Herod in JC Superstar

Anyone have any thoughts about this character and his portrayal?

usually over-the-top and gay.

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Some choose not to play it that way too-Alice cooper in the 90's London Revival comes to mind.

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historically, Herod was not King when Jesus lived. if you want to go by history...

Mind you ALice COoper wasn't actually in the 96 revival, just on the CD. but yes, usually very gay, I guess due to the style of his song and the Campiness of the number.

However I love that the Live Vienna CD with Drew as Jesus has a woman playing Herod. She is totally fierce in an "Ursula" kind of way.

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I've always thought that the scene was going for a burlesque kind of feel. Not the "stripper" aspect but just the cheap show-biz sensibility.
All the frivolity and sarcasm juxtaposed with JC's somber and bedraggled state.

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Well, not to mention that the audience needs a breather before the whole savage beating, suicide and crucifixion moments that are coming.

That's a reason, but not the reason that they decided on such a hackneyed old-fashioned form for the song. THey could have had a rock comedy song, but ALW chose traditional musical theater for a reason.

It's fascinating.

Photos of King Herod from the Original Broadway Cast album, unfortunately poor in quality:





Photos from: http://www.elijah.org/fenholt/jcsbdwy.htm

It's not just Jesus Christ Superstar in which he is portrayed in this manner. I've seen him portrayed similarly in non-musical adaptions of the Gospels.

In the original version on Broadway, he is portrayed by someone who looks like he just came from a Carmen Miranda look a like contest

Remember, it was directed by Tom O Horgan.

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Scott Miller said it best, so I'll just quote him:

"The next song, 'King Herod's Song,' is among the most interesting, for both good and bad reasons. First, Herod is like so many modern Christians, always asking God for something, always making deals, always begging for miracles, always flocking to far-flung places to witness the latest fake miracle sighting. Herod here plays the role of the Pharisees in the Bible, goading Jesus, tempting him to prove he has God on his side. But Jesus sees how shallow and inconsequential Herod is, and he knows that no matter what he says, his situation isn't getting any better. This song is Lloyd Webber's only obvious use of pastiche, a kind of raucous, blackly comic, British music hall song and dance number, presumably chosen to trivialize Herod, to show us how insignificant he is. Still, though it's clear that Lloyd Webber wanted to paint Herod as a grotesque man playing at being King, the use of such different music is a questionable choice. The song doesn't belong with the rest of the show, and certainly Herod isn't the only villain in the story; why aren't the others portrayed with equally bizarre, non-rock music? As unexpected as it is, introducing this kind of musical anomaly so far into the evening leaves the audience feeling disoriented, and sometimes more hostile toward Rice and Lloyd Webber than toward Herod. Merely using more rock sound in the instrumentation would have helped the number immeasurably, but as it stands, it just doesn't belong. British audiences, who are more familiar with the tradition of the British musical hall (their version of vaudeville) probably found this music less jarring than Americans did, but it still seems weaker than the rest of the score.

In the 1994 recording Jesus Christ Superstar - A Resurrection, 'King Herod's Song' is done as a 1950s rock number in 6/8; not only is it stronger dramatically, it also fits better into the score. Many modern productions now massage the music into something closer to rock, to satisfy audiences now used to fully integrated pop opera scores like Les Misérables and Rent. Herod eventually passes the buck again, and sends Jesus back to Pilate after he's had his fun. This number is often played as silly, comic relief in most productions, and inexplicably making Herod gay! (Apparently, for some folks, Herod's decadence in the Bible is easily expressed by homosexuality because we all know how decadent those gays are!) But the truth is that there is far more substance in this material than is usually apparent. For this great philosopher and political leader to be treated so disrespectfully, so grotesquely should be deeply upsetting, particularly with the extra baggage of two thousands years of Christian culture we all have. 'King Herod's Song' should be ridiculous – Rice once wrote, 'King Herod was a bit of a debauched bloke, who sat around smoking and drinking all the time with a lot of women around him.' – but he should also be scary, dangerous, disturbing."

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Whoever this Scott Miller is, he's an idiot. The songs fits for the reasons mentioned in my other threads, and saying that ALW "inexplicably" makes him gay shows how Miller doesn't know anything at all about how Herod Antipas has been portrayed as gay prior to JC Superstar

too many MT writers don't do their homework and then present their analysis as definitive when it's clearly not.

Edit: Oh, THAT Scott Miller. I read "Deconstrucing Harold Hill" what a vapid attempt at scholarship.

Updated On: 4/18/08 at 10:57 AM