Jersey Boys will be back to reopen Whitehall’s Trafalgar Theatre

Multi-award-winning musical Jersey Boys will return to the West End to take up residence at the new refurbished and reinstated Trafalgar Theatre in Whitehall from April next year.

The much-loved show which tells the true rags to riches story of New Jersey’s Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons will be the first production to play the Grade II listed former Trafalgar Studios which will open in 2021 following a multi-million pound restoration project.

Produced in London by the Dodgers and Trafalgar Theatre Productions Ltd, Jersey Boys will open at the Trafalgar Theatre on 21 April 2021 following preview performances from 14 April. Casting will be announced soon.

Written by Marshall Brickman and Rick Elice with music by Bob Gaudio and lyrics by Bob Crewe, Jersey Boys at the Trafalgar Theatre will be staged by the original Broadway creative team led by the Tony Award-winning team of Des McAnuff and choreographer Sergio Trujillo with scenic design by Klara Zieglerova, costume design by Jess Goldstein, lighting by Howell Binkley, sound by Steve Canyon Kennedy and projection design by Michael Clark. The orchestrations are by Steve Orich and the music supervision and vocal arrangements by Ron Melrose.

Winner of Tony, Olivier and Helpmann Awards for Best New Musical, Jersey Boys has won 65 major international awards and has been seen by over 27 million people worldwide.

After debuting on Broadway in 2005, the hit-packed jukebox musical first opened in London at the Prince Edward Theatre on 18 March 2008 before moving to the Piccadilly Theatre in March 2014 where it ran for another three years. Jersey Boys also played two record-breaking UK and Ireland tours from 2014 to 2016 and from 2017 until 2019.

The Broadway production ran for 11 years, taking its final bow in January 2017 as the twelfth longest-running musical in Broadway history. Jersey Boys returned to New York with a new production in November 2017 and the US national tour is still breaking house records in cities across the country.

• The Trafalgar Theatre will open its doors following an ambitious programme of work which returns the venue to its original heritage design and includes a new single auditorium. All new seating has been introduced along with a new stalls bar, a new spacious foyer and improvements to the toilets.

Angela Thomas