Passion plays: Tradition, history play roles in religious dramas

By Genna McLaughlin
For the Tribune-Review

People wrapped in green boas bar-hop in celebration of an early St. Patrick's Day against the South Side's church-filled skyline, while the steeple of St. Michael's casts long, forbidding shadows like something out of a Dickens' novel.

Not far away, inside one of the fortlike, turn-of-the-century buildings on the hill, members of Veronica's Veil Players don their own costumes - togas and Roman armor - in preparation for a different tradition: the 83rd season of the Passion play "Veronica's Veil."

Two priests of St. Michael's Parish wrote the play in 1910 as a re-enactment of the Last Supper, Crucifixion and Resurrection of Jesus Christ and the Christian persecutions that followed. It has been performed for the public every Lenten season since 1919.

"Some people literally spend their whole lives here, watching or performing the Passion play every Lent," said Scott Schmitt of Brentwood. Schmitt, an art education student at Carlow College in Oakland, has played Jesus in the production for the last three years. "Some people give up something for Lent. Other people come here."

In the past, the show has drawn busloads of spectators from as far away as Michigan. The 833-seat auditorium, built solely for the production in the early 1900s, has held sold-out crowds many times. This year, the crowds have been small for the 12 productions between Feb. 23 and March 24. For the evening performance on March 16, more people stood on four South Side street corners than sat inside the auditorium.

"Part of me wants to blame Sept. 11 because people don't want to come by bus to Pittsburgh," said Managing Director Dennis Thumpston. "It also could be because Easter is early this year, and it's taking people by surprise."

Dwindling attendance also could be a result of new Passion plays that continue to crop up each year. Locally, more and more churches are adding creative readings of the Passion on Palm Sunday, musical and dance interpretations of the Passion and, in many cases, full dramatic productions similar to "Veronica's Veil."

At Trinity Episcopal in Washington, Pa., Deacon Mark Stevenson has increased the role of the Passion play in the Mass each year. This year, parishioners will assume characters in the story and perform a dramatic reading on the altar. "These texts are part of an oral tradition that we've lost," said Stevenson, an actor and theater professor at Chatham College in Shadyside. "My goal in staging them is to get people to sit and listen to them rather than just read them."

Assembly of God in Monroeville performs the passion-based dramatic musical, "Redemption's Plan" for the public. This year's performances were scheduled 7 p.m. March 29 through today. According to Bill Jenkins, the church's pastor of music and fine arts, the musical brings new people to the church and has resulted in increased membership.

Some congregations have gone even further. The Word of Life Ministries in Greensburg created the Word of Life Drama Team in the 1980s and began performing Passion plays eight years ago. This year, they presented the Passion play for the public six times between March 25 and March 30.

While the Passion is usually the most popular, it's not the only theater performance being offered by area churches. Like Veronica's Veil Players, which performs four non-Biblical productions throughout the year, church drama groups are throwing comedies and musicals into the theatrical mix.

"Everyone will come to a play, it's visual," said Debbie Pina, director of the Word of Life Drama Team. The team performs a mix of three dramas and comedies each year. "I'm sure that there are people who have never entered a church who come to see our productions."

Jenkins estimates that the three annual musicals, including the Easter musical, have attracted more than 50 percent of the Assembly of God's 1,150 members.

Whatever the motivation, churches are once again embracing drama - a mere 400 years after they cast it out.

Monasteries in France introduced drama to western civilization during the Middle Ages. In fact, the first known formal drama in the west was an Easter trope performed by three monks as part of the liturgy in 925. England's great mystery cycles, re-enactments of the entire Bible by village theater groups, grew and prospered until 1600.

"When the church ceased being the focal point of western civilization, the mystery cycles lost importance and died out," said Stevenson.

England's Henry VIII discouraged the theatrical mysteries following his divorce and separation from the church. And the Catholic Church itself struck the final blow at the Council of Trent when it called for an end to productions of religious plays because they were considered secular and anti-clerical.

But the Passion, the central event of the Bible, never died out completely. In Oberammergau, Germany, the world's most famous Passion play has been performed every decade since 1634. At the millennium performances from May to October 2000, more than half a million people traveled to the small village to watch the six-hour play.

The Oberammergau play has inspired others. In 1951, Brazil began its own Passion play in New Jerusalem, the world's largest outdoor theater built specifically for the play. Unlike in Oberammergau where the townspeople play all 1,855 parts, popular actors from around the country star in the Brazilian production which draws 60,000 spectators during the week leading up to Easter. The Oberammergau production also inspired the priests of St. Michael's Parish.

According to Stevenson, it's fitting that the Passion should be the impetus for a revival of theater in the church. "It was the turning point of history. It's the most powerful story in the Bible, and I think Lent is a great time to begin incorporating liturgical drama into your services."

It doesn't hurt that the Passion has all the ingredients of an Oscar contender: love, betrayal, forgiveness and the triumph of good over evil. When Andrew Lloyd Weber and Tim Rice released their modern rock rendition of the story in the early 1970s, it topped U.S. charts. The play that followed, "Jesus Christ Superstar," became the longest-running musical in the history of British Theater.

Today theater companies all over the world perform "Jesus Christ Superstar," despite the criticism it continues to draw from the church for taking too much liberty with the Bible. In 1971, Carnegie Mellon University graduate Stephen Schwartz put music to Matthew's telling of the Passion to create "Godspell," another version that appealed to the mainstream.

"I've directed both 'Godspell' and 'Jesus Christ Superstar' once in my 20 years at Chatham," said Stevenson. "For both shows, we had to turn hundreds of people away."

Stevenson said that as a Christian, he doesn't consider "Jesus Christ Superstar" a true telling of the Passion of Christ. But, there are creative versions like "Godspell" and the "Cotton Patch Gospels" which are biblically accurate and entertaining.

"People were very upset with me when Chatham presented 'Cotton Patch Gospels' because it was a comedy. For me, it's a comedy; it's a musical, but it's very true. As long as it's based on the truths in the Bible," he said. "As long as you don't lose sight of the fact that it's a historical reality."

The reality for Thumpston, Schmitt and the rest of the Veronica's Veil Players is about making ends meet.

The $6 to $10 admission price for "Veronica's Veil" helps to cover the production costs and the maintenance of the theater. If there's anything left over, it's used by the Prince of Peace Parish which consolidated with St. Michael's in 1992.

"We keep production costs low, but it's hard with such a big, old building," Thumpston said. "There's always something that needs to be repaired, and repairs are costly."

Schmitt is reminded every night as he leaves the theater. "There's an apartment building to our left and a closed church (St. Michael's) in front of us. It makes you think."