Jesus Christ Superstar is a sung-through rock opera with music by Andrew Lloyd Webber and lyrics by Tim Rice. Loosely based on the Gospels' accounts of the Passion, the work interprets the psychology of Jesus and other characters, with much of the plot centered on Judas, who is dissatisfied with the direction in which Jesus is steering his disciples. Contemporary attitudes, sensibilities and slang pervade the rock opera's lyrics, and ironic allusions to modern life are scattered throughout the depiction of political events. Stage and film productions accordingly contain many intentional anachronisms.
The Producers is a 1967 American satirical black comedy film written and directed by Mel Brooks and starring Zero Mostel, Gene Wilder, Dick Shawn, and Kenneth Mars. The film is about a con artist theater producer and his accountant who scheme to get rich by fraudulently overselling interests in a stage musical purposely designed to fail. They find a script celebrating Adolf Hitler and the Nazis and bring it to the stage. Because of this theme, The Producers was controversial from the start and received mixed reviews. It became a cult film and found a more positive critical reception later.
Samuel Joel "Zero" Mostel was an American actor, comedian, and singer. He is best known for his portrayal of comic characters such as Tevye on stage in Fiddler on the Roof, Pseudolus on stage and on screen in A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, and Max Bialystock in the original film version of Mel Brooks' The Producers (1967). Mostel was a student of Don Richardson, and he used an acting technique based on muscle memory. He was blacklisted during the 1950s; his testimony before the House Un-American Activities Committee was well publicised. Mostel later starred in the Hollywood Blacklist drama film The Front (1976) alongside Woody Allen, for which Mostel was nominated for the British Academy Film Award for Best Supporting Actor.
Teddie Joe Neeley is an American singer, actor, musician, composer, and record producer. He is known for portraying the title role in Jesus Christ Superstar (1973), a role for which he was nominated for two Golden Globe Awards and has reprised numerous times.
Corpus Christi is a 1998 American play by Terrence McNally, written in 1997 and first staged in New York in 1998, dramatizing the story of Jesus and the Apostles, depicting Jesus and the Apostles as gay men living in modern-day Texas. McNally arranges the narrative through anachronisms that represent Roman occupation.
Philip Loeb, was an American stage, film, and television actor, director and author, perhaps best remembered for playing Jake Goldberg in The Goldbergs. He was blacklisted under McCarthyism and committed suicide in response.
Joshua Shelley was one of the actors blacklisted by movie studios as a result of the House Un-American Activities Committee's (HUAC) investigation of the Communist Party in Hollywood in 1952. He did not begin to again work regularly in Hollywood until 1973 when his career restarted.
Barry Dennen was an American actor and writer. He is best known for playing Pontius Pilate on the original recording and later in the film of Jesus Christ Superstar.
Jesus Christ Superstar is a 1970 album musical by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice, on which the 1971 rock opera of the same name was based. Initially unable to get backing for a stage production, the composers released it as an album, the success of which led to stage productions. The album musical is a musical dramatisation of the last week of the life of Jesus Christ, beginning with his entry into Jerusalem and ending with the Crucifixion. It was originally banned by the BBC on grounds of being "sacrilegious". By 1983, the album had sold over seven million copies worldwide.
Jesus Christ Superstar is a 1973 American musical drama film directed by Norman Jewison, and co-written by Jewison and Melvyn Bragg, based on the 1970 concept album of the same name written by Tim Rice and composed by Andrew Lloyd Webber, which in turn inspired a 1971 musical. The film, which stars Ted Neeley, Carl Anderson, Yvonne Elliman and Barry Dennen, depicts the conflict between Judas and Jesus and the emotions and motivations of the main characters during the week of the crucifixion of Jesus.
Tom O'Horgan was an American theater and film director, composer, actor and musician. He is best known for his Broadway work as director of the hit musicals Hair and Jesus Christ Superstar. During his career he sought to achieve a form of "total theater" described by The New York Times as "wittily physical", and which earned him a reputation as the "Busby Berkeley of the acid set".
Robert Franklin Bingham is a retired American actor and singer. Bingham is best known for playing the role of Caiaphas in Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice's rock opera Jesus Christ Superstar in the first USA concert tour, original Broadway cast, original French cast, and in the 1973 film version.
Jason Tam is an actor and dancer, born in Honolulu, Hawaii. He graduated from Punahou School for high school and went to CAP 21 in New York City for musical theatre. His most notable roles include Markko Rivera on the daytime soap opera One Life to Live, Paul in the 2006 revival of the Broadway musical A Chorus Line, the SQUIP in both the Off-Broadway and Broadway run of Be More Chill, of Xander in Lysistrata Jones on Broadway and Shoe on the teen drama Beyond the Break. His other stage performances include Les Misérables on Broadway, She Loves Me at The Guthrie Theatre, West Side Story,Oklahoma!,Footloose the Sacramento Music Circus, and King and I at Casa Manana. He is also a frequent collaborator with musical theatre writer Joe Iconis. In 2014 he joined the original cast of the Tom Kitt and Brian Yorkey collaboration If/Then at the Richard Rodgers Theater as David. He played the role for the entire run of If/Then. He can be heard on the 2014 Broadway’s Carols for a Cure album.
A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum is a 1966 period musical comedy film, directed by Richard Lester, with Zero Mostel and Jack Gilford reprising their stage roles. It also features Buster Keaton in his final screen role; Phil Silvers, for whom the stage musical was originally intended; and regular Lester collaborators Michael Crawford, Michael Hordern, and Roy Kinnear.
William Ellis Porter II is an American actor and singer. Porter gained notice performing on Broadway before starting a solo career as a singer and actor.
Brett Sullivan is a London-based Australian-British filmmaker. Born in Sydney, Australia, 1971, Sullivan formed production company Steam Motion and Sound with Julian Chow in 1996. Steam established a UK office in 2003, and a New York office in 2014 with co-founder Clayton Jacobsen.
Josh Young is an American actor best known for appearing on Broadway in the revival of Jesus Christ Superstar as Judas and Amazing Grace, originating the role of John Newton.
Windy City is a 1984 American drama film written and directed by Armyan Bernstein and starring Kate Capshaw, Josh Mostel and John Shea.
Larry Marshall is an American actor and singer. He is known for his work in musical theatre and film.
Kate Mostel, born Kathryn Harkin (1918-1986) was an American dancer, actress and memoirist.
