The Canadian Badlands Passion Play
Continues July 14, 15, 16
Passion Play site, Drumheller
Review by Melanie Little
Devotional theatre, for all its Sunday-school associations, is a vital link in the development of western theatre. Morality plays and passion plays--the latter detailing the life of Christ, usually from the last supper to the resurrection--emerged in early medieval Europe and, despite their ties to the church, were actually some of the earliest and most enduring forms of popular art. They took drama out of the castle and into the streets, where Jesus was just as likely to be played by the local butcher than by a courtier or a priest.
It was in an admittedly secular spirit of curiosity that I made my way to Drumheller to witness this year’s first performance of the Canadian Badlands Passion Play. I was interested in the show as theatre. A production with an almost entirely amateur cast; a performance in an outdoor theatre holding over 2500 people; a story familiar to most of the audience, if only by sheer osmosis--would it work? Could it hold the audience’s attention, and the interest of non-believers like me?
The production is by no means perfect. Some of nearly 150 non-professional actors do more than their share of mugging, and the script is uneven, prone to occasional bits of anachronistic moralizing about things like "commerce" and "spirituality." Overall, however, it’s a profoundly moving entertainment which uses its very substantial strengths to great advantage.
The most obvious of these strengths is, of course, the landscape. I doubt there’s another place on earth that’s more perfectly suited to a passion play. The badlands uncannily evoke the stark, dramatic countryside around Jerusalem. The play is performed on a broad stage in a dramatic canyon, and the surrounding hills are perfect for providing hiding places for offstage actors and effecting dramatic entrances. The ampitheatre-style seating seamlessly echoes the layered sediment of the facing coulees, and culminates in a raised section for a two-hundred-person choir that floats behind the audience like a heavenly host.
Best of all, the company, which has been presenting the passion for thirteen years, makes excellent use of these gifts. The staging is full of texture and movement, and the frequent audience cries of "look over there!" attest to how much is going on. The direction of the many crowd scenes, too, is first-rate. The crowd ebbs and flows like a character in itself, and the actors as a group perform a pair of stunning but low-tech special effects that would make Robert Lepage weep with envy.
The company’s stated aim is to stay true to the historical period of Jesus’s life --hence the heavily researched period costumes and instruments, as well as the lack of modern pyrotechnics in the effects. This is a significant departure from the medieval passion plays, which almost boastfully employed the latest technologies (a late-medieval bolt of thunder, for example, might have been signalled by a shot from a gun). The whole Badlands style of staging, in fact, is much more realistic than that of its forebears. While I missed the garish hellmouth that’s usually a standard in these plays, I understood the Badlanders’ decision to opt for a less iconographic, more naturalistic style. Not only is it appropriate for the natural setting; it’s much less puzzling to contemporary audiences. When Jesus casts out a demon in the Drumheller play, the afflicted person simply changes from raving blasphemer to quiet, grateful follower. Somewhat less fun than snake carcasses coming out of mouths and devils with ostrich-feather wings, perhaps, but effective nonetheless.
Much of the credit here must go to the two professional actors in the cast, Nathan Schmidt as Jesus and Tim Hildebrand as the narrator, the apostle Matthew. Schmidt’s Jesus is magnetic and believable, and fittingly carries the play’s reliance on the Christian paradox of kingliness-in-humility on his back. As the narrator, Hildebrand’s Matthew provides a vital link to the audience. A prologue which borrows liberally from both the style and content of Shakespeare’s prologue for Henry V ("We ordinary folk of this valley have dared, on this unworthy sandstone stage, to bring forth the greatest story ever told…") might have rankled as overly derivative and linguistically anachronistic but for Hildebrand’s winning delivery. And his character’s transformation from despised tax collector to devoted, beloved apostle is one of the real flashpoints of emotion in the play.
Over eight hundred volunteers contribute over seventy-two hours annually to the Badlands Passion Play. "Labour of love" is a cliché I normally despise, but few events in this province are more deserving of the phrase. The play is heading into its second and final summer weekend; if you’re jaded by the hedonism of the Stampede, head to Drumheller for a cleansing of the palate, if not the soul. |
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