From 98 Degrees to “Men of the Strip,” Jeff Timmons talks Vegas, baby!

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From 98 Degrees to “Men of the Strip,” Jeff Timmons talks Vegas, baby!

A lot of things have changed for Jeff Timmons since his days as a member of 98 Degrees, when he made young girls swoon and weep with songs like “I Do,” “Because of You” and “The Hardest Thing.” Now 40 years old and a father to his own teenaged daughter, Timmons has gone from the boy band scene to, well, something a little more grown-up.

I spoke to Timmons recently about the new show he created, called “Men of the Strip.” At first blush, I know it sounds kind of raunchy, but it isn’t. (No, really. My mother, my aunt, and three of my former Sunday School teachers read this blog, for crying out loud.)

“Men of the Strip” bills itself as “an explosive and multi-faceted new live male revue entertainment extravaganza.” But I wanted to get behind all the muscular chest shots, glitzy Vegas adjectives and gorgeous choreography. I wanted to find out what made Jeff decide to create such a show, what went into it, how it’s all come together, and how often I can get backstage. (I KID, I kid.)

“It’s a great show, an amazing production, it’s high-end, high-quality theater with what basically amounts to a grown-up boy band,” Jeff told me. “Look at it this way. When I was in 98 Degrees, we were singing to the girls, sometimes taking our shirts off. This is basically the same thing, only now the girls who used to watch us on Nickelodeon are now 22 or 23 years old and having girls’ night out with their friends.”

Mind. Blown.

“Men of the Strip” is a contemporary take on the Chippendales, the classic male revue which Jeff hosted a few years back in Las Vegas. That’s where the idea for the new show was actually born.

“It was a sold-out run the entire time I was there,” he said. “The Chippendales have their own brand, so I just thought why not create a new one, and make it more about the music and singing?”

So he teamed up with “Money Mike” Foland and Glenn Douglas Packard. Foland is a former wrestler turned entertainment industry wizard, and Packard is an Emmy-nominated choreographer and producer who has worked with Michael Jackson, P!nk, Usher, Missy Elliot, Whitney Houston and Ricky Martin. Together, the “boss men” held auditions in New York, Las Vegas, Miami, and Los Angeles until they finally had their dancers together.

“We’ve created a show that’s young, hip, more mainstream, and current,” Jeff said. “That’s why I call it a grown-up boy band. The guys sing, they dance, they go out in the audience and dance with the girls. It’s not raunchy or grindy. It’s not what you think of when you think of male strippers.”

And in case you’re wondering, Jeff does some singing as well, including the hits that put 98 Degrees on the map. Speaking of the boy band days, lest you think he has put all that behind him, he just finished a tour with the guys last summer, and he’s still friends with other boy band heartthrobs of the 1990s, like the Backstreet Boys and *NSYNC.

“Justin (Timberlake) was actually at our show in Columbus last night,” Jeff said. “We got him to get up and sing with us. It was great.”

In the meantime, “Men of the Strip” is continuing to heat everything up, working on getting their name out and building their brand. Keeping with the “grown up boy band” theme, the dancers in the show have cute nicknames, like the ones teenaged girls tend to give their heartthrobs, like “Latin Lover,” “Mama’s Boy,” and “Heartbreaker.”

The men are in the midst of doing intimate, buzz-generating meet and greets that allow ladies of all ages to hang with the multi-talented stars of the show. In the months leading up to the launch of “Men of the Strip” in Vegas, each of the performers will be creating their own individual brands in addition to helping develop the branding of the franchise.

Besides introducing “Men of the Strip,” these events, scheduled to run through the holiday season, will include performances by Jeff (who performs some of his own music as well as hits from 98 Degrees) and a few steamy, high-energy numbers with the cast to tease the Las Vegas mega-show.

A second leg of the tour, scheduled for 2014, is still to be announced. In conjunction with these live events, Jeff and his team are developing a fascinating, behind the scenes “docu-series” about the creation and development of “Men of the Strip” and the real lives of the eight performers.

“It is just really fun,” Jeff said. “It’s different, doing something that’s a little irreverent. So far the reaction has been phenomenal. We haven’t had one bad review. I’m keeping my fingers crossed.”

When he’s not working, this former teen heartthrob is all grown up and married with a blended family of four kids. His 14-year-old daughter, from his previous marriage, was born after the heyday of 98 Degrees, but she still likes listening to their music. Well, most of the time.

“She tries to hide that she likes Justin Bieber and One Direction,” Jeff told me. “She says ‘No, Dad, only your music!” and then I catch her sneaking off to listen to the stuff she really likes.”

That’s all right. Something tells me Jeff and his new crew will have no shortage of grown-up fans.

For more information on “Men of the Strip,” including tour stops for the rest of 2013, bios on dancers, and how to order a 2014 “Men of the Strip” calendar (which you’ll want to buy as a gift for your favorite blogger, right?!), visit www.menofthestrip.com.