My Late Night with the Jonas Brothers

Because I am 45, I was not in the core Jo Bro demo. Because I am a good mother, however, interested in sharing vital cinema with my children, my kids and I did fall hard for the boys in Camp Rock. We then watched the concert film, the documentary, the music videos. Because I am a person with eyes, I took notice of the glow-ups. (Really, though, with the exception of some impressive muscles, let’s call this what it is—three men deciding not to fight against their natural hair texture.) Their new music (that is, music released after I started paying attention) is catchy as hell. Here are some of my faves.

Ok now you’re all caught up. Handsome as the day is long.

This Thursday, the Brothers announced they were playing a show at Webster Hall, which holds 1500 people, and is in lower Manhattan. This seemed significantly more appealing to me than Giants Stadium (ok, ok, Metlife) in Rutherford, New Jersey, which seats 82,000. Surely I knew someone who knew someone who could get me in there. I did meet Nick Jonas once, backstage at The Last Five Years, which he is currently co-starring in on Broadway, with the very fabulous Adrienne Warren. We spoke for exactly three seconds, and then I listened to him talk to my friend about how he was settling in—it was such a familiar tired-working-parent-human conversation that I felt immediate, gutting sympathy for him. He was wearing an enormous fleece, a protective cocoon. I told my children that I would take a picture with Nick for them but then I felt too aware of his humanity and so I did not. Here is a picture of my friend with a picture of Nick, though.

I’ll spare you the machinations but I wound up with four tickets. MVP of the year goes to my friend Cate who is not only a true millennial Jonas fan but is also from their homeland of New Jersey. She got me on the guest list, which feels pretty close to touching heaven. I took my friend Joe and one of my booksellers, Nicole, and if you can believe it, the other ticket went to WASTE. I TRIED. Shout-out to all my friends who actually would have gone with me if they’d been able, you missed something incredible, look at the rest of this post through your fingers so you don’t get too sad.

While we were waiting at the box office to get our fancy tickets, an SUV pulled up outside, and suddenly we were all being asked to stand to one side. Nick Jonas popped out of the car, looking very adorable in a (checks notes) brown linen suit and a goddamn kerchief tied around his neck. We’ll come back to this, but whoever is styling these men needs a raise. The way I can tell that the Jonas Brothers are not my psychotic fan home base is that I did not for a moment think that he would recognize me as a person he had shaken hands with, and he did not. Nicole waved, because she is a sweetheart. Nick nodded at all of us in a general way and hurried on to wherever he had to go. Everyone—I say this definitively—swooned.

The main room at Webster Hall is not very big, and so even though we made our way in right before they started, we were close. The crowd was mostly millennial, I would say, with cute outfits and fancy nails and shiny, clean hair. I am used to the New Kids fandom, which is twenty years older, and so I felt a little bit like a chaperone, but that is a nice feeling, too. I would have helped any girl in there. Safety! Let me tell you about the safety of being in a boyband crowd.

Let’s pause for a second and talk brass tax, though. I have recently come to the conclusion that if there are more than two brothers in a band, it cannot be a boyband. More than two brothers means that there is a father making it happen, you know what I mean? A Joe Jackson. A whatever the Osmond father’s name is. Hanson is not a boyband, you know? (REMEMBER WHEN I WAS ON A PLANE WITH HANSON?) Ergo, the Jonas Brothers are not actually a boyband. Another point of evidence: the young women around me were all yelling JONAS, JONAS, JONAS, and not any individual name. The picking of a favorite is essential to boyband culture. You cannot simply love them all. Anyway! Moving on!

A bald man came onto the stage. He looked remarkably like Justin Brannan, the former hardcore kid running for NY office, and introduced himself as the band’s musical director. This evening was a “live rehearsal” for their upcoming tour, that was the idea. There was a drummer with long blond hair blowing in a Beyonce-like fashion from start to finish. There was a full band, playing and having fun. Then the brothers emerged.

They do have faces, I swear.

It was so much fun to see how excited the crowd was. They knew every song the moment it began, they screamed and they screamed and they screamed. Nick, our friend Nick, was the emcee, the hero, the star. He sang, he played guitar, he danced around, he charmed the pants off everyone. Joe (who came to the bookstore wearing a Santa hat and a deep v-neck) wore the outfit of a divorced dad in the 1980s: mustache, sports coat, air of disengagement. Kevin looked like Luke Perry, relaxed and like he could probably ride a horse if he wanted to. The words grown and sexy come to mind. Kevin is the thinking woman’s choice, I’m telling you. He played guitar all night and sometimes sang harmonies but otherwise just followed along, mouthing all the words that his brothers (and the fans) were singing. I could write a poem about Kevin Jonas.

Well, I could write a novel.

They played for an hour and a half. The merch was very good but the line was too long. My children were very mad they couldn’t go. I was home by midnight. A perfect evening.

The next day, after a 3rd grade basketball game and various other family obligations, we went to see & Juliet, which is playing just a few blocks from The Last Five Years. It’s a jukebox musical about William Shakespeare writing Romeo and Juliet, if you aren[t familiar, set to the tunes of Max Martin, aka it’s mostly Backstreet Boys and Britney Spears. Right now, Joey Fatone from *NSYNC is on it, and wonderful. Here’s what I’m saying: it’s a boyband world, and we’re just living in it. Let’s hear it for the boys.

Thank you Cate for the ticket, and thank you to Joe and Nicole for coming with me, and thank you to the Jonas Brothers for a great night.

xoxoxoxoxo