Godspell summary

Because this show is such a product of the seventies, it's not really the story of Jesus' life in the same way Jesus Christ Superstar is.  It starts with John the Baptist and Jesus' entrance, then goes into a bunch of parables.  Like I said, it's a product of the seventies...that explains pretty much everything about the entire show.  In art terms it's more impressionist imagery than an actual attempt to show accurately what happened.  Act 2 gets into a little bit of the betrayal and crucifixion, but from what I know of the story a lot was left out.  That's about all there is to say about the plot... Most of the songs in Act 2 are designed to bring the audience to tears and to leave you feeling emotionally drained.  It sometimes works-while working on a production of this I ended up watching eight straight performances (four run-throughs, four performances) and I sure ended up depressed, and I'm not even Christian.  And there really is a purpose to the seemingly random order of parables and songs if you watch it as much as I did.  Anyway, so there isn't really a plot, but if you're high I'm sure the whole thing makes sense.  It must; otherwise it wouldn't have been popular back in the seventies.  Oh, and speaking of incoherent writing from the seventies, there are only two real characters in this play.  One is Jesus; the other is a combination of Judas (a follower of Jesus who betrayed him to the police) and John the Baptist (a similar preacher from just before Jesus).  I have no clue where to separate the two of them.  The rest of the characters seem to be pretty interchangable disciples.

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