{"id":2505263,"date":"2026-07-16T22:13:48","date_gmt":"2026-07-16T22:13:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2505263"},"modified":"2026-07-16T22:13:48","modified_gmt":"2026-07-16T22:13:48","slug":"frank-sinatra-bio-musical-in-london-is-an-insult-and-not-ready-for-broadway","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/frank-sinatra-bio-musical-in-london-is-an-insult-and-not-ready-for-broadway\/","title":{"rendered":"Frank Sinatra bio musical in London is an insult \u2014 and not ready for Broadway"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/wp-content%2Fuploads%2Fsites%2F2%2F2026%2F07%2F134610812.jpg?quality%3D90%26strip%3Dall\" \/><\/p>\n<div>\n<div class=\"inline-module inline-module--review alignleft\">\n<div class=\"inline-module__inner\">\n\t\t<span class=\"inline-module--review__eyebrow subsection-heading-semi__label\"><br \/>\n\t\t\tTheater review\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"inline-module--review__title subsection-heading-semi\">\n\t\t\tSINATRA\t\t<\/h2>\n<div class=\"rating\">\n<div class=\"rating__stars\">\n<div class=\"rating__star rating__star--filled\"><?php \/**\n * Review star.\n * \n * @package nyp-editor\n *\/\n\n??><\/p>\n<style><![CDATA[\n\t.review-block-star {\n\t\t--review-block-star--empty-color: #585858;\n\t\t--review-block-star--fill-color: #000;\n\t}\n]]><\/style>\n<p><svg class=\"icon-star review-block-star\" stroke=\"var(--review-block-star--fill-color)\" fill=\"var(--review-block-star--empty-color)\" stroke-width=\"0\" viewbox=\"0 0 16 16\" height=\"13px\" width=\"13px\">\n\t<defs>\n\t\t<lineargradient id=\"half-gradient\">\n\t\t\t<stop stop-opacity=\"1\" offset=\"50%\" stop-color=\"var(--review-block-star--fill-color)\"\/>\n\t\t\t<stop stop-opacity=\"1\" offset=\"0%\" stop-color=\"var(--review-block-star--empty-color)\"\/>\n\t\t<\/lineargradient>\n\t<\/defs>\n\t<path d=\"M3.612 15.443c-.386.198-.824-.149-.746-.592l.83-4.73L.173 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stop-color=\"var(--review-block-star--empty-color)\"\/>\n\t\t<\/lineargradient>\n\t<\/defs>\n\t<path d=\"M3.612 15.443c-.386.198-.824-.149-.746-.592l.83-4.73L.173 6.765c-.329-.314-.158-.888.283-.95l4.898-.696L7.538.792c.197-.39.73-.39.927 0l2.184 4.327 4.898.696c.441.062.612.636.283.95l-3.523 3.356.83 4.73c.078.443-.36.79-.746.592L8 13.187l-4.389 2.256z\">\n\t<\/path>\n<\/svg>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"rating__star rating__star--empty\"><?php \/**\n * Review star.\n * \n * @package nyp-editor\n *\/\n\n??><\/p>\n<style><![CDATA[\n\t.review-block-star {\n\t\t--review-block-star--empty-color: #585858;\n\t\t--review-block-star--fill-color: #000;\n\t}\n]]><\/style>\n<p><svg class=\"icon-star review-block-star\" stroke=\"var(--review-block-star--fill-color)\" fill=\"var(--review-block-star--empty-color)\" stroke-width=\"0\" viewbox=\"0 0 16 16\" height=\"13px\" width=\"13px\">\n\t<defs>\n\t\t<lineargradient id=\"half-gradient\">\n\t\t\t<stop stop-opacity=\"1\" offset=\"50%\" stop-color=\"var(--review-block-star--fill-color)\"\/>\n\t\t\t<stop stop-opacity=\"1\" offset=\"0%\" stop-color=\"var(--review-block-star--empty-color)\"\/>\n\t\t<\/lineargradient>\n\t<\/defs>\n\t<path d=\"M3.612 15.443c-.386.198-.824-.149-.746-.592l.83-4.73L.173 6.765c-.329-.314-.158-.888.283-.95l4.898-.696L7.538.792c.197-.39.73-.39.927 0l2.184 4.327 4.898.696c.441.062.612.636.283.95l-3.523 3.356.83 4.73c.078.443-.36.79-.746.592L8 13.187l-4.389 2.256z\">\n\t<\/path>\n<\/svg>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"rating__star rating__star--empty\"><?php \/**\n * Review star.\n * \n * @package nyp-editor\n *\/\n\n??><\/p>\n<style><![CDATA[\n\t.review-block-star {\n\t\t--review-block-star--empty-color: #585858;\n\t\t--review-block-star--fill-color: #000;\n\t}\n]]><\/style>\n<p><svg class=\"icon-star review-block-star\" stroke=\"var(--review-block-star--fill-color)\" fill=\"var(--review-block-star--empty-color)\" stroke-width=\"0\" viewbox=\"0 0 16 16\" height=\"13px\" width=\"13px\">\n\t<defs>\n\t\t<lineargradient id=\"half-gradient\">\n\t\t\t<stop stop-opacity=\"1\" offset=\"50%\" stop-color=\"var(--review-block-star--fill-color)\"\/>\n\t\t\t<stop stop-opacity=\"1\" offset=\"0%\" stop-color=\"var(--review-block-star--empty-color)\"\/>\n\t\t<\/lineargradient>\n\t<\/defs>\n\t<path d=\"M3.612 15.443c-.386.198-.824-.149-.746-.592l.83-4.73L.173 6.765c-.329-.314-.158-.888.283-.95l4.898-.696L7.538.792c.197-.39.73-.39.927 0l2.184 4.327 4.898.696c.441.062.612.636.283.95l-3.523 3.356.83 4.73c.078.443-.36.79-.746.592L8 13.187l-4.389 2.256z\">\n\t<\/path>\n<\/svg>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div>\n<p>Two hours and 45 minutes, with one intermission. At the Aldwych Theatre in London, UK.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>These vagabond shoes were longing to stray.<\/p>\n<p>But my sneakers reluctantly remained at the Aldwych Theatre for the second act of the new musical \u201cSinatra\u201d in London\u2019s West End.<\/p>\n<p>Sadly, the best was not yet to come.<\/p>\n<p>Ol\u2019 Blue Eyes is given the ol\u2019 cruise ship treatment in the sorry Frank Sinatra bio show directed by Kathleen Marshall, who also helmed the Tony Award-winning Broadway revivals of \u201cThe Pajama Game\u201d and \u201cAnything Goes\u201d an eon ago.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Perhaps contentedly stuck in the past, Marshall stages \u201cSinatra\u201d as if it\u2019s a musty old jukebox trifle \u2014 or, well, an aughts one: sans modern flair, chock-full of hokiness and making no convincing attempt at drama.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<figure class=\"nyp-slideshow-modal-image wp-block-image aligncenter size-large\"><figcaption>A new musical called \u201cSinatra,\u201d about the famous singer, is playing London. <span class=\"credit\">Production photos by Brinkhoff-Moegenburg<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>\u201cTina \u2013 The Tina Turner Musical,\u201d which also <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2018\/10\/10\/the-london-shows-that-should-come-to-nyc-and-the-ones-that-shouldnt\/\">premiered at the Aldwych back in 2018<\/a> before heading to New York, was far from perfect. But, sporadically, it gave me chills watching a regular girl evolve into a superstar.<\/p>\n<p>Turner momentously recording \u201cPrivate Dancer\u201d couldn\u2019t be further apart from the biggest applause at the \u201cSinatra\u201d performance I attended: When Frank\u2019s parents (Jenna Russell, bizarrely, and Marty Maguire), contorted into the comic relief, hammily sang \u201cYou Make Me Feel So Young\u201d as if they were Edna and Wilbur Turnblad in \u201cHairspray.\u201d<\/p>\n<aside class=\"single__inline-module aligncenter\">\n<div class=\"inline-module inline-module--more inline-module--columnist inline-module--more--thirds\">\n<div class=\"inline-module__inner\">\n<h2 class=\"inline-module__heading subsection-heading subsection-heading--single-line \">\n\t\t\tMore From\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<span class=\"subsection-heading__sub\">Johnny Oleksinski<\/span><br \/>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/h2>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/aside>\n<p><em>That<\/em> is the highlight, such as it is, of the musical ostensibly about one the greatest singers of all time.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Even with Frank Sinatra Enterprises and his daughter Tina Sinatra on the producing team in London, there is no chance this show in its current state could succeed on Broadway. New York and New Jersey would riot.<\/p>\n<p>While an American\u2019s the boss, the Chairman of the Board is a Brit. That\u2019s Joel Harper-Jackson, a fine enough performer whose chief virtue is his Sinatra soundalike voice. He sings the classics smoothly and I get the sense he is trying to rise above an impression, although he doesn\u2019t quite manage that ascent.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"nyp-slideshow-modal-image wp-block-image aligncenter size-large\"><figcaption>\u201cSinatra\u201d mostly concerns Frank\u2019s romantic life. <span class=\"credit\">Production photos by Brinkhoff-Moegenburg<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>It doesn\u2019t help that the creatives have snipped his climbing rope. The hackneyed book by Joe DiPietro (\u201cMemphis\u201d) is written to be delivered by robots.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSinatra\u201d chooses a focused chunk of Frank\u2019s life starting at the end of his mega Paramount Theatre residency in New York in 1944. We\u2019re whisked there via a screensaver cityscape video that buffers as if the WiFi bill hasn\u2019t been paid on time.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>After that comes a demoralizing career slump caused by dud songs and bad movies, and then a triumphant resurgence in 1956 with \u201cI\u2019ve Got The World On A String\u201d and the \u201cThis Is Frank Sinatra\u201d album.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"nyp-slideshow-modal-image wp-block-image aligncenter size-large\"><figcaption>Frank leaves his wife Nancy for actress Ava Gardner. <span class=\"credit\">Production photos by Brinkhoff-Moegenburg<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>However, you\u2019d be mistaken if you think this is a story about a consummate musician and his art. \u201cSinatra\u201d focuses, almost totally, on the man\u2019s extramarital affairs in Hollywood.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Titillated? Not so fast. There are sexier episodes of \u201cAntiques Roadshow.\u201d More emotional ones, too!\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>When Frank jets to LA to shoot a movie, leaving wife Nancy (Phoebe Panaretos) and the kids back at home, three stars he seduces \u2014 Judy Garland, Lana Turner and Marlene Dietrich \u2014 pop out of a hole in his bed like groundhogs and cutely sing \u201cCome Fly With Me.\u201d That\u2019s quite a choice for one of his most famous tunes.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"nyp-slideshow-modal-image wp-block-image aligncenter size-large\"><figcaption>\u201cSinatra\u201d only covers Frank\u2019s life through the late 1950s.  <span class=\"credit\">Production photos by Brinkhoff-Moegenburg<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Another head-scratcher is abruptly cutting off Harper-Jackson on \u201cMy Way\u201d midway through the ballad.<\/p>\n<p>Frank then falls hard for the forward actress Ava Gardner (Ana Villafa\u00f1e), who gives him a series of dealbreaker rules for their courtship. Even if she\u2019s a one-note character, her strong will melts his Italian heart. Meanwhile, ours stay safely solid.<\/p>\n<p>The marriage to Nancy crumbles as his poor wife sees pictures of her philandering hubby out with glam ladies in magazines and reads dishy items in Hedda Hopper\u2019s column. How sad to see Hedda, a force, turned into a bubbly gag of pat exposition. But that\u2019s what so much of this lacking show is.<\/p>\n<p>What of the songs? Sinatra\u2019s rich catalogue has mostly been turned into character numbers rather than performed on a stage or in a studio. An especially weird shoehorn is when he croons \u201cJust The Way You Look Tonight\u201d to his daughter after the Oscars.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s understandable why the creators would pick that route over a \u201cBehind the Music\u201d format \u2014 to avoid repetition and more deeply explore his life. But \u201cSinatra\u201d is monotonously repetitive and consistently pulls its punches when it comes to his inner workings.\u00a0<\/p>\n<figure class=\"nyp-slideshow-modal-image wp-block-image aligncenter size-large\"><figcaption>\u201cSinatra\u201d is not ready to make the leap to Broadway. <span class=\"credit\">Production photos by Brinkhoff-Moegenburg<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>And so, all the show could possibly offer is some dazzle and musical excitement. Only it falls short there as well. Marshall\u2019s choreography is droopy.<\/p>\n<p>Watching \u201cSinatra,\u201d it\u2019s hard to shake the memory of a recent Broadway show \u2014<a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2025\/04\/26\/entertainment\/just-in-time-review-jonathan-groff-parties-like-its-1965-in-stellar-bobby-darin-musical\/\"> \u201cJust in Time,\u201d the Bobby Darin musical.\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Darin was a contemporary of Sinatra\u2019s, though one with fewer enduring songs and, for today\u2019s audiences, a lesser-known backstory.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Yet \u201cJust in Time,\u201d against all odds, is a sensational show and a hit. It opened with an unforgettable star turn from Jonathan Groff and, most importantly, the design and Alex Timbers\u2019 direction intoxicatedly transported us back to another era.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Audiences rightly expect such transcendence, and even more so with a musical about an icon. Instead, London has a cheap-o tribute show with a roll-on kitchen and a jokebook.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019ll take a lot more ingenuity and thought (a shredder, really) if \u201cSinatra\u201d ever wants to be a part of it \u2014 New York, New York.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><em> \u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n<p><em> \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source celebrity.land \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Theater review SINATRA Two hours and 45 minutes, with one intermission. At the Aldwych Theatre in London, UK. These vagabond shoes were longing to stray. But my sneakers reluctantly remained at the Aldwych Theatre for the second act of the new musical \u201cSinatra\u201d in London\u2019s West End. Sadly, the best was not yet to come. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2505264,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25174],"tags":[21741,305355,24047,345886],"class_list":["post-2505263","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-gossip","tag-entertainment","tag-frank-sinatra","tag-theater","tag-theater-reviews"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/Frank-Sinatra-bio-musical-in-London-is-an-insult-\u2014.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2505263","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2505263"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2505263\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2505265,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2505263\/revisions\/2505265"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2505264"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2505263"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2505263"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2505263"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}