Henner; The Tale of the Allergist’s Wife, “Taxi”). His former high school rival Tygen Billows (Brandon Williams) browbeats him into reviving his old band to compete against his in The Battle of the Bands which he lost to Mitch 20 years ago. His former bandmates are Bart Vickers (Jay Klaitz; Rock of Ages), a math teacher who isn’t good at math; Sully Sullivan (Paul Whitty; Once), a cop who really doesn’t want to be one; and Rummesh “Robbie” Patel (Manu Narayan; My Fair Lady), a dermatologist on the verge of an arranged marriage. To replace their deceased guitarist, they hold auditions and choose Ricky Bling (Sawyer Nunes; Matilda), a rapping high school student. We also meet Dani Franco (Kelli Barrett; The Royal Family), Mitch’s former sweetheart, who is now going with Tygen, and her teenage daughter Billie (Noa Solorio), as well as some of the colorful local characters. The first act spends a lot of time on exposition with most of the big production numbers filling the much livelier second act. I’m not a good judge of rock music, but I found the score by Mark Allen uninspired. Chris Bailey’s choreography catches fire in the second act. Derek McLane’s (The Parisian Woman) functional set recalls drawings from a comic strip. Emily Rebholz’s (Dear Evan Hansen) costumes are amusing. I am puzzled what motivated Tony winner John Rando (On the Town, Urinetown) to direct. The cast is uniformly enthusiastic. Brandon Williams steals every scene he is in. Ms. Henner looks too young and sexy to play Mitch’s mother. The audience was clearly determined to show they were having a good time, occasionally shouting out retorts to the actors. Any mention of New Jersey was met with loud approval. I had to wonder how this show ever reached Broadway. Running time: two hours 30 minutes including intermission.