Russian city cancels Jesus Christ Superstar performance over religious complaints

[rug]

Published: 29 September, 2012, 23:20

Rock opera Jesus Christ Superstar has been pulled before a performance in the Russian city of Rostov-on-Don following complaints from Orthodox Christians. The believers claim the production is in breach of a controversial new religious offense law.

­A group of eighteen private citizens sent a letter to the administration of the large city in the south of the country ahead of a touring performance of the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical, which premiered 42 years ago.

“In our view the image of Christ presented in the opera is incorrect. If they want to stage a play about the life of the Savior, they should first clear it with the local church authority,” one of the offended believers told Life News.

“Now that there is a law for these offenses, we have decided to appeal to the state for help.”

http://rt.com/art-and-culture/news/jesus-superstar-cancel-believers-310/

I always liked this show. Judas stole the movie.

As for this, it's chilling: “Now that there is a law for these offenses, we have decided to appeal to the state for help.”

[K8-EEE]

1. Oh I see Russia has GOP style Free-Dumb now!

Ted Neely was the hottest Jesus ever! He inspired a short-lived personal religious revival when I was in 7th grade and in Catholic school, however, I got over it. That religion never made any sense to me even though I went through all the motions of confirmation and stuff, but I did get into Ted Neely JC! YEOW!

[rug]

2. Just for you, here he is 36 years later.

[msongs]

3. judas did what god wanted him to do, and look what god did to him in return, the ingrate nt

[rug]

4. Judas is an intriguing character.

His only contemporary who was as angst-ridden was Peter.

Here's a good (nontheological) article on him.

"Should we hate Judas Iscariot?"

http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/atlarge/2009/08/03/090803crat_atlarge_acocella

[dimbear]

5. Maybe something a little more orthodox, like Bulgakov's "Master and Margarete."

Should be noncontroversial.

[rug]

6. Wow, I never heard of that.

"The Master and Margarita (Russian: «Ма́стер и Маргари́та») is a 1937 (eventually not published until 1967) novel by Mikhail Bulgakov, woven around the premise of a visit by the Devil to the fervently atheistic Soviet Union. Many critics[1] consider it to be one of the best novels of the 20th century, and the foremost of Soviet satires, directed against a suffocatingly bureaucratic social order."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Master_and_Margarita

High praise indeed. Thanks.

[cbayer]

7. I never saw this as heretical or blasphemous in any way.

I wonder what offends them.

[rug]

8. Me either.

I started wtaching parts of it again last night on youtube. The theology isn't really heterodox. In fact, it's pretty insightful.

[cbayer]

9. I loved both this and Godspell at certain times in my life.

I felt they were just modern tellings of the old tale and appreciated them as that. And I don't recall people being offended.

Go figure.

[Rowdyboy]

10. How very odd...both are beautiful pieces. Hard to understand taking offense...

[MineralMan]

11. I saw it during its initial run, and have

seen the film a number of times. My wife and I went to a performance with Neely in it here in the Twin Cities during the farewell tour. Neely did a good job, but his voice had to be supplemented on the high notes with recordings. I'm not surprised at that. I never could understand the controversy over this play and film. As a piece of theater, it is excellent, and it doesn't do any damage to the scriptural accounts, either.

[pinto]

12. I see this was initiated by 18 private citizens. For 200 years the Orthodox Church was

essentially the State Church of the Russian Empire. Until the Bolshevik Revolution it played a dual, aligned role as a church and an arm of the state. It is on the whole extremely conservative. I'm not surprised 18 adherents jumped at the chance to use the new blasphemy law to challenge the production. The law plays into the agenda of small, extremely conservative groups to promote re-introducing Orthodoxy as a state sanctioned standard.

Ironically, 'Superstar' has been staged in Russian cities, including Rostov-on-Don in the recent past to wide acclaim. I found the Church's response interesting -

“I’d like to note this is the opinion of some citizens, and not actually the official stance of the Church,” said Igor Petrovsky, spokesman of the local archdiocese. “ Maybe they should have got a blessing from their priest before firing off a complaint.”

[rug]

13. Good points.

Some people are just salivating to use state power to quash people and thoughts they don't like.