mediawatchwatch.org.uk

Stephen Green, national director of the failed fundamentalist lobby group Stephen Green’s Voice (aka Christian Voice), has threatened direct action against a planned TV show by the BBC and Andrew Lloyd-Webber.

Lloyd-Webber is planning a fourth series of his popular casting show to follow on from How do you solve a problem like Maria (which auditioned hopefuls for the lead role in The Sound of Music), Joseph (for Joseph and his Technicolour Dreamcoat), and I’d do anything (for Oliver). This time it’s the hit 70s musical Jesus Christ Superstar which is the target vehicle, although the TV show does not yet have a title (Just a man, Blessed are the weak, or Burning round the corner on a Yamaha are possibilities. Other suggestions welcome.)

Green is practically wetting himself with excitement at the prospect of another Jerry Springer: The Opera type campaign, apparently unconcerned by the fact that his actions then were counterproductive to the extent that they helped put paid to the blasphemy law.

If it were to go ahead, the show would then become for Christian Voice very much a ‘Jerry Springer the Opera’ operation, with witness and evangelism at every venue. There are still plenty of veterans of the early protests over Jesus Christ Superstar around who would love to share the Gospel with the queuing wanabees. It might even be that we could encourage Christian singers to enrol in order to tell Andrew Lloyd-Webber just what they think of his project in the audition room itself.

The so-called veterans from the 70s West End run of the show objected to Jesus’ portrayal as a mere man, buffeted by events, who was ultimately laid in a tomb without the subsequent Resurrection.

UPDATE: There is no such thing as the Resurrection.