The excitement was palpable as we waited for the performance to begin but once the overture began we were hooked.
The audience this evening appeared to be mainly made up of middle aged people who would have been brought up on music based on biblical stories at school, Noah and his floating Zoo, Jonah Man Jazz, Creation Jazz, Joseph and his amazing technicolour dreamcoat and of course JC Superstar.
I had never seen the live outside performances that people had raved about as my own introduction to this was watching the 1973 production filmed in the Israeli desert when I was much much younger.
As a musical the lyrics and super memorable tunes have always stayed with me and the talent of Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber shouldn’t be underestimated given how this musical has stood the test of time. .
The set was ‘simply’ amazing with amongst other things the cross being part of the last supper table.
We can debate if Mary Magdalene would have been at that table, but Hannah Richardson played her in the most beautifully calm way and we see why Jesus chose her to be in His inner most circle she loved the bones of Him and He respected her like no one else ever had.
The heartbreak that Judas suffers after being ‘chosen’ to betray his Lord was tangible and Shem Omari James as Judas showed us the turmoil that he suffered and the awful sadness and despair of his hands being forever tainted with the silver coins of his betrayal.
This is obviously a personal opinion as the dancers were amazing but as an old-fashioned gal there was no need for them to be so over sexualised at times (there are surely other ways to show frenzy) and it kind of ruined some of it for me with them writhing for no apparent reason.
The guitar rock vibe was well and truly alive and kicking and fitted the emotional journey we were on.
It really was an enjoyable lively performance but I do think if you weren’t brought up with a little religious knowledge of what this is based or if you ‘lose’ some of the lyrics during the performance, you may be a bit confused about the sequence of events, so maybe gen up a little first you’ll enjoy it so much more.
