Philip Bulcock

Age:

Hometown: Bury, “quite a small working-class town” in greater Manchester in the north of England, where Bulcock grew up the son of an electrician father and a mother who was a teacher. They separated when he was a boy. The actor has lived in London for some 20 years.

Currently: Lending unexpected and very real gravitas to the part of Nick Massi in the West End production of Jersey Boys, the Tony Award-winning musical about Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons now playing at the Prince Edward Theatre. Massi, you may recall, is the one of the quartet who is no longer alive, something of which Bulcock remains acutely aware. “Nick was the only one without a voice when they were putting this show together, and I was very conscious of that when I took the role. I guess I’ve felt proactive and also defensive of his participation. I’ve wanted to be sure Nick was properly represented in the show, which I think the writers did anyway, but I felt I had to back it up.” And whereas his co-stars have had to deal to varying degrees with the real-life presences of the men they play eight times a week, Bulcock says that not having Massi around is “on the one hand frustrating, though on the other hand, it’s quite nice. I don’t have anything to look up to.” He grins. “There’s no one to say, `You really messed me up. I want you fired.’”

Jersey Boys stars Philip Bulcock, Ryan Molloy, Stephen Ashfield and Glenn Carter

Oh, What a Night: Bulcock saw director Des McAnuff’s ongoing Broadway production in September 2007, well before starting rehearsals for the London version and points to differences between the two. “The audience there is much more geared toward the music, sometimes to the detriment of the story. They go bananas from the beginning of the show. And obviously all the Jersey references go down brilliantly, whereas here we’ve had to change a few.” On the West End, by contrast, “audiences listen more to the story of the band, which they don’t know at all, and a lot of them don’t know that the music in the show is stuff they will know. People go, `Wow, I didn’t know they’d written that.’ So they’re not really coming for the music, or I don’t think they are; they’re coming for the show.” With specific regard to the content of the show, Bulcock points to “the mafia stuff. For people from New Jersey, it’s around their lives, or they know it exists, whereas here it’s a glamorous thing, so there’s a very different connection to that part of the story.” In the final analysis, the actor says, the reactions in both cities “have their benefits and drawbacks. We wish the audience would go as nuts here.”

Glower Power: As Massi, Bulcock has been acclaimed for the command with which his glowering, nonverbal intensity draws an audience toward him, despite having fewer lines to work with than some of his colleagues. “It’s always a hard job for an actor when you have scenes where you’re not saying anything. Words are an anchor and without them, you’ve just got to stay focused and communicate exactly what you’re thinking—where was Nick was going at that moment in his life or what was he doing. A lot of the time, Nick is in Tommy’s shadow—he needs Tommy [DeVito, played by Glenn Carter], who’s the big brother he never had, but he hates Tommy at the same time because he knows Tommy is messing it up from the start.” Has Bulcock actually read the raves that have come his way? The performer laughs. “I try to avoid doing that. I’m a bit of a coward, I think. Eventually, months after, I bring myself maybe to find it on the Internet and have a look, but I can’t base my judgment of my ability on what they say.”

To Sing or Not To Sing: Bulcock followed his acting training some years later with a four-year directing course, since which time he has been back in the profession six years, returning to the musicals fold with Jersey Boys. “I hadn’t done any musicals at all until Jersey Boys,” Bulcock says of this phase of his career, having previously appeared as Kenickie in “about the fifth cast” of Grease at the Cambridge Theatre. “What attracted me was the acting challenge. I always just wanted to be an actor and I didn’t realize that pigeonholing still exists where they slot you into a certain genre. You still get the attitude now that certain casting directors won’t come and see you because they know it’s a musical.” He pauses. “But then I’ve seen some musicals that have been so poor you can understand why they say that”—not, Bulcock hastens to add, Jersey Boys. “This is brilliant writing, you know? As an actor, it brings out the best in you.”