| Jerry Springer - The Opera | Milton Keynes Theatre 18 – 22 April 2006 Mon – Thur eves 7.30pm Fri & Sat 5.30pm & 8.30pm Wed 2.30pm The show is NOT suitable for children. RICHARD THOMAS Prior to Jerry Springer – The Opera, Richard Thomas wrote and produced Kombat Opera’s Tourette’s Diva. Richard’s television and theatre credits include Musical Director on The Frank Skinner Show (Series 3 on BBC1, Series 4, 5 & 6 on ITV1), This Morning With Richard Not Judy (Series 1 & 2 on BBC2), and Harry Hill’s sell-out national tour. He also composed and performed music for Attention Scum (BBC2), which was nominated for The Golden Rose of Montreux 2001. Richard Thomas has been involved in several Edinburgh Fringe Festival shows including Perrier Award nominated The League Against Tedium, Beethoven’s Not Dead, Legends on the Edge of the Millenium, Arthur Smith’s Hamlet, Cluub Zarathustra and The Tom Miles Quartet. |
A controversial production of Jerry Springer The Opera has opened in Milton Keynes as part of a nationwide tour.  | | Reverend Phil Hill |
The musical, which has won countless awards, is one of the most talked about in British theatrical history. It has been denounced as "a filthy piece of blasphemy" by some Christian groups, who claim that the production mocks God and Jesus Christ and contains 8,000 swear words, a total reached by adding every swear word sung by each member of the 27-strong chorus. On the opening night in Milton Keynes, many members of local Christian groups held a vigil outside the town's theatre. Worshippers from the Hockliffe Street Baptist Church in Leighton Buzzard were joined by members of the Salvation Army and people from charismatic and evangelical churches from across Milton Keynes and Bedfordshire to sing and pray for half an hour before curtain up. They also handed out leaflets to the audience entering the theatre, explaining their objections. Praise The Reverend Phil Hill from Leighton Buzzard Baptist Church explained what they were trying to do.  | | Protests outside Milton Keynes Theatre |
"We wanted to praise Jesus Christ, we don't want to protest and be negative we want to be positive" he said. "We want to tell this community that Jesus Christ is worth praising, worshipping and serving. "We think it [the show] is disgraceful and deeply offensive to Christians but we want to get the positive message across, not the negative message. They [the audience] are going to go in and hear what is not the truth about Jesus, we want to tell them what the truth is." One of the main criticisms levelled at the Christian protesters is that they are protesting without having seen the show. But Reverend Hill said that he had done his homework. "I saw some of it on television, as much as I could possibly stand. I got to the second act and then I thought enough's enough" he revealed.  | | Protests outside Milton Keynes Theatre |
"And I've read the script to double check that I didn't make any mistakes on the interpretation of it. It's like if this show insulted my wife, I'd want to stand up here and say my wife is a better person than this. "Frankly I don't see how any decent person can sit through the first act with all those hundreds of foul words" he continued. "But I agree that that's the society we live in and as a satire on Jerry Springer I think it's fair game. But the depths to which it sinks over God and Jesus and Mary is just so foul that not to stand up here I feel would be a failure." Target  | | Protests outside Milton Keynes Theatre |
He also said that he felt that the Christian religion was perceived as an easy target. "I think that because of our history of tolerance we're seen as a soft target" he said. "My suspicion is that quite a lot of people who think I can't be that offensive will see it and will realise just how vile and gratuitous the offensiveness is."  | | Protests outside Milton Keynes Theatre |
Meanwhile, Terry Sanderson from the National Secular Society said that religion must be open to criticism.
"Any ideology, whether political or religious has got to be open to debate to satire, mockery even because that's the only way we can keep our democracy going by examining ideas" he explained. "Once ideas are off limits and you can't talk about them with anything other than utter respect then the whole of democracy goes out of the window." | 
