{"id":119579,"date":"2025-08-05T01:08:19","date_gmt":"2025-08-05T01:08:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/119579\/"},"modified":"2025-08-05T01:08:19","modified_gmt":"2025-08-05T01:08:19","slug":"cynthia-erivo-is-divine-in-jesus-christ-superstar-at-hollywood-bowl","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/119579\/","title":{"rendered":"Cynthia Erivo is divine in ‘Jesus Christ Superstar’ at Hollywood Bowl"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Cynthia Erivo, a noted theatrical divinity, redeemed the title of \u201cJesus Christ Superstar\u201d<\/a> at the Hollywood Bowl last weekend in a magnetic, heaven-sent performance that established God the Savior as a queer Black woman, as many of us suspected might be the case all along.<\/p>\n

Divine dispensation allowed me to catch the final performance of this revival of Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice\u2019s 1971 breakout musical. I returned from vacation just in time to join the pilgrimaging hordes carting cumbersome picnic baskets and enough wine for a few dozen Sicilian weddings. The vast number of attendees caused bottlenecks at entry points, prompting one wag to crack, \u201cWhat is this, the Second Coming?\u201d<\/p>\n

The headliners, Erivo as Jesus and Adam Lambert as Judas<\/a>, certainly have sizable fan bases. But so too does the subject of this Greatest Story Ever Told, a messiah whose following has few equals in the history of the world. Suffice it to say, it was a supercharged evening, comparable more to a rock concert than one of the Bowl\u2019s forays into the musical theater past.<\/p>\n

The hard-charging exuberance was appropriate for a production that went back to the concept album roots of a rock opera that, like other countercultural musicals of the period \u2014 such as \u201cHair\u201d and \u201cGodspell\u201d \u2014 preached peace and love while rebelling against oppression and conformity. \u201cJesus Christ Superstar\u201d<\/a> reminds us that Lloyd Webber wasn\u2019t always a symbol of the bourgeois establishment.<\/p>\n

Yes, the composer behind \u201cCats,\u201d \u201cThe Phantom of the Opera\u201d and \u201cSunset Boulevard\u201d had an early revolutionary streak, challenging authority and testing social taboos. What made \u201cJesus Christ Superstar\u201d controversial wasn\u2019t simply the depiction of Jesus of Nazareth as a man with vulnerabilities and doubts. It was the blast of guitars and vocal shrieks that accompanied the telling of his last days and crucifixion in a manner more akin to the Who\u2019s \u201cTommy\u201d than the church organ interludes of a traditional Sunday service.<\/p>\n

\"Cynthia <\/p>\n

Cynthia Erivo delivered a heaven-sent performance in \u201cJesus Christ Superstar\u201d at the Hollywood Bowl last weekend.<\/p>\n

(Farah Sosa)<\/p>\n

Director and choreographer Sergio Trujillo leaned into the concert nature of \u201cJesus Christ Superstar.\u201d The metallic scaffolding staging, the mythic scale of projections and the rhythmic flow of cast members, moving from one musical number to the next, freed the production from literal illustration.<\/p>\n

The religious meaning of the story was communicated through the intensity of the performances. Erivo and Lambert are incapable of ever giving less than 100% when translating emotion into song. But the human drama was most evident in the handling of duets, the musical give and take that showcases the richness of all that lies between lyrics.<\/p>\n

The conflict between Erivo\u2019s all-seeing, all-feeling Jesus and Lambert\u2019s competitive yet remorseful Judas was thrillingly brought to life in their different yet wholly compatible musical styles. In \u201cStrange Thing Mystifying\u201d and \u201cThe Last Supper,\u201d Lambert, a Freddie Mercury style-rocker, and Erivo, a musical theater phenomenon who can pierce the heavens with her mighty voice, revealed a Judas who can\u2019t account for all his actions and a Jesus who understands the larger destiny that is both sorrowfully and triumphantly unfolding.<\/p>\n

\"Phillipa <\/p>\n

Phillipa Soo provided sublime support in a cast that had considerable Broadway depth. <\/p>\n

(Farah Sosa)<\/p>\n

Phillipa Soo\u2019s Mary Magdalene brought a probing, tentative and profound intimacy in her adoration of Erivo\u2019s Jesus. In her exquisite rendition of \u201cI Don\u2019t Know How to Love Him,\u201d the tenderness between Mary Magdalene and Jesus, at once earthy and ethereal, deepened the expressive range of the love between them.<\/p>\n

Soo, best known for her graceful lead performance in \u201cHamilton,\u201d provided sublime support in a cast that had considerable Broadway depth. Ra\u00fal Esparza, whom I can still hear singing \u201cBeing Alive\u201d from the 2006 Broadway revival of \u201cCompany,\u201d played Pontius Pilate with lip-smacking villainy. Josh Gad, who missed Friday\u2019s performance<\/a> because of illness but was in sharp comic form Sunday, turned King Herod into a Miami-style mobster, dressed in a gold lam\u00e9 getup that would be just perfect for New Year\u2019s Day brunch at Mar-a-Lago.<\/p>\n

\"Raul <\/p>\n

Raul Esparza as Pontius and Cynthia Erivo as Jesus in \u201cJesus Christ Superstar.\u201d<\/p>\n

(Farah Sosa)<\/p>\n

The acting company distinguished itself primarily through its galvanic singing. Music director and conductor Stephen Oremus maintained the production\u2019s high musical standards, bringing out the extensive palette of a rock score with quicksilver moods.<\/p>\n

One could feel Erivo, a generous performer who understands that listening can be as powerful as belting, building up trust in her less experienced musical theater castmates. The way she registered Lambert\u2019s bravura moments bolstered not only his confidence in his non-singing moments but also the miracle of her own fully realized performance.<\/p>\n

Ultimately, Jesus\u2019 spiritual journey is a solitary one. In \u201cGethsemane,\u201d the path of suffering becomes clear, and Erivo\u2019s transcendence was all the more worshipped by the audience for being painfully achieved. Unmistakably modern yet incontestably timeless, abstract yet never disembodied and pure of heart yet alive to the natural shocks that flesh is heir to, this portrayal of Jesus with piercings, acrylic nails and tattoos met us in an ecumenical place where all are welcome in their bodily realities and immortal longings.<\/p>\n

Lloyd Webber is undergoing a renaissance at the moment. Fearlessly inventive director Jamie Lloyd has given new impressions of \u201cSunset Blvd.,\u201d<\/a> which won the Tony for best musical revival this year, and \u201cEvita,\u201d which is currently the talk of London\u2019s West End.<\/p>\n

Trujillo\u2019s production of \u201cJesus Christ Superstar\u201d deserves not just a longer life but more time for the actors to investigate their momentous relationships with one another. The drama that occurs when Erivo\u2019s Jesus and Soo\u2019s Mary Magdalene interact should provide the model for all the cast members to lay bare their messy human conflicts. \u201cJesus Christ Superstar\u201d depends as much upon its interpersonal drama as its rock god swagger \u2014 as Erivo, in a Bowl performance that won\u2019t soon be forgotten, proved once and for all.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Cynthia Erivo, a noted theatrical divinity, redeemed the title of \u201cJesus Christ Superstar\u201d at the Hollywood Bowl last…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":119580,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5123],"tags":[66301,26554,1582,276,74514,19728,66303,74511,66300,66308,66304,2961,224,5337,4818,74512,43387,74513,18904,74515],"class_list":{"0":"post-119579","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles","8":"tag-adam-lambert","9":"tag-andrew-lloyd-webber","10":"tag-ca","11":"tag-california","12":"tag-cast-member","13":"tag-director","14":"tag-erivo","15":"tag-final-performance","16":"tag-jesus","17":"tag-jesus-christ-superstar","18":"tag-judas","19":"tag-la","20":"tag-los-angeles","21":"tag-losangeles","22":"tag-love","23":"tag-mary-magdalene","24":"tag-new-year","25":"tag-phillipa-soo","26":"tag-production","27":"tag-revival"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114973488348468968","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119579","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=119579"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119579\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/119580"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=119579"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=119579"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=119579"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}