(2000) The greatest story ever told becomes the greatest story ever sung in Gale Edwards's updated stage direction of Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber's rock-of-ages musical.

From within an anachronistic, futuristic setting - a graffiti-covered wall of famous quotes in a variety of languages, street toughs in leather and chains, the Jewish crowd in 1930s hats and coats, Darth Vader-like storm troopers, television monitors - following the general populace's enthusiastic response to the entry of Jesus Christ (Glenn Carter) into Jerusalem through the enmity that eventually overtakes his mission, Judas Iscariot (Jerome Pradon) struggles to understand this man. "Strip away the myth from the man." Is he just a man? "Jesus Christ, Superstar, who are you? What have you sacrificed?" Ending with the crucifixion, there is no resurrection - other than a hint. "We only wanna know. Do you think you are who they say you are?"

The disciples - a gang of blacks, Asians, and whites (reminiscent of West Side Story and YMCA) - are content: "Always hoped that I'd be an apostle … Then when we retire we can write the gospels/ So they'll still talk about us when we've died." But when Jesus needs them, they're asleep in Gethsemane, or like Peter in denial.

Similarly the followers at first chant: "Christ, you know I love you/ Did you see I waved? I believe in you and God/ So tell me that I'm saved." Later when he's on trial, they turn against their king: "Crucify him!"

In a grand baritone, the high priest Caiaphas (Frederick B. Owens), contrasting with the nearly shrill voice of Annas (Michael Shaeffer), and their council call for Jesus's death, fearful of his rising popularity; but they need permission from either Pontius Pilate (Fred Johanson) or King Herod (Rik Mayall).

Pilate sends Jesus ("You're Herod's race! You're Herod's case!") to the impresario king in his white dinner jacket and red bow tie, accompanied by showgirls in snug red-sequined sheathes and male dancers, at Herod's Vegas-styled casino, who mocks Christ: "Prove to me that you're no fool/ walk across my swimming pool." Back to Pilate, a harsh authoritarian but haunted by a dream of a man from Galilee, Rome's representative seeks some palliative to avoid ordering Jesus to die: "I need a crime."

Among the apostles wielding guns, Simon Zealotes (Tony Vincent) had hopes of Jesus's leading an armed rebellion: "add a touch of hate at Rome." But Jesus dismisses the militant role: "You see the truth, but you live a lie ... To conquer death, you only have to die."

Still Christ has his doubts too: "For all you care, this wine could be my blood," he says to his Twelve at the Last Supper. "For all you care, this could be my body." In the Garden of Gethsemane he beseeches God: "Take this cup away from me for I don't want to taste its poison/ Feel it burn me, I have changed I'm not as sure/ As when we started."

The reformed prostitute, Mary Magdalene (Renee Castle), finds she's confused by her feelings for Jesus, who both attracts and scares her: "I don't know how to love him." But when Judas misinterprets what he sees when he discovers Jesus and Mary together, he goes to Caiaphas and Annas, with whom he has a friendly association, offering to turn Jesus over to them. While he fears what he's done will damn him for all time, an angelic chorus sings praise: "Well done, Judas."

Complex and conflicted, a humanist dedicated to charity for the poor, Judas thinks Jesus has gone too far with his cult of personality and talk of being God: "To think I admired you/ For now I despise you." Unlike the other apostles, he comprehends more of Jesus's objective and threatens to gum up the works at the Last Supper: "What if I just stayed here/ And ruined your ambition?"

Following the kiss in the Garden of Gethsemane, Judas, in part realizing his role was ordained by God - "I've been used/ And You knew all the time/ God! I'll never know why you chose me for your crime/ For your foul bloody crime/ You have murdered me!" - takes his own life by hanging; yet he reappears as a flashy commentator as Jesus trudges with the cross down the Via Dolorosa on a TV screen: "Why'd you choose such a backward time and such a strange land?/ If you'd come today you would have reached a whole nation./ Israel in 4 BC had no mass communication." And he's there at the foot of the cross when Christ is taken down.

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Copyright © 2008 Patrick Ivers. All rights reserved.
Reproduced with the permission of the copyright holder.

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