Ever listened to "Hot August Night" by Neil Diamond? Probably not, but bear with me. That 1973 album, a two-hour live recording of Diamond's legendary performance at the Greek Theatre, shows the man at his best--not the "Donny Osmond" Diamond who has become a mainstay of easy-listening stations, but the "Ted Nugent" Neil who could rip, tear and wail with the best of them.
Sadly, however, the years have not been good to Diamond. His voice has lost the gravelly edge that gave his songs their passion, and he has been consigned himself to making rather saccharine Christmas albums--a rather odd choice for a Jewish boy from Brooklyn.
To be honest, when I went to see "Jesus Christ Superstar" at Raleigh's Walnut Creek Amphitheater on Aug. 13, I was expecting something similar. The starring actors--Carl Anderson as Judas and Ted Neeley as Jesus--were also the leads when the Andrew Lloyd Webber play opened on Broadway in the early '70s, and starred in the 1973 movie version after that. Although both of them had toured with the national company since then, I had my doubts as to whether they could pull off the kind of passion needed to make "Superstar" more than an interesting theological treatise set to funky disco music. After all, I thought, there was no way they could manage the intensity that made them so great in the years before I was born. Nobody stays that good for that long.
Never in my life have I enjoyed being so wrong.
The play opened with an entrance by Jesus worthy of, well, Jesus. Neeley appeared out of nowhere, clad in white robes and with brilliant light shining on him. Almost immediately, he hugged Anderson's Judas in an embrace that, in one simple act, set the tone for and captured the essence of the entire play. If you have seen "Superstar" before, you know what I'm talking about--that conflict between the traditional conception of Judas as the evil betrayer and nothing more, the disciple who says so little in the Gospels but whose actions ultimately mean more than anyone else's. If, however, you have not seen the play, perhaps a brief explanation is in order.
In one act, the embrace between Jesus and Judas says what is stressed throughout the play: Judas was not the worst but the best disciple, the one closest to Jesus instead of simply the one who betrayed him. Therein lies the play's revolutionary theological angle, especially when viewed as a product of pop culture. Although scholars have long debated the exact role of Judas--some even going so far as to say he did not exist--such ideas have not become a part of popular discourse on Judas. Before "The Last Temptation of Christ" and other such movies, then, you have "Superstar," a play by the ubiquitous Andrew Lloyd Webber. What this play did was make people think about one of the most popular Biblical stories in an entirely new way: Is it possible that Judas was actually the best disciple, and betrayed Jesus not for money but because he believed Jesus was actually hurting the cause of the Jews? If nothing else, one cannot watch "Superstar" without at least considering this question and grappling with one's own answer to it.
Part of the reason that the Judas-Jesus struggle is so compelling is, of course, due to the impassioned performances given by Anderson and Neeley.
Anderson was, hands down, the highlight of the evening. With a deep, gravelly voice that grabs you by the throat and demands attention, he brought Judas to impassioned life, conveying every ounce of his struggle between loyalty to Jesus and loyalty to the Jews. His Judas was far more than some guy who betrayed his messiah for 30 pieces of silver; rather, he was a troubled man who truly believed that Jesus was doing the Jews more harm than good, and betrayed him to the Romans for that reason and that reason alone.
Anderson himself has done a great deal of research into Judas' life, which was evident in the performance. A less informed (and lesser) actor might have brought out only Judas' anger at Jesus, rather than the deep love and admiration--mixed with more than a little envy--that Judas does have for his messiah in the play. Anderson, however, did not fall into that trap, which is exemplified in Judas' death scene, the play's most moving moment--more moving, ironically, than Jesus' own crucifixion in the final scene of the play.
In "Judas' Death," Anderson is on the verge of suicide due to the guilt he feels for betraying Jesus. He tells the Jewish leaders to whom he betrayed Jesus that he had no idea Christ would be harmed, and he wishes he could change his decision. "They beat him so hard that he was bent and lame, and I know who everybody's gonna blame. I don't believe he knows I acted for our good--I'd save him all his suffering if I could."
The Pharisees, however, fail to see why Judas feels guilty, which only causes him to feel worse. In the most touching single moment of the performance, Judas echoes the words of Mary Magdalene earlier in the play: "I don't know how to love him; I don't know why he moves me. He's a man--he's just a man. He is not a king--he's just the same as anyone I know." The beauty of this scene is that despite his fervent desire to the contrary, Judas does not believe what he is saying. Anderson knows this, and brings it across with the finely honed nuance of an actor who understands fully his character and every struggle he is feeling.
Right before he kills himself, Judas says, "He scares me so... Does he love me, too? Does he care for me?" At that point, he is a scared child who realizes that he has made a terrible mistake and is regretting it with all his heart. Judas knows that he may have lost the love of the man who meant the world to him, and he dies feeling utterly alone and helpless. Anderson could not have conveyed this more passionately to the audience, and, to some extent, the play never seems quite to capture the same level of gut-wrenching emotional power after this scene.
Like Anderson, Neeley is at his best when dealing with his character's faults, his human side--Jesus as Jesus, not Jesus as Christ. Two scenes in particular exemplify this struggle, and Neeley handled them beautifully during the performance.
The first scene occurs during the song "The Temple," when Jesus is walking in the desert and is approached by person after person asking him to heal them. The crowd, seemingly endless, continues to approach, never giving Jesus any time to rest. The direction in this scene was excellent, and communicated perfectly Jesus' messianic struggle to save everyone, and the difficulty of this mission. Instead of rushing through the healings, Neeley's Jesus spent several long seconds with each person, touching them lovingly and caring about each one of them. When they kept coming, Neeley's anguish at being unable to help them all was palpable, and his final cry of "Heal yourselves!" evoked the tormented impotence of a messiah who isn't feeling so messianic after all.
The other scene in which Neeley truly shone was during the song "I Only Want to Say," when he asks God for a reprieve from his destiny. He sang, "I only want to say, if there is a way, take this cup away from me--I don't want to drink its poison. I'm not as sure as when we started." This ecstatic agony of doubt is absent in the Gospels' version of the Gethsemane scene, and there is no better example of Jesus' struggle. When Neeley wails at God, crying out that he does not want to die, the audience almost begins to think that perhaps he doesn't need to die, after all. Perhaps Jesus is just another man, with human emotions and feelings, who does not deserve to be crucified for the sins of people he does not know. That Neeley is able to convey these feelings and evoke such a visceral reaction from his audience is a testament to his ability as an actor.
The performance, however, was not without its flaws. The choreography of the minor characters was almost universally dismal. Most of the men playing the disciples seemed to think they were in a hip-hop video instead of a stage play set to '70s music, and their rhythmless antics were more comical than compelling.
Perhaps the most grating choreographical touch of the performance occurred, sadly enough, in many of the scenes involving Judas. For some inane reason, the director apparently decided that Anderson simply wasn't a good enough actor to convey his character's emotions without outside assistance, so he had three women in red tutus dance around Judas and play the role of temptresses. This kind of "Let's club the audience over the head with Important Symbols" approach served only to undermine some of the most touching scenes in the performance and in the process insult Anderson as an actor.
Other than these few snafus, however, the performance was truly phenomenal, and the audience seemed to love it. Next time, however, perhaps everything should be left in the capable hands of Neeley and Anderson--a two-man "Superstar," if done the right way, could be a truly messianic experience.
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