The women in front of us at the Broward Center were in the mood to party. There were four of them, sporting luridly patterned blouses and shoes with low heels. These past-their-prime party animals were sitting directly in front of me, my partner and my two sisters. They had apparently gathered for happy hour before the 8 o’clock performance of “Jersey Boys” and were feeling no pain as the show began. The heavy blonde one on the end began singing a warbling rendition of “Big Girls Don’t Cry.” This was a really, really bad sign.
Soon the music began to swell. As though on cue, the four women in front of us were instantly on their feet, ample backsides swaying to the music and arms stretched over their heads as though they were at a revival. The view from our $100 seats was now of a solid wall of garish polyester prints. My sisters shot each other a meaningful look.
It very quickly became apparent that these women came here to dance and would not be denied, and thus began a pattern that persisted through the entire first act. When the music played they would jump to their feet and become slaves to the rhythm. They shook and shimmied and gyrated to the tunes in dance moves they never learned on American Bandstand.
When the music stopped and the dialogue began on stage, the four women, sat down, but then they began reminiscing, in the same volume they used when talking to their elderly, hard of hearing parents. “I was a sophomore in high school when this song came out,” said the one who looked like she had given herself a Lilt Home Perm. “I’m a Jersey Girl myself” said the one who applied her makeup with a paintball gun. “I’m from Edison.” “We’re ALL Jersey Girls originally” confided the one with the bad facelift while the heavy blond switched to an off key rendition of “Walk Like a Man.”
When the music cued again, the four women popped up and began to shake their booties. Emboldened, my older sister said “Sit down!” but she was ignored so she said it again, louder. I began to slouch low in my seat. My partner, who, having only one brother, is ignorant in the ways of big sisters began to stare at his shoes. I’m not sure he ever looked up at the stage again that night.
When the music stopped the four women sat down and began to converse again. “Sshh!” said my middle sister. “Sshhh!” said my older sister and then, unexpectedly, the elderly dowager at the end of the row, who even 40 years ago had to have been ancient, took up the cry: “SSSSHHHHHH!” she said, as though willing herself to hiss them right out of the theatre.
The pattern continued through the whole first act: the women danced through the songs, while all around them people told them to sit down, and they talked through the dialogue while the audience told them to keep quiet. Finally the dowager went to get the usher who, impossibly, was even older than she was. The bad perm showed the usher her middle finger and kept dancing. The usher turned on her heel and went for security as the first act ended.
I’m not sure of what happened next because, in disgust we went to the lobby during intermission, where my 2 sisters and the dowager talked angrily among themselves while my partner and I wished we were dead. When we returned for act two the fours seats in front of us were empty and stayed empty. “Escorted from the theatre,” said the dowager’s husband. In a world filled with rude patrons with bad perms it is nice when justice actually prevails, and I hoped against hope that as the Jersey Girls were escorted from the theatre that big girls DID cry.
J