Last night I saw The Ten Commandments: The Musical performed by The Chicago Gay Men’s Chorus. First let me say that it was a bit disconcerting at first to see Moses parodied given that I grew up watching Charleton Heston playing Moses in the epic movie every Easter season on TV. But I also grew up watching Monty Python’s Flying Circus poke fun at all things holy as well, so this discomfort was very short lived and I found myself laughing at a very witty show. I was at the show because my wife works with Jonathan Verge who played Dathan and nearly stole the show with his great stage presence and expressive performances.
So I enjoyed the show, but I also enjoyed a chance to see and mingle with people that are far too often villified in U.S. society, namely Gays and Lesbians who made up (judging by the pairs at least) a good portion of the audience. I could see for myself that they’re just ordinary people like me and we were all out to have a good time. Yeah, this should be obvious, but if that is so, then why do we have so much trouble with it? As for the cast, they were a rainbow of size, shapes and colors. Aside from Jon, my favorite performers were George B. Smart as Moses, Jeremy Hilborn as The Burning Bush, and Will White as Nefretiri. The Plague Balladeers were good too. Some of the show’s humor does depend on the fact that many of the performers are gay, which I felt was signal to the audience that it was okay to acknowledge the fact that most of the performers were gay. I think this was as liberating for the audience as for the performers themselves!