I find it very, very challenging not to have problematic cognitive dissonance when I see an ad for The Passion: The...
I find it very, very challenging not to have problematic cognitive dissonance when I see an ad for The Passion: The Musical. It's not Mel Brooks, it's not Monty Python. It's not even Andrew Lloyd Webber. It's completely serious and it's Fox. I can't even.
They've been doing live action The Passion outdoors in NL every Easter for the past five? Six? Years.
ReplyDeleteIt's completely serious and they rope in the biggest world-famous-in-the-Netherlands celebs on a yearly basis. Different ones each year, even.
Surprisingly, the black dude isn't even always judas.
(So I think we can safely say you have us to blame for this one, especially given the similarity in the giant lit cross gimmick)
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Passion_(Netherlands)
(Somewhere on the interwebs they said that last year's The Passion (PS: the title is in English, even here...) had a television rating market share of 46%, which I don't know if that's half of all tv viewers that evening or half of everyone in the country but either way it's a shit-ton)
ReplyDeleteWell, there are several places in the US that do big Passion Plays/Pageants. However, I am not aware that they are "musicals", per se, which implies a very specific American theater form, and Fox's marketing is just so High School Musical, The Crucifying that it's weird.
ReplyDeleteI actually did find somewhere that stated Fox licensed the format from the Dutch production company. And yes, it is a musical, in a sense (I've never watched it mind you).
ReplyDeleteIt's probably as much of a musical as Carols From Kings is, at least — storytelling interspersed with random pop songs.
Huh. Well, ok then.
ReplyDeleteF-L Silver I found it again: http://deadline.com/2015/12/the-passion-live-musical-jesus-tyler-perry-fox-1201667399/
ReplyDeleteLooks like Leigh Butler is getting a ring side seat!
This is our punishment for this year's primary season, isn't it.
ReplyDeleteIt might just be a continuation of the trend that started with Big Brother of us inflicting the absolute worst tv we make on the rest of the world. The Voice, deal or no deal, aforementioned Big Brother...
ReplyDeleteI mean, arguably, we started reality tv with that last one. So... I'm expecting us to be first against the wall, really.
Apparently after the US and the U.K., NL is the third biggest tv format exporter worldwide. Mostly that's EndeMol — Joop van den Ende and Johnny de Mol.