A local Atlanta theater is set to host a play made up of Bible stories. Which would actually be a pretty cool story – except that in this play, all the featured Biblical characters are gay.
“The Most Fabulous Story Ever Told,” is set to premiere on April 27 at the Out Front Theater Company, which only features shows created by people who are “lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender or questioning.”
Apparently, this includes a play introducing Adam and Steve, a gay twist on the Biblical account of Adam and Eve. The play also reportedly features the story of “Jane and Mabel,” clearly a parody of brothers Cain and Abel, along with a lesbian Virgin Mary.
While the LGBTQLMNOP crowd is likely thrilled about the show, which has been around since 1998, the baffled New York Times reports a few folks are clearly less-than-enthused that this Atlanta theater has picked it up.
The main driver of the protest seems to be a conservative Catholic group called America Needs Fatima, which circulated an online petition that has garnered more than 40,000 signatures. The group has protested earlier productions of “The Most Fabulous Story Ever Told,” along with other works it found objectionable, such as 2006’s movie adaptation of “The Da Vinci Code.”
This petition reads: “I vehemently protest your showing the blasphemous play ‘The Most Fabulous Story Ever Told,’ which, among other blasphemies, refers to the Virgin Mary as a lesbian. Please cancel your showing of it.” It also refers to the play as showing a “homosexual version of the Old Testament.”
The owner of the theater, of course, said he has no plans to cancel the show.
Now, seeing as I won’t be frequenting this theater anytime ever, I personally have few qualms with any play housed inside a theater that only features gay productions. If you want to watch a bunch of shirtless men parade around in spangly sandals and rub each other down with fake frankincense in some perversion of the New Testament, be my guest. A silly and embarrassingly unoriginal play doesn’t change who Adam and Eve were, any more than it changes the definitions of “right” and “wrong.”
I would, however, like to point out that if this were anything other than a play written by a gay man taking aim at Christianity – say, an all-white version of Roots, or a Baptist rendition of the life of the Prophet Mohammed – the public/political/media outcry would be deafening. But, thankfully, it’s only Jesus getting smeared here.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to write my own version of Rent, in which all the characters are nuns who don’t whore around.