Archive for Musicals.Net Musicals.Net |
| mynameisfwad |
Girl Judas...help!I recently got cast as Judas in our rendition of Godspell. I would really like to know more about this character, you know:personality, character traits, costume, relationship with other characters, that sort of thing.Also, I'm a girl, and I need to know if it would be harder to play the part beacause of my gender. Any advice? please! Thank you. :] |
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| what_the_heck013 |
Is Jesus also a female? | ||||||
| mynameisfwad |
no...
he's a male. actually, he's the only male in the whole production. =p |
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| mynameisfwad |
for real, here.
im getting a little nervous. help please!!!!!! Especially on 'All for the Best' |
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| Glissando |
I think it could go either way. I can see the female thing going well, or going badly, so I really can't say. Sorry. 
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| what_the_heck013 |
This won't help you, but I dont like the idea of a male Jesus and a female Judas. I think they both should be male or both female. (When I directed it, they were both female). It may be harder this way because there might be a sort of sexual tension between you two... but then there might not.
ANYWAYS, when I directed a female Judas, we had her be this sort of seductive... Velma Kelly sort of character. Actually, our "All for the Best" was sort of based around Chicago. Except they did it in drag... oh whatever. I don't feel like I'm helping... have you seen the movie? If you haven't been able to figure out personality and relationships by reading the script, the film should help. Do you also play John the Baptist? |
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| Celeste_SM |
I just want to reassure you that I saw a children's production of Godspell with a female Judas and a male Jesus that was just fine. I hesitate to talk to you about your character, because that is your own work to do, and for the director to direct.
You know the story, right? Why do you think Judas followed Jesus? Why do you think he betrayed him? Bring those elements of your understanding to your character. |
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| Hortonhearsawho |
I think whats important here is that you tell us Judas' story , in your own way . how your Judas changes from an ally to an enemy.
is it in the way that you look at jesus, the way you speak to him... do you think that a female Judas changes the relationship at all?? allow your character to interact in a way that tells the audience who you are and what your thinking |
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| mynameisfwad |
thank you guys so much.
we havent even gotten our scripts yet, but when we do, ill try to find out more. :] you guys are awesome...really!!! |
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| Robinflamingo |
Hey, you could also read the source material... 
The Book of Matthew, Chapter 3 |
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| mynameisfwad |
hmmm....that really does help for the John the Baptist scene.
I still don't understand how there can be any sexual tension between me and Jesus... right now we just finished a run through of the play...learning all the songs and whatnot...now we have to act it out. The only thing thats getting on my nerves is that our Jesus can't sing his songs without help and if he's in a bad mood, the energy level of the play instantly goes down. =[ |
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| Matt Rools You |
Not to be offensive, or unaiding, but Godspell is the last place to be looking for character development. The book is awful, the lines are just way to silly to be taken seriously.
For what it's worth, the music is FANTAS! |
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| Robinflamingo |
Hmm. 90% of Act One is verbatim from Matthew. I'm not sure I'm ready to call the source material silly. One of the joys of Godspell is being able to develop your disciple based on the combination of songs and lines that are assigned to you. It's not an awful book - it's a flexible book. And how could the music be fantastic if the book is "awful"? "Hmm. I think I'll write a fantastic song, and surround it with silly lines." I don't think so. At any rate, to the OP: I hope your production goes well, and you fall in love with it. 
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| Matt Rools You |
I'm not trying to say Godspell is a bad show, I like it a lot.
I simply don't see any room for character development. I'm not suggesting the source material is silly. I am saying the way the dialog is presented is silly, and offers itself to easily to hilarity and near-nonsense. And yes! The songs in Godspell are fantastic. The dialog is not. It is possible to have wonderful music and poor dialog (BRKLYN the Musical, for example). |
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| Robinflamingo |
Guess we'll have to agree to disagree. I do not find anything silly and hilarious about the dialog. I find it warm and human. The comedy comes from the character development. The pathos comes from the humanity. The brilliance comes from the Bible. | ||||||
| Matt Rools You |
Godspell would not be the first show I'd want to utilize to teach a young actor the art of character development.
I've thought about this more... all of the characters examples of the clown archetype (minus Jesus). They joke around, but the hidden meaning is deep. That is difficult to accomplish as an actor, let alone accomplishing it well. Every performance of Godspell I have seen has failed to truly present the meaning of the source material without hiding behind the mask of the clown (The film for instance was ridiculous.) |
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| Robinflamingo |
You didn't see our production. You didn't see the professional production I was in in the late 70's. You may have seen bad productions, but I would maintain you didn't see representative productions. I agree 100% that the film is not representative, although I wouldn't go all the way to ridiculous. No one said it should be used to teach character development. In fact, I've often stated, as have many of the people who are regulars in this forum, that it is a deceptively difficult show. If you spend any time reading the production notes for the director, you'll see the same thing. It suffers when people assume it is a clown show, because it is NOT. |
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| Melindaisy |
We will be presenting this show this summer. My husband is directing and has already (auditions will be in April) started working on staging, characters, etc.
So much of the way the parables are presenting is open to interpretation by the director. There are suggestions ("this is what was done in the original"). But very few specifics. Therefore, the impact the show has on the audience will be determined a great deal by how the director sees the show staged and the characters interpreted. The less the director puts into developement of their vision for the show, the less time he or she spends working on these interpretations, the less effective the show will be. Too many people fall back into the clown interpretation because of the film. Schwartz also says that it was never meant to be hippies either. |
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| Monsieur D'Arque |
The best production of Godspell I ever saw was one in which John and Jesus didn't show up at all... the character development was incredible, the plot was truly moving for the first time, and it addressed a series of much more relevant and real questions than the average Godspell...
With Jesus dead and gone (or resurrected), do his teachings still mean anything? Is God still there? What separates the people of today from both God and community? |
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| Matt Rools You |
1) I don't understand why you are getting so frustrated. Your attempt to demean me because I am new to this forum, have less experience in the theater and my age relative to your's is unbecoming. I'm debating with you the merits of the show in a mature manner. I don't appreciate your tone. Of course, I could be overreacting, the internet is guilty of not allowing emotion and inflection into a conversation. 2) You earlier mentioned that the first 1/2 of Godspell is the Gospel of Matthew verbatim. This is not so. The playwright took many liberties, that allow for the hilarity and nonsense tat is so often seen on stage, and passed off as Godspell. 3) I assumed that the OP was in some type of school production, be it at her day school, or weekend acting classes. Based on that I made the statement that Godspell would not be the first production I'd use to teach character development. |
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| Robinflamingo |
I am not frustrated. Nor am I being condescending. This is how I talk and write.  I am defending a show I've been involved with for thirty years. I'm sorry if I'm old and you aren't, but that's the facts.
Even though I'm not a huge fan of the movie, compared to the stage show, here's a Biblical scholar's breakdown of the film - again, not my own. [0 min] Prologue - (Gen 1) [1 min] John the Baptist - (Matt 3:1-12) Prepare ye the way of the Lord [9 min] Baptism of Jesus - (Matt 3:13-17) Save the people [14 min] Fulfil the Law - (Matt 5:17-20) [17 min] Pharisee & Publican - (Luke 18:10-14) [18 min] Settling Disputes - (Matt 5:23-26) [19 min] Unmerciful Servant - (Matt 18:23-35) Day by day [24 min] Eye for Eye - (Matt 5:38-42) [25 min] Sheep and Goats - (Matt 25:31-46) [27 min] Lamp for the Body - (Matt 6:23) [28 min] Two Masters - (Matt 6:24) Turn Back O Man [33 min] Good Samaritan - (Luke 10:30-37) [35 min] Giving Alms - (Matt 6:1-4) [36 min] Rich Man & Lazarus - (Luke 16:19-31) Bless the Lord [42 min] Beatitudes - (Matt 5:3-12) All for the Best [49 min] Love your Enemies - (Matt 5:43-4 
[50 min] Parable of the Sower - (Matt 13:3-8, 18-23) All Good Gifts [53 min] Consider the Lilies - (Matt 6:28-30) [56 min] Prodigal Son - (Luke 15:11-32) [62 min] Ask Seek & Knock - (Matt 7:9-12) [63 min] You are the Light of the World - (Matt 5:13-16) Light of the World [65 min] Question on Authority - (Matt 21:23-27) [66 min] Taxes to Caesar - (Matt 22:15-22) [67 min] Greatest Commandment - (Matt 22:34-40) [67 min] Seven Woes - (Matt 23:1-39) Alas for You By my Side [74 min] Betrayal of Judas - (Matt 26:14-16) Beautiful City [78 min] Last Supper - (Matt 26:17-35) On the Willows [84 min] Gethsemane - (Matt 26:36-46) [85 min] Temptation - (Matt 4:1-11) [86 min] Arrest - (Matt 26:47-56) [88 min] Death - (Matt 27:45-50) [92 min] Burial - (Matt 27:57-61) Long Live God This section of the script notes is the section I was referring to in some of my previous comments: Godspell Script Notes and Revisions by Stephen Schwartz Godspell is a deceptively difficult show to direct. This is primarily because so much of the dramatic action, and virtually the entire action of the first act, is sub-textual. The text of Act One is, after all, essentially just a series of lessons and parables in what appears to be no particular order. And while Act Two essentially follows the Passion story, with such familiar scenes as the interrogation of Jesus by the a Pharisees, the Last Supper, Gethsemene, and so on, it is still interspersed with stories and teachings. So it is easy for the show to appear formless, or worse, for the ten performers to degenerate into ten stand-up comics vying with one another for laughs and attention. This is the diametric opposite of what Godspell is about. Above all, the first act of Godspell must be about the formation of a community. Eight separate individuals, led and guided by Jesus(who is helped by his assistant, John the Baptist/Judas), gradually come to form a communal unit. This happens through the playing of games and the telling and absorption of lessons, and each of the eight individuals has his or her own moment of committing to Jesus and to the community. When Jesus applies clown make-up to their faces after "Save the People," he is having them take on an external physical manifestation that they are his disciples, temporarily separating them from the rest of society. But the internal journey of each character is separate and takes its individual course and period of time. Exactly when and why this moment of commitment occurs is one of the important choices each of the actors must make, in collaboration of course with the director. At the end of the first act, the audience is invited to join the community through the sharing of wine(or grape juice), mingling with the actors during intermission. As for character development, I assumed that was aimed at me, since the OP hasn't been around for weeks  so sorry if that was incorrect.
I'm amazed you think I'm being demeaning or frustrated. Truly. I'm just talkin'. |
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| Matt Rools You |
Well, I guess it's just the impression I got from reading what you typed. | ||||||
| Robinflamingo |
But did I answer your questions? I'm just trying to address the concerns that you have stated. That's why I dug up all that research. It's research I've done over the years that has formed the basis of my analysis and direction of the show. |
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| Matt Rools You |
It still doesn't change my opinion on the dialog. I may not have seen a valid performance of Godspell, but a show that allows for such gross misinterpretation... like I said, I love the music
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