REVIEW: Godspell

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Posted: November 22, 2008 - 5:21 am

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Godspell at UAA: Anthony Oliva (Judas), Nathan Huey (The Goofy One), Stephany Jeffers (The Confident One), Christina Gomez (The Sassy One), Sarah Shoemaker (The Comical One), Michael Sauvageau (The Playful One), Katrisha Villarante (The Sweet One), Alex Pierce (Jesus), Floor - Amber Gauthier (The Shy One). Photo by Fran Lautenberger.

By MAIA NOLAN

The holidays are just around the corner, but let’s postpone “Good Christian Men Rejoice” in favor of something more immediate: Good musical theater fans rejoice, for the singing, dancing gospel has come to the Anchorage stage. And no, I’m not talking about “Jesus Christ Superstar.”

The University of Alaska Anchorage’s production of John-Michael Tebelak and Stephen Schwartz’s “Godspell” opened Friday night, and it’s a firecracker of a show, funny and touching and earnest, with all the spirit of a Sunday gospel brunch. Even the nonbelievers in Friday night’s crowd were clapping along with the reprise of “Day by Day” and lining up to share “wine” with the cast onstage.

While “Godspell” draws from the same source material as Andrew Lloyd Weber’s rock opera about Jesus’ last days, it’s a bit more sunny and a bit less edgy, and its flexible book and setting have made it a favorite of community theatres and church groups for decades.

Director Fran Lautenberger takes advantage of that flexibility, setting her production in a modern Bluetoothed, BlackBerry-ed, hands-free world (which comes alive thanks to excellent technical direction and light design). As the troupe of performers evolves from a group of individuals into a community, they jettison their personal electronics and gravitate toward one another. The shofar that opened the original production is replaced by a megaphone, and cast members clamber over scaffolding decorated with Christmas lights as they are “baptized” in a water fight.

In December, Anchorage audiences will have a chance to see the national touring company of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “Jesus Christ Superstar,” a musical that originally premiered a year before “Godspell,” starring Ted Neeley as Jesus. Neeley, the consummate rock opera Jesus, has been milking the role since 1974, and at age 65, he’s now nearly twice as old as Christ was at the time of the crucifixion.

Lautenberger’s cast, on the other hand, is young and scrappy, and energetic in a hooray-for-everything! kind of way. The ensemble is so uniformly good that to single out any one performer would seem like a disservice to the rest. Each player has his or her moment to shine, and shine they do. They sing, they dance, they do puppet shows (no, really), and they do it all with energy and aplomb, but without being hammy. Better still, they’re accompanied by live musicians; there’s no canned, synthesized music in this production, and it does make a difference.

The performances aren’t perfect — clearly there are singers in this group who are first-time actors, and actors who are first-time singers — but it’s almost better that way. Who would believe a bunch of ragtag zealots with perfect pitch?

The only problem with “Godspell” is a technical one: The wireless microphones in UAA’s Mainstage Theater deliver patchy audio that tended to cut in and out during solos on Friday night. It was a shame the audio system couldn’t deliver when the performers definitely could.

“Godspell” runs Fri.-Sat. at 8 p.m. and Sat.-Sun. at 3 p.m. through Dec. 7 at UAA’s Mainstage Theater. Tickets are $10-$18, available at the UAA box office, 786-4849.

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