Jesus Christ! Superstar Sir Andrew fails to turn up

MUMBAI, MARCH 9: Before the magic and the music came the preparation. At Bandra's St Andrew's auditorium the spot lights speckled the stag...

MUMBAI, MARCH 9: Before the magic and the music came the preparation. At Bandra’s St Andrew’s auditorium the spot lights speckled the stage and the seats, sound was checked and re-checked, an actor sat on the stairs outside belting out his lines with a walkman on to block out the world while another practised walking across a shadowed stage with a candelabra in hand.

Adrenaline was running high, for the cast and crew of Jesus Christ Superstar were expecting a very special guest indeed-Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber, the man behind the script and score of the original play.

But when the curtain scrolled up and the music softened to let in the voice of a disillusioned Judas Iscariot, the reserved seat was empty and remained so throughout the performance. Sir Andrew who is staying at the Taj Mahal Hotel had apparently overslept and could not make the journey from Colaba to Bandra on time.

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What was most galling was that there was no word either. After the welcoming announcement in some of the newspapers today the non-appearance of the composer was a crushing disappointment for the JCS production team.

Expressing his disappointment director Rahul DaCunha said that had Sir Andrew turned up it would have ben a great day for his team.

However, Charlotte Lester of Good Relations, the public relations firm handling his visit, denied that Webber had committed to watch the performance. “He had said that if he was free, he would drop in. But by this morning, he was exhausted because of the busy schedule. Besides, he had to catch up with people involved in the project, Bombay Dreams, for which he is here. The drive from the Taj to Bandra was too tiring anyway, so he could not make it,” she adds. Webber is in the city to work out the modalities of the joint project on Bollywood which he is working on with A R Rahman and Shekhar Kapur.

DaCunha, however, said that they had only gone ahead with the advertisment after receiving a committment from Webber, even though the performance for the Children of Cathedral School was planned even before he came to India. “We were really expecting him. We tried our best too. But, it seems, he is leaving a day before schedule. As a result, all his meetings had to be packed in. I was really looking forward to his comments,” he said.

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