by Tom Gallagher
Jesus seems to be everywhere these days, except in the Republicans federal budget proposal. According to a marketer for Christian-theme performances, "Broadway is having a faith moment."
The New York Times reports on this story.
But what many of these productions lack are ticket-buying multitudes who identify themselves as people of faith, a group rarely courted by Broadway producers offering the sort of focused advertising campaigns that turned movies like "The Passion of the Christ" and "The Blind Side" into unexpected hits.
Tom Allen is working to change that. A partner in Allied Faith & Family, a Hollywood marketing firm that aims to attract churchgoers to movies and now theater, Mr. Allen has spent the past 18 months breaking into the cloistered world of Broadway.
He has worked with "Memphis," "Sister Act" and "Leap of Faith" to draw coverage from Christian news media and to create study guides for the shows -- annotated with Bible passages -- to leave at parish halls. He has suggested script changes to appeal to the devout. (His request that "goddamned" be cut from "Leap of Faith" was denied.) And he has displayed a preacher's touch at postshow receptions with religious theatergoers, like a recent one at Sardi's where he mingled among a dozen priests and ministers he brought to see "Leap of Faith," about a con-man evangelist whose latest scheme leads to a change of heart.
"Broadway is having its first faith moment," Mr. Allen said repeatedly to his guests, and many of them concurred. Never before, they said, had Judeo-Christian messages dominated the theater capital: overtly in "Leap of Faith," "Jesus Christ Superstar,""Sister Act" and "Godspell," and more subtly in shows with redemption themes like"Memphis," "The Lion King," "The Gershwins' Porgy and Bess," "Spider-Man: Turn off the Dark" and even the profanity-laden "Book of Mormon."
