Godspell

Sincere but misguided, The Fantastiks meets Bozo meets St. Matthew. The familiar story is retold in the simplest of terms, casting Jesus (Garber, in sweatshirt and overalls) as a modern-day flower child living and dying in the Big Apple. When it's good, GODSPELL is filled with energy, fun, and zip; when it's bad, which more often is the case, it's juvenile. The worst part of the production is the over-the-top mugging that director Greene allows--as if Jerry Lewis were interpreting the New Testament. Schwartz's score is often repetitious, and the picture, filled with famous Manhattan backdrops, looks more like a rock 'n' roll travelogue of New York than anyth...